Somesuch Blog

Nothing Compares 2 U...

Thu, 04 Apr 2013 13:34:00 +0100

The other day I heard that new Rihanna song ‘Stay’; the one that sounds a bit like an Adele song; the one co-written by—and featuring—Mikky Ekko, a bloke who looks like he wears boot-cut jeans and should be a judge on American Idol; the one with the video of Rihanna crying in a bath.

The decision to cry in a video is a risky one. You have to deal with a big elephant in the room. I used to call it The Nothing Compares 2 U Phenomenon. Everyone remembers that video. It’s part of the canon. Music Video lore. Directed by John Maybury, its main focus is an austere close-up of Sinead O’Conner singing. As the song reaches the final verse she intones, ”All the flowers that you planted, mama / In the back yard / All died when you went away”. A beat. She trembles almost imperceptibly, and then lowers her head, looking every inch like Florence Delay in ‘The Trial of Joan of Arc’. Another beat. Perhaps these lines summon a faraway memory—a recollection of the physical abuse she suffered at the hands of her late mother—because when her eyes meet the camera again she starts to cry. The lines that follow feel like a supplication. It’s an extraordinary moment. Spontaneous, raw and truthful; its power arguably unrivalled in music video history.

It’s a curious trait of the music industry that when something works its first inclination is to try and repeat it. Yeah, but he’s the new Ed Sheeran. Nigel’s gonna love it. Thus crow forlorn A&R men as they peddle their new signing to disinterested radio promoters. The same is true of music videos. Particularly ‘Nothing Compares 2 U’. The echo of its influence can still be heard in offices where Banksys share wall space with INXS platinum disks. Most record executives have the attention span of a Ritalin starved ADHD child. Their biggest fear is boring. Boring keeps them awake at night, worse than the Radio 1 playlist meeting. Chuck the kitchen sink at it if you have to. Just don’t make it boring. But occasionally they get all misty eyed about videos for ballads.

I just think this needs to be simple. You know. Pure. It’s such a beautiful song. I just wanna see the artist sing it. You know. Really sing it. No gimmicks. Like the ‘Nothing Compares 2 U’ video. Have you seen that?

Yes. Yes, I’ve seen that one. Every video commissioner’s worst nightmare. The Nothing Compares 2 U Phenomenon. Trying to re-create that video is like waiting for a Marian apparition, like holding out for Our Lady Of Atika to cry blood again. The pilgrims wanna believe it, but it’s never gonna fucking happen.

It worked for me once. We had to commission a video for James Blunt’s single ‘You’re Beautiful’. I called Sam Brown and said, can you make it like the ‘Nothing Compares 2 U’ video please. His interpretation of that most crude brief was sublime by pop video standards. The video ended up launching Blunty in the States. It’s still one of my favourites.

However, every other time has been a disaster. I remember being at the bad end of a 20 hour shoot day in Vegas, watching Alesha Dixon invoke her painful divorce from So Solid Crew’s Harvey in a brave effort to cry on camera. She looked like she was trying to do a poo. Eventually a quick stab with a tear stick did the trick. The precious tear rolled down her cheek, carrying with it all the emotional impact of a replicant’s fart.

And so to Rihanna. If ever an artist had reason to cry in a video it’s her: remember that this someone who was so badly beaten by their partner that they had to be hospitalised. The fact that ‘Stay’ is about the inability to resist true love only gives the film a more disturbing resonance. Yet she is so self-consciously in control of her image that the tears somehow feel hollow. (There are not many people that bathe on all fours.) I could almost sense the presence of her acting coach from ‘Battleship’.

If only she’d let go.

Anyhow, if you haven’t watched it yet, check out Romain Gavras’s new spot for Samsung. Here.

Intern Duties Volume 2...

Thu, 21 Mar 2013 18:09:01 +0000

Jaro Minne has been interning with us over the past two weeks. He’s a very talented film-maker currently studying in Brussels. You can see his work here.

He made a film for us—the next in our ‘Intern Duties’ series. It was shot over his lunch break, around the corner from our office, and edited the same afternoon.

