MUSIC VIDEOS
“HAPPILY” Music Video
Happily the music video is about the challenges of making an album in the same small space that you reside in. Happily will be one of the 9 new songs on the album HINDSIGHT, set to release on January 8th, 2021.
It was fun and easy to shoot- being at my house- and the film clip idea was born while I was having a conversation with Jack Tully (incredible musician) about how ridiculous it is sometimes trying desperately to fit your music in around your life!
The actual song fell into place more effortlessly than any other song on the album. and strangely I didn’t agonise over this one at all, which is rare for me. The lyrics talk about how there’s no point stressing, even when things seem like a real mission, because things usually work out well. I love to give advice in my songs that I don’t really follow in real life.
“HAPPILY” Music Video
Happily the music video is about the challenges of making an album in the same small space that you reside in. Happily will be one of the 9 new songs on the album HINDSIGHT, set to release on January 8th, 2021.
It was fun and easy to shoot- being at my house- and the film clip idea was born while I was having a conversation with Jack Tully (incredible musician) about how ridiculous it is sometimes trying desperately to fit your music in around your life!
The actual song fell into place more effortlessly than any other song on the album. and strangely I didn’t agonise over this one at all, which is rare for me. The lyrics talk about how there’s no point stressing, even when things seem like a real mission, because things usually work out well. I love to give advice in my songs that I don’t really follow in real life.
“SEA OF DREAMS” Music video
Released 01/12/2019, this was a seemingly never-ending project. Being my first music video, putting it together was a bit of a learning curve but also a very fun journey involving a lot of help from my legend friends.
The story follows a struggling musician who finally gets asked to play a gig and heads off on a huge mission with his old vintage keyboard to get there on time, only to be quite disappointed when he arrives to the venue.
It is about being committed to the things you love and always trying to see the silver lining in things.
“DON’T FORGET YOUR SHOES” Music video
This is a short mini-video to accompany the single “DON'T FORGET YOUR SHOES”, released 01/10/2020. The film clip follows a young heart throb trying to move on from a love but constantly being reminded about it in different ways.
It is filmed around the beautiful Broken Head point and in an old farmhouse there that has a huge amount of memories for myself and our group of friends.
The same house also appears in SEA OF DREAMS and in JACK TULLY’S film clip - “The Great Tragedy”, (which is an awsome song.)
CLIPS FROM MAKING THE MUSIC
“SEA OF DREAMS” Making of video
Here are some clips from the making of the jman & the pigs music video "SEA OF DREAMS".
When we were filming the boat-in-the-organ-scene, a wave hit me and I lost my hat (that I had picked up at a Byron Bay op shop). It turned out this hat with the blue beak and red sides and the big W on the front was impossible to find anywhere. It was a complete enigma - I had to eventually order one the same colours and draw the logo on the front. This process delayed filming by a year believe it or not which was absolute torture.
The one man who comes to watch the gig at the end and then flies in the clouds is Terry Hannon.
Terry (“The Tez”) is a bit of a local legend in Byron Bay and claims to have invented the notion of Surf Schools where you put people in a bus and take them on a half day adventure to a beach and teach them to surf. He is one of the most classic and charasmatic people I’ve ever known!
BUILDING THE LIVE SET UP
Putting together the live set up for "jman and the pigs" is a never ending process. It has gone through many incarnations but it has always has the 1967 Kawai organ at the centre, (both as the central sound but also physically to hold everything else up!) It took so long to make the set up more ergonomic and intuitive but it’s still a head twister and has regularly let me down mid-gig. The end of the vid features my great freind Rod who will always give positive feedback, even if it sounds like somebody drowning in a toilet… a true friend and legend.
“DON’T FORGET YOUR SHOES” Making of song
DFS was released 01/10/2020. Recording drums for this song was tough as i didn't know how i wanted them to sound when i started recording! It was just trial and error. After a lot of mind changing I finally got them to wherhow I wanted them to sound. I think.
the original version actually had the sound of an electronic drum kit, which definitely had something nice about it, but in the end I decided it just sounded like it needed to be more lively and less contained, so I re-recorded the drums in our living room at Broken Head about 3 years after originally recording the rest of the song and those electronic drums.
It’s crazy how long a song can just sit around unfinished for- torture!
“DFS” Making of the Music Video
Putting the scenes together with Woby (Todd Clare) and Joe Butler was a lot of fun, and kind of a little goodbye project as I knew I was leaving Byron Bay for a while to move to Canada where my girlfriend Marie-Eve lives.
They have known each other since they were kids so they have this funny brother kind of dynamic. Todd is an awsome photographer and Joey is a mind blowingly talented musician. He plays guitar and sings with kind of a similar style to Nick Drake.