Music

I was flipping through tv channels this morning and came across a good portion of Feist’s new music video for “How Come You Never Go There.”

Some of it was absolutely fresh and captivating, so I went online to watch the whole thing. The black and white cinematography, Feist’s crazy, mysterious curly long hair, (she looks amazing in it too – when you finally get to see her – more on that in a minute) the dramatic natural forest setting, a beautiful cloud sky shot, but something was not quite right with it either. It’s too bad, because a few tweaks would have made this a classic!

I’ve been working on a couple videos of late for work (which I’ve really been enjoying) and I feel it’s sharpened my critical eye. So below I’ve put in some critical feedback on the video…

Please watch the music video and check out some of my suggestions (right below it). Find out if you agree with my thoughts.

As promised, here are a couple suggestions I have for the video if they were to re-do it.

First, a few things I really like about it:

• black and white
• forest scene (day and night)
• smoke
• some wind
• cool hair (didn’t have to be that long though i don’t think)
• sky shot (could have been another, even)
• feist looks amazing (up close)
• emily carr in the forest vibe

What I think could be improved:

• Need to see Feist’s face more in general, and a bit more in particular at the start. At .23 seconds, you should see a glimpse of her face here! Were they trying to be intriguing hiding her like that? I don’t feel it worked, it’s  awkward and you should show a little profile so people know who’s song it is…she’s a star! In fact, you barely see her face in the first whole minute of the song. That’s crazy I think, and you should have her signing at least one of the lines in the first minute as well….they wait too long and show her, and then almost too much (mostly getting blown around) at the end of the video.

• .55-58 should again see at least a bit of her, and ideally singing a verse here…instead she ends up looking too witch-like, not like an artistic, reflective, lonely creature

• 1.38 again is too witch-like – switch up the forest setting (new location)!

• 2.12-2.17 is phenomenal and could be repeated like 3 times and it’s still be fun to watch…so why not at least once more! could have been a daytime version of that move as well perhaps?

• 2.25-2.37 could be totally removed. this spot looks really run down after a full day shooting – pick a new untrampled on spop + the wind also starts to get way to extreme here, looks really cold and awkward for here. some cool forest night setting stuff would have been great. a rock, a waterfall, even a quick shot of a frog or an owl or hawk or some creature…

What do you think about the video, or about her new song/cd? Please comment here >>

Listen to the new Feist Album on iTunes >>

I was watching some clips on Conan O’brien’s new show’s website teamcoco.com (conan rocks!) and noticed that Diet Coke was a major sponsor. Diet Coke’s intro commercial on one of the videos featured a clip of a song that sounded really cool. I took a second to look it up on google and found that the band “The Temper Trap” not only had a great song, but a sweet video too….I love the triangles spinning and the galaxy feel in this video. Enjoy!

I’ve heard this song “Rose Garden” a couple times on CBC Radio 2 and had to go find it online…very catchy stuff, cool that he’s Canadian too – raised in London, ON. More info on SHAD here >>

I’m feeling this song today and thought I’d share it! If you listen to it, be sure to listen till the end. There’s a cool chanty dance beat at 4:09.

I find myself quite often looking for good yoga-type music and this is a good example of what I’m looking for. YouTube has some decent meditation/yoga songs, but there’s a lot not so great stuff too. Hit and miss. I’m probably going to end up buying some music on iTunes or at the music store, but I’m also on the hunt to put together a good YouTube playlist too… Enjoy!

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