Intern Duties, Jaro Minne from Somesuch & Co. on Vimeo.

The two leads had never met before. Jaro cast one of them on the tube on his way to work. And he found the other one on couchsurfing.org.

We Run Tings. Tings Nuh Run We

Fri, 01 Mar 2013 11:13:15 +0000

The homie Oliver Payne has a solo show at Herald Street which opens tonight.

There’s also an after party. Rollo Jackson is DJ-ing. Along with Jagger. It will be jokes.

And sometime over the next couple of weeks our new spot for Samsung drops…

White People's Vision

Tue, 26 Feb 2013 12:51:00 +0000

A lot of advertising agencies wanna piece of the music video game these days. They call them pop promos, which is cute. It makes sense. Bang out a pop promo. Simple. There’s no easier way to affiliate your brand with that all important demographic - young people.

The tricky thing for advertisers is that recording artists aren’t products in the sense that they are actual-real-life-humans, full of foibles, insecurities, opinions, drug habits, and megalomania. They don’t always like to do as they’re told.

Here’s a cautionary tale from the late noughties. Yep. Some of the craziest shit I ever saw during my time as a video commissioner.

****

It’s late March 2008. Richard Kylea Cowie, AKA Wiley, AKA Eskiboy, will release his latest single ‘Wearing My Rolex’ in six weeks on the Asylum imprint. The song, with its infectious DSK sample, and bonkers bars—Usually drink, usually dance, usually bubble--is already picking up specialist radio play, while a YouTube rip is racking up the views. To most industry observers it has all the DNA of a nailed-on hit record. It just needs a video to push it over the line.

The Asylum marketing department are adamant that they want a video that will crossover, and sit comfortably on the various Box TV channels. Their plan is to re-brand Wiley as a pop producer, in the vain of Calvin Harris, and move him out the narrow culs-de-sac of grime. No yoots. No hoodies. No pit bulls. No scooters. No mountain bikes. No garage doors. No trigger fingers. No Tim & Barry TV exclusive.

Director Kim Gehrig comes up with a simple idea: Wiley is stalked down a London Street at night by hot dancers dressed in fox outfits; they dance up on him and steal his shit, including his Rolex, until he is finally left standing in his boxers. A cheeky, cartoonish urban fantasy. A Midsummer Night’s Dream with a rapper. It’s the kind of idea Ludacris or Andre 3000 would make. The label love it.

I have no contact with Wiley throughout the commissioning process. All communication with him is handled by Asylum’s MD, Ben Cook, via text message. Strange, elliptical messages. hold tight lets make a lickle video cuz. the fox one is a mad ting lol. is that the one doe. its a lipsin ting dun know. sweardown. im not shook of any music person on earth. get me a blue drink.

Then nothing for two weeks. He is AWOL. Missing somewhere. The shoot has to be put back. Rumours abound: he’s been slashed in the face by the parent of a child to whom he promised some beats and a bit of studio time, but never turned up; he’s back on the rocks, sheet rocking, geeked out, abandoning a Bentley on a street in Manchester; he’s hiding in Liverpool with one of his baby mothers. No one knows.

By the time Wiley shows up again, the video is late. The pressure increases. I hurry the video into production, the prep time curtailed, still mindful of the fact that I don’t know whether he’s read the treatment properly, or if he even likes it.

The day before the shoot Asylum finally convince Wiley to meet the production team so that they can take him through the shot list. I arrive at a large office. The receptionist escorts me through an open plan amphitheater of production desks, before we enter a sterile boardroom dominated by a giant oak table and countless awards—moon-men, gold arrows, silver arrows, bronze arrows, yellow pencils, black pencils, gold lions, gold circles. The room creaks under the weight. Wiley arrives with Bless Beats, the producer responsible for the ‘Rolex’ riddim. Bless Beats is the most stoned man I’ve ever seen. Lean does not even begin to describe it. Chinese eyes peer from under a cap, bloodshot and wet. His eyelashes look like they’re encrusted with THC crystals. All he can say is safe. Safe. He is actually made out of zoots. Wiley on the other hand is fidgety. Cracky. On edge. He sits on his hands like a kid, and leans forward when he speaks, his eyes bulging. He has a cup of tea and looks around the boardroom distrustfully. Kim tries to make small talk. It’s hard.

