Last Friday I shared the first "home" video I've done in years... with an upgrade.
My brother Aaron has the best taste in music so whenever he joins me in the van he's always in charge of the playlist. I love everything he puts on but some artists really stick with me and Emma Ruth Rundle is one of those. Her amazing album Engine of Hell had just come out when I discovered her but the album I love the most is Marked for Death. It ends with the saddest, most beautiful song Real Big Sky which is about death (my favourite subject).
Recently I decided I wanted to record something for myself. I've just come off tour with Crimson Veil and this year has mostly been about practice (I play electric cello in the band) and performing. I felt like I've had very little time and space to just sit and be creative so when I came back home for a while I carved out a window of time to make this cover. I started with a string arrangement for the chorus which I fell in love with and spent the next couple of weeks working on the track. I struggled initially with the vocal performance but after a bit of work it just clicked for me. It's also the first time in a while that I've produced my own track - recently I've been feeling like I want to be fully in control of this process from start to finish.
Real Big Sky is a great song and I wanted to do it justice by producing a proper video for my cover. I asked my good friend and collaborator Arron West if he was up for making a video in my garden and we got lucky with the one day of British Summer. My cat Sam insisted on being in the video even though he can only sit still for so long before he attacks you... but we managed to make it work. (We will be sharing the takes that didn't work on Instagram so if you want to see him hanging off my arm by his teeth, just follow me.) I'm so grateful to Arron for making the journey to my place in Ashdown Forest and working so hard on this video. I really love what we've done with it and I hope you do too.
Here is a small video diary I made of my recording process:
If you're not subscribed to my YouTube channel please join us here and let me know what you think of the video. I hope that this is the first of more "home" videos to come soon.
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