GoldenPlec are thrilled to bring you the new Overhead, the Albatross single and video - Big River Man. Enjoy.

We also sat down for a chat with Luke Daly, director and guitarist in O,TA, and we talked a little bit more about the video above.


 

What was the idea behind the video?

"The idea was to simply try and make an eight-minute instrumental performance video interesting. I've only directed a few performance videos before, most of the music videos I have directed have been narrative based so this was something new for me. As this was the first official video we have done for an album track we wanted to try and capture what we are like live but also try and keep the video as original and fun as possible.

We sat down and came up with the idea of having the video set up more like a play than a typical band performance with each section having a different feel. We wanted each section to flow into one another, the problem with doing this was that we had no idea if the style would work until we got it back to the edit, but when you have my boss 'Buckfast Murphy', aka James, at the helm of any edit you can always be confident that the video will reach it's full potential.

Every play needs a stage so we decided to film it in the Axis Theatre in Ballymun who were unbelievably accommodating - it's an amazing facility."

 

Did you have the idea for a while?

"I suppose we came up with the idea in the studio about two months ago and it was finalised in Conor Biddle's (lighting designer) car on the way to a gig."

 

Who did you work with on the project to make the idea a reality?

"Whenever I or one of the other members of Bold Puppy come up with an idea we get together and then try to figure out how to make it a reality. I suppose that's the fun part, trying to figure out how to realise a vision that you have conceived when you were probably under the influence. Once we have figured out how it can be done we get Joe who is also in the band to organise/produce everything, he is particularly adept at this.

When it comes to logistics and finding things, he reminds me of a direct cross between Del Boy from 'Only Fools and Horses' and Uma Thurman's character from 'Kill Bill'. The man who really brought it to life though was the lighting designer Conor Biddle - when the truck of lights turned up I think we all got a bit of a shock, no room for subtlety here."

 

What is one of the elements we should look out for?

"I guess the last shot was the toughest to get right but I think my favourite is the shot with Daniel Lang (Red Enemy) and Cian Hanley (Pockets) playing the ladder and Anthony McMahon (Sails) going nuts with the shakers."

 

Was there anything else we should know about?

"I'm a vigilante in my spare time, but I'm quite busy so that side of my life is sort of quiet. I'm also a pacifist but I still find time to get out on the gun range, empty a few hundred clips into pictures of local cats."

 

Did you face any challenges during the making of the video?

"The biggest challenge we had was getting the last shot right. One of my favourite things to do is to make the cinematographer I work with Kevin Minogue's life as hard as possible, luckily he never runs from a challenge. The last shot was a three and a half minute single take that involved 19 musicians, all entering at different times, from different places and it all had to be co-ordinated and timed to perfection.

I don't think we got it perfect but we encountered a lot of technical issues during it which meant we only had time for a few attempts. I think had we had a couple more hours we could have nailed it, but I guess you will always have the same complaint when you are creating something. One of the biggest challenges for me personally was making sure the other five members in the band were happy with the final product."