We present the location. Dis is the fox one yeah? Yeah. Maybe we should just film it round my house. Get me. Just cotch at my house. Maybe allow the foxes. Is Mo around to do this one?

My trenchant denial begins to crack. This is gonna be OK. A slight sick-y feeling gives way to full blown, watery-mouthed nausea. It’s always OK, right? Retching, sweaty panic. It’s not OK. We’re fucked.

As it’s a night shoot, Wiley’s calltime the following day is 1pm. By 2pm he still hasn’t turned up. I call the marketing manager who’s charged with escorting him to set on time. Where the fuck is he? Everyone’s waiting. I hear a weak, tremulous voice at the other end. I’m trying, but he reckons he needs some new clothes. We’re wandering around Bethnal Green trying on track suits.

He finally shows up at 3.30pm. I meet him at his car. We walk to the winnebago. The absence of bags tells me that the shopping mission wasn’t successful. Do you want some lunch? Yeah, KFC kid’s meal. He disappears into the trailer. Within a couple of minutes it begins to resemble a large mobile hot box. Purple Haze is a next bud.

The minutes slip by. Not a peep from the trailer. Just the deep inhalations of men bunning skunk weed. I try and keep a low profile, but paranoia gets the better of me. The crew are staring. Eyes burrow into my brain, mocking, disdainful. This one’s on you big-shot-record-company-ding-dong. No good sweating into your Barbour. You need to sort this shit out. Then the full first AD shake down. Get him out. Now. The schedule’s already fucked.

I knock on the door of the trailer and step in. Wiley looks at me. Hood up. Eyes low. Dead gawk. Yes bruv. I’m coming. He drags his heels like a kid that doesn’t want to go to school. Straight sulk walk. When we arrive on set he pauses to take it all in, amid a hum of anticipation, before saying…

This is white people’s vision…

… and then walking off. Skepta and his manager desperately try and persuade him to stay, but he keeps walking, around the corner, out of sight. Gone. Swayze.

It’s a strange moment. Oddly violent. The crew stand around dumbfounded. Ben Cook from Asylum starts crying softly. Kim to her immense credit soldiers on, corralling the dancers, improvising a brand new routine with the choreographer. Fuck it. There’s a camera and film. Might as well shoot something.

It’s tough to understand why he did it. There are too many convenient explanations: dickhead, some of the crew mumble—I had another one of these grime guys the other week—he fucked off after a couple of hours—i’m not being funny, but they’re just lazy cunts—it’s hard not to detect the other pole of Wiley’s comfortable racism in these hushed protestations; others lament the selfishness of someone that can so readily squander the efforts of so many people who, for a reduced fee, have worked long hours to do the best work possible in their departments; inevitably the hood psychologists are quick to talk about self-destruction—a childhood predicated on poverty and failure, strangled by inherited expectations of what life may hold, leads him to bolt as soon as the daunting possibility of mainstream success beckons, the flight made more insidious by the fact that it functions under the guise of keeping it real.

I dunno man. Maybe it just didn’t feel right to him.

I still believe Wiley is a great artist; the great talent of his generation like Brian Wilson or the RZA.

Miraculously Kim and editor Tom Lindsay manage to cut something out of the footage. In spite of Wiley’s absence, the video is wildly successful. It’s added to every TV channel. High rotation. For two weeks it’s ubiquitous. Usually drink, usually dance, usually bubble. The success of the video is only matched by its notoriety amongst die-hard fans. I’m suddenly the most hated man in grime. Youtube vitriol. da person who made this at the label shud be shot cuz. Wiley is texting everyone death threats. Atlantic have to hire extra security. Kiss FM have a phone-in dedicated to one particular scene in the video where a fox dancer eats fried chicken out of a bin. Disgusting bruv. But the momentum is inexorable. It’s a hit.

