The glamour of filming music videos (guest post)

Welcome to the third guest post to feature during my bubby bloggy break.

We’ve heard from two fabulous bloggers so far, so this week I’m changing things up a bit, with a post from my friend, and talented musician, Ken Seto.

He’ll be embarrassed by that description (the ‘talented’ bit, hopefully not the ‘friend’ bit), but it’s not a debatable topic. It’s fact.

Ken and I have known each other since we were six years old (so not that long for us spring chickens, really… ahem). I’m not going to pretend we were besties straight away – I was far too afraid of catching boy germs. But we went to the same schools. We both played the piano, and found ourselves competing in the same events at the local Eisteddfod year after year (after year, until, in later years, we were pretty much the only two left competing!).

Ken has always been an amazing musician. He was the yardstick against which I measured myself (and generally came up short). With dexterous fingers that could pluck major tenths from the keyboard with ease, a strong voice, perfect pitch, and a knack with impromptu harmonies, there was no doubt he’d continue with musical pursuits beyond school. And succeed.

Don’t tell him I said all that, though. He’ll get embarrassed again.

Here’s his tale of recording his first video clip for the song ‘Repeat’ with his band Wantaways.

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Hi, I’m Ken and am here blogging about a music video I recorded a few months ago. “Wantaways” is the name of my band, and “Repeat” is the name of the song that I filmed.

Before I start, wanna thank the talented and lovely Emily Hawker for having me on board, and wish her all the best over the next exciting few months.

Anyway, “Wantaways” is a little brainchild I’ve had for a few years now. To be specific, it’s a music project I thought I’d try involving a few steps:
1) I think up music or songs in my head
2) I get my talented friends BJ and Lyndon to help me record them
3) I share them with family and friends

So I started doing those things, usually in that order, until I had about 12 songs recorded and put online. I enjoyed this thoroughly.

Then someone mentioned the idea of a video clip. I won’t say I hated the idea, but it was at best a foreign one. Before I knew it, we’d booked a videographer, lighting expert and make-up artist. The thing was, these people actually provided these services in exchange for money or the like. This set them apart from me, who, up until this point, had only thought of songs in my head and sung them through my mouth. It was a bit daunting.

However, like a lot of people, I have a recurring predictable day-job that involves getting out of bed and going to sleep at certain intervals. To take annual leave for the video clip, I had to work two extra days meaning I had worked 10 days straight before the day of the shoot. This was actually a blessing in disguise, because I was too nervous to give a stuff.

And the video itself? It was shot in my house – the band scenes with the cool lights were in the living room, and the character bits with my lovely amateur friends were also filmed there. It took a day to pull up the black curtains in the living room to make it look much better than it was, and I spent most of the day making instant coffee for myself.

The phonebooth was shot on Grantham Street in Brunswick opposite Union Square in freezing cold temps and in front of a lovely but suspicious group of youths. The pizzas in the clip were also our lunch after we filmed (there mum, I wasn’t just throwing money away…)

All up the song Repeat took a month to write, a week to storyboard, and a day to film. I’m not sure if I’d do it again, but that’s beside the point. I can now say I’ve shot a professional music video in my house. It wasn’t one of my life aims, but at least I got a few days off work when I eventually caught a cold afterward. Very rock-star like.

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Wantaways is a solo project by Melbourne musician Ken Seto. Melodically driven, Wantaways dresses unassuming rock notes with alt/pop flavours.

You can check out the clip of first single ‘Repeat’ on youtube, or visit the Wantaways facebook page for more information and updates.

Wantaways is now on i-Tunes and Spotify too!

Is this tale the glamorous one you were expecting? Have you been involved in the production of an EP or music video?