Interactive, Web-based Music Video for 3 Dreams of Black

Remember the Arcade Fire Google Chrome Video that I talked about a few months ago? It utilized the new HTML 5 standard and combined it with google maps - to create a personalized music video based on your location. Very neat stuff.

Today's post is something that further pushes the envelope with "web-based" music videos...and it's really awesome (it's brought together by Chris Milk, the same people who did the Arcade Fire vid).

"3 Dreams of Black" is a track from the concept album "ROME" by Danger Mouse and Daniele Luppi. The album features Norah Jones and Jack White and will be released some time in the near future. In the mean time, they've released a really neat promo video that is designed specifically for viewing through a web browser. In fact, much like the Arcade Fire video, you can ONLY watch it online, using google chrome. But boy is it cool.

It's so interactive that it feels like a video game - you can change the view point, and guide the animals as they morph and interact with the environment. In fact in many ways it's closer to a video game, because many of the elements are rendered live (if you don't know what that means, it just means your computer is actually creating each frame, instead of just playing each frame).

What's more, you can also create your own animals/creatures to appear - and some of them will even automatically appear in other people's viewing experience. It's not just interactive, it also connects viewers to each other!

See the actual video at www.ro.me

See the behind the scenes video here:


What do you think?

Interactive, Personalized Music Video by Arcade Fire

I don't know how I completely missed this until now, but better late then never!

The new music video - although calling it that doesn't really describe everything that's going on in it - by Arcade Fire is one heck of an interesting experiment. It's a joint project between them and google. "...google? Google made videos?"

...well, not exactly. This is where it gets interesting.

Instead of a normal video, it's an interactive experience that combines traditional music videos, google maps, your own text input, mouse movements, and browser technology. Using a specific video clip as the basis, it uses the ability to place different sized browser windows to create a seamless experience that is custom made to each person.  By adding a location - and google streetview's photos of that area - the video renders 3D images of your address, while adding 3D animations over it.  At the same time, the multiple windows create a split screen (split several different ways) viewing experience that jumps between the windows, rendering different things. It's really quite neat, not just as a music video but as an internet browsing experience. Indeed, it's a refreshing and surprising way to enjoy the internet itself. This really changes the concept of the music video.

But really, this won't make any sense unless you see it yourself. To see it properly, you'll need to download google chrome.

So go see The Wilderness Downtown - An interactive film by Chris Milk, featuring "We Used to Wait" by The Arcade Fire.

To learn more about this project, and how it's done, go here.

A Webcam Based Music Video

Here's something that I some how completely missed for the past few months. But who cares, I'm not Digg and I don't always have to be about new things. Right?

Right.

So, this is a really fun music video by a Japanese artist/band "Sour". From my understanding, at one time the frontman was also based in New York. It's a video made by collaborating with the fans of the band and their webcams. It starts off as a montage of a few webcam shots of people lipsyncing to the video, but you'll be pleasantly surprised by the cutting/editing work as it progresses.

I love how the proliferation of media equipement - like webcams - makes this sort of thing possible. ...and the way the fans are included! What a great way of reaching out to their fanbase.

Also, musically I am really quite surprised by the bridge part: Check out the arrangement and the solo starting at 2:18. Very different for this kind of music. He just distorted a classical guitar and shredded it! and it doesn't sound out of place. Very very cool.

日々の音色 (Hibi no neiro) - by Sour.
Also, Check out their website here.

How Music Works

...okay, so maybe the title of this blog entry is a little misleading: after all, we can't say we've figured out everything about music. Nonetheless, there's a 4 part documentary whose title is exactly that. It's a really good documentary, even if you already know all of the things it talks about. The presentation is simple and effective, all the while explaining a range of musical theory and historical anecdotes. Really great stuff. Obviously, it's a very Western centric view of music, but it seems to understand that.

The first part is melody, and it tracks the development of melodies and song structures over the centuries. It covers topics like the pentatonic scale, which is a scale found in almost every single culture. Neat stuff.



The second part is rhythm, and it introduces some basic time signature differences, and how rhythm shapes music.



The third part is harmony, and it explores the development of harmony, and what makes it sound good to us.



The fourth part is bass, and it shows how the idea of a bass instrument is relatively new, and how it plays a prominent role in modern music.



An important note! These videos are hosted on what looks like a Russian youtube-like site. I think they limit the bandwidth of each video some how, so sometimes not all the videos will load. Don't worry! Come back and try it again in a few hours, or on another day. It should work eventually.

A Music Video I Always Recommend

There's one music video that I always recommend to people regardless of their musical preference. It's because the story/concept in the video is good enough that the video stands on it's own (that being said, the music obviously is important in the pacing etc, and the song is also one of my favourites).

It won't make much sense until you watch the whole thing though, so be patient if it's not the sort of thing you usually listen to!

Radiohead - Just

Radiohead - Just
by steveo_russianspy

Not Only Is This One Continuous Shot, It's Also A Live Recording!

I've lately been playing a couple music videos over and over again. It's pretty neat that both of these were introduced to me very recently, yet they happen to share a really rare quality/achievement in music videos:

1. It's one continuous shot. From start to finish, the whole thing is done with one camera, one take. Neat stuff. The earliest version of this (as far as I know) is with Bob Dylan's "Subterranean Homesick Blues" (but it's actually just a part of a documentary film). Since then, it's been done by U2, Feist, to Miley Cyrus...so it's not as rare as you might think.

However, the 2 videos I've been obsessed with also have this...

2. The actual music is being recorded/performed live as the tape is rolling. Music videos are always lip synced, and the audio itself is previously recorded in a proper studio... which is why when you hear the album version, it sounds exactly like the music video. These two gems however, decided to record the audio live as well! So not only are they performing to the camera in one take, the artists must also perform the music correctly. It really feels "raw" and personalized...and I find the musicianship that is required to pull this off to be extremely impressive.

Anyways! 2 genres, 2 indie artists, 2 videos with one shot, with live audio. Enjoy!

Stop Motion Bed Sheets? A Neat Video Concept.

This one is pretty neat. The song itself is pretty good, but today's entry is all about the video. It's a cool concept: A stop motion video, but all on a bed! You'll see what I mean:

Her Morning Elegance, by Oren Lavie.
To check out other music videos that are a little different, click on the "music video" label on the bottom of this page, or to the right.