‘Wearing My Rolex’ finally reaches number two in the national singles chart, losing out to Madonna’s ‘4 Minutes’ for the top spot.

In The Streets...

Fri, 22 Feb 2013 18:00:42 +0000

Our intern Roger Gonzalez went for a quick skate round our office at lunchtime today and threw together this edit. It’s tight. The homie Ben Larthe helped with the filming.

Intern Duties from Somesuch & Co. on Vimeo.

You can see some of Roger’s other work here.

Bounce, Darling...

Tue, 15 Jan 2013 14:57:00 +0000

We recently completed a documentary project for Nokia Music and the Sundance Channel: six films about the emerging music scene in six American Cities. New American Noise. You can see the trailer here. Emily Kai Bock, Bob Harlow, Tyrone Lebon and Abteen Bagheri all directed segments. The films premiere at the Sundance Festival on the 18th January. You’ll also be see them on the tinternet here.

I hassled Abteen to write a guest post about some of his adventures. As he says, his experiences support the following adage:

Everything you need to know about a city, you can learn at the local strip club.

****

The documentary style is liberating. There’s a go with the flow attitude, a difference in the feeling of a ‘work day’ when you’re shooting a documentary versus say, a short, music video, or commercial. The feeling and attitude is one I’d like to incorporate in my other work. By week two of shooting (we did Portland and New Orleans back to back) filming was the routine—documenting was life.

First off, with my documentary, there’s no actual shot list. That’s okay. I once crumpled one of those up in Australia before we started shooting The Presets, much to the dismay of producer Tash Tan… but it all turned out okay, if you’re asking me. With a documentary, you may have some ideas scribbled down or stored in your mind, but you’re mostly finding a way to put yourself inside the action you’re trying to capture. You’re waiting for surprises. A shot list could only lead to disappointment.

The crew is tiny, flexible, mobile and in this case consisted of two of my IRL friends: cinematographer Isaac Bauman and producer Chris Black. Our sound guy smiled a lot and had clearly done a lot of shrooms. Mostly, everything was set up for a comfortable environment—getting intimate with our subjects wasn’t difficult because we were close as a group. Eventually, we were just the homies, even though on the surface there was a Persian kid and a bald Jewish guy with a red beard running around inside of clubs in the lower 9th ward with professional camera equipment, but I digress. We were the homies.

And as the homies, it was our duty to loosen up. In the last two months I shot two projects in New Orleans—one a music video involving a major label, and the other this documentary. To save you from a litany of dissimilarities, I’ll point out a major one: we shot this thing at various levels of sobriety…

We were just out there living our lives, integrated into the BOUNCE scene, seeing everything through a digital camera. That’s an important distinction. The camera was digital (c300… with some vintage glass for the haters out there). We had plenty of card space. We’d shoot from morning ‘til 2:00 or 3:00am if we had to. Because we were in New Orleans, with their lax drinking laws (‘drive-thru’ daiquiri shops, people drinking from bottles on the streets), often times we’d enter the New Orleans night with their generous version of a bourbon double in our hands. We’d already been shooting for eight hours and as the parties started, we’d join up. I’m not condoning drinking and shooting, or smoking marijuana and shooting (which we tried once for 1am b-roll—end result paranoia) but I will say we got some damn good footage, dancing with the warmth of liquor in our stomachs. And Isaac Bauman is so skilled that most of it was in focus.

I was asked to blog about a funny anecdote. There’s your backstory. Let’s go back to my through line: everything you need to know about a city, you can learn at the local strip club.

Night eight or so of filming in New Orleans, we’re having drinks. Bourbon. We were staying at a motel outside New Orleans called the Studio 6 (more backstory, sorry). Studio 6 was a long term apartment style motel with felt blankets. We thought we had bed bugs. It was essentially a safe house. Our first night there, a dude named Mike with gold teeth said… ‘Didn’t I see y’all in the hood tonight?’ I turned around and said, ‘Who wants to know?’ But actually, I laughed nervously and said ‘Was that where we were?’ We get to talking. Mike is a nice guy, he tells us to be careful, how everyone thought we were police, etc. Isaac tells him we’re making a documentary on bounce music. He says, ‘OH BOUNCE MUSIC? Well that’s happenin’ at Lil’ Dawlins every night. If y’all want bounce, y’all should go there.’

Back to night eight. We’re having drinks with the client. We mention Little Darlings, which turns out to be a strip club. That’s where we’ll go film next.

Little Darlings is in the heart of the French Quarter. We roll up with no camera, which was our way of not scaring anyone. After Chris talks to the doorman, we learn, as expected, that we’re not allowed to film inside. By this point, two beautiful black women have their arms around Isaac, who is being taken inside. Another stripper grabs my hand. The client says, ‘Let’s go inside!’ She tells me I need to let loose and have some fun. I’ve been working too hard, she says. Alright, I say. Fuck it.

Next thing I know, everyone is gone. A stripper is holding my hand. No one can hear my mumbled confusion. Is Isaac getting a lap dance from two women at once upon stepping in the joint? Where is my producer? All I hear is, ‘You gonna buy me a drink, baby?’ I go to the ATM. I buy the stripper a pineapple daiquiri cuz I’m supposed to let loose. I’m feeling good.

Fast forward to two lap dances later in a dark room filled with cigarette smoke. The dances are interrupted by me asking the stripper in my lap about bounce music. After all, I’m doing research. Still no sign of Isaac or Chris. Is there some kind of private room I don’t know about? When are they going to play bounce music?

I leave the room, a bit disheveled, looking for my crew, who have now abandoned me. Maybe they’ve staged a mutiny. As I’m walking back, a beautiful woman grabs my hand. She tells me her name is Bunny. She has red hair and light brown skin. Two dances for the price of one she says. I wish I could have said no. If you’re offended, remember I’m a boy in my early 20s and I acknowledge my path is not a righteous one. She takes me to the ATM. The machine isn’t working, so I have to put in my PIN a few times. Now I’m in another room. She asks me if I’ve been with a black woman before. I ask her about bounce music. How the strippers dance to it, if she’d maybe like to do an interview later…

So you know, lap dances happen, whatever, and I leave the room. No regrets. Bunny was nice. She told me a bit about bounce music, the artists she likes, how they shake on stage after midnight. I’ve learned all I’m going to learn. I’ll call them tomorrow for an interview. I had let loose. I had a lead to film the next day. My mission was done here. I walk straight for the exit. I’m all lap-danced-out. Not more than 20 feet away (umm 6.096 meters), there’s my crew, the client, all sitting on a couch. Isaac is having the time of his life, ‘making it rain’ with thirteen brand new one dollar bills. I was the only one who got a lap dance. The isolation was necessary, I convince myself.

We continue filming the next day. All is well. I’m all out of cash, clearly. I go to get some. My bank card is missing. Uh oh. Check my statements online, all my money (I didn’t have much) has been withdrawn at a restaurant. And what’s it next door to? Little Darlings.

I sit and think about it for a second. First thought: I lost my card. Wait, but how did they have my PIN number? Thoughts of Bunny’s swaying hypnotic hips come back to me. Oh, Bunny… you so sly.

I couldn’t even be mad. What an artist. She stole my debit card AND the PIN number. This isn’t an ordinary crime. This isn’t the work of a novice. This is real, skilled trade stuff. She was with me at the ATM. She hit the cancel button so the machine wouldn’t work. She saw me put in the numbers. I was straight hustled.

And there’s this particular anecdote’s half-assed moral. New Orleans: Straight hustlin’. Bunny was the embodiment of the New Orleans attitude—‘I’m here to get mine.’ The BOUNCE scene was just like that. A bunch of rappers looking out for themselves—open beefs, drama. It was some East Coast West Coast shit happening right there in the neighborhood. Beautiful. Out of competition comes the best work.

Stay on the grind, young blood.

The documentary experience in New Orleans was completely unique—as I’m sure it is in every city. The beauty of location. There was no drinking in Portland. We shot on fixed lenses with a bigger camera rig. In New Orleans, our camera was stripped down, shooting loose on a zoom lens, roaming around our subjects. I’ve learned that for me, content and location are huge in dictating style. Not all of my stuff looks the same, and I’m okay with that. I’ll keep looking for my own style, allowing the material and the circumstances to push me in the natural direction.

Portland has its share of wild stories as well… scoped out a few brothels (just the lobby) during down time. Filmed six hours of footage at a drag queen show that never made the cut. Honestly, none of this stuff seems weird until I stop to write about it. Label it as research. Until next time…

Uptown out.

Collage of the Week

Wed, 14 Nov 2012 18:18:00 +0000

Thanks to AG Rojas, aged 17 of Pasadena California, who submitted this tribute to everyone’s favourite rapper.

From now on anyone whose submission to Collage of the Week gets published will receive an exclusive Somesuch & Co t-shirt. You can see some of the designs below.

Hit us up:

tim.nash@somesuchandco.com

We Three Kings of Miami

Wed, 07 Nov 2012 17:19:21 +0000

Daniel Wolfe’s HTC ‘Miami Bass Project’ finally launched this week. It’s been a while coming. We shot it earlier this year.

Watch the 60 here and the extended version here.

George Belfield was on the ground, working on the project. Here are his reflections on the experience. Safe.

****

Miami is refreshingly free from the constraints of irony. Back in the Drizzle there is a constant substratum of self-analysis, identities contorted by layers of awareness. Miami is mercifully unhindered by such doubts. It is a city inhabited not by people, but by personae. Everyone has an angle. Everyone has a nomme de rue. Smurf. Turf. Double-O. Whooshy. G-Smoov. Where do these names come from? Trigger seems obvious enough, but Sofa King just liked the double entendre in an ad for a furniture shop. When I asked Cakes why they call her that she simply tapped her ass. Some white people have nicknames too. The location scout was called Spring Break. Don’t ask.

My favourite name of the lot was King Make Movies.

For the first few days I thought they were just referring to our HTC commercial shoot when they said “It’s gon’ be a movie”, but a ‘movie’ in Miami is just a good time. A night so big they should’ve immortalised it in celluloid. The kind of night that’d probably sell out the Peckham Plex if they did. King Make Movies, like most people I spoke to, describes himself as “A promoter, a ennertainer. Sorta like a local celebrity. People know me.” He’s in the moviemaking business, Miami-style.

Having bricked my way through customs I drove straight to the casting in Winwood, where I met King Make Movies and his friend Sofa King. Spot the two guys standing at the back nodding along to Rick Ross’ I’ma Bawss, the soundtrack of Miami. See them swimming in the grey seaweed of smoke from a couple of Black And Milds. Within half an hour of meeting him I’m being shown through King Make Movies’ phone photos. It’s mostly girls in various stages of undress.

“Who’s she? She seems nice.”

“I just tol’ her to suck on them titties.”

I’m now his friend on Facebook. He runs nights at Kaffe Krystal and the G5ive Gentlemen’s Club. He also has his own logo and merch, which he kindly gave to the wardrobe girls and casting director.

What a lad. Shout out to King Make Movies.

His friend Sofa King was the most helpful person we met in Miami. Every city needs a fixer. Anyone looking to set up a ghetto block party in Miami should look no further. He gave us the speakers for the shoot, found most of the cars, and provided the DJs that kept the crowd warm between DJ Switch’s cameo appearances. He also helped casting directors Leanne (British) and Lashawna (American) streetcast every last person in the ad. He has a deep badman voice with a lispy top-note as the esses catch on his golden grill. He is the only man I have ever seen with enough swagger to pull off wearing a Bluetooth earpiece.

When I interviewed him for the behind-the-scenes film he hadn’t slept, having spent the night at legendary nightspot King Of Diamonds. He fans out a few crumpled dollar bills like a hungover magician.

“When I started I had twel’ hunnerd.”

Shout out to Sofa King.

Every time we drove from our base in Fort Lauderdale into Miami proper we passed the neon striped King Of Diamonds strip club, but we never went in. As Sofa is at great pains to explain though, King Of Diamonds is so much more than a titty bar.

“For anyone that haven’t been to King A Diamonds, King A Diamonds is… (long pause)… well how can I explain this, it’s… (another pause)… It’s errything you ever wanted, and more. I mean it’s not like regular strip clubs. I mean, these girls do tricks. Shout out to Remy Red.”

In Miami, I experienced the closest I have ever been to a strip club, when Dan Emmerson and I went to Hooters one night for onion rings and beer. I’m not proud of it, but there it is.

Here’s my Miami Playlist.

There are three songs in Miami. I can honestly say I didn’t hear any other music in public.

Meek Mill feat. Rick Ross – Ima Boss

Jay-Z & Kanye West – Niggas In Paris

Tyga – Rack City

Shout out to the Three-O-Five.

Man Nah Wear Ugg

Tue, 06 Nov 2012 16:16:49 +0000

I love Vimeo.

Around 18 months ago we rebuilt our site using Vimeo as our player. Before this we were using Wiredrive. Their website boldly declares that Wiredrive puts your media to work. It actually doesn’t. It creates conversations like this.

‘Hi, it’s **** calling from Bungle-Bartle-Boss-Boss-Abbott-Steve-DDBCDEFG. Your website doesn’t work. It won’t play.’

‘I’m so sorry to hear that. If it’s not too much of an imposition, may I ask what browser you’re using?’

‘What do you mean?’

‘You know. How do you get on the tinternets? Firefox, Safari, Chrome? You get me?’

‘Oh I see. Let me have a look. I’m not very good at computers. Ah yes. Here it is. Internet Explorer.’

‘Ok safe. Do you know if you’ve updated it recently?’

‘Well I was having some problems, so I called the IT Help Desk six years ago, but they still haven’t got back to me.’

Yes. This shit doesn’t happen anymore. Vimeo is a far more stable player. Whatever horrendous, atavistic browser you’re using, you can still watch our work. Since we switched to Vimeo we haven’t had a single complaint.

And then last week two of our videos were disabled as a result of copyright infringement claims by record companies. We were notified by Vimeo without any prior contact from the Labels concerned. Nothing. No courtesy email. No conversation. Just the old Major Label iron curtain. Computer says fuck you. None of this is of course Vimeo’s fault. As they exist in the public domain they are bound by DMCA guidelines, which give third parties the right to flag content they feel has been mis-appropriated. I have no issue with this. The thing that makes me wanna punch walls, is the dogmatic, myopic, one-size-fits-all, bumbaclut, wrong-headed, niggardly approach employed by the Business Affairs teams at Majors.

The story goes like this. I had it drilled into me for six years. Given that all other barometers of an artist’s traction have been gradually eroded, Youtube views are everything. Under no circumstances can you cannibalise your view count. All traffic must be driven to ONE Official Youtube file. Labels hire people to monitor what’s being uploaded across the various platforms and then flag any Unofficial files that they might find. The trouble is that Vimeo uploads by companies who actually make the videos, often with a great investment of time, energy and money, innocently seeking to promote their efforts, often get killed in the crossfire.

Even my mum knows that Youtube is a faulty gauge of potential success because it’s free. For every Ed Sheeran there are a hundred Kreayshawns, who after 40 million views on Youtube, sold 4900 copies of her album in its first week of release. No shit. Views don’t equal sales. It’s impossible to distinguish between the curious viewer who stumbled on your video, a crack-head fan who <3 <3 <3s your video and watches it a hunnert times an hour, and someone who might actually buy the fucking record.

Somesuch & Co don’t have a sales rep. We put any surplus resources back into the work. Sally and I spend hours, evenings, weekends, holidays, writing this garbage because we genuinely give a shit about the company we’ve created, we’re proud of the work, and we want as many people as possible to see it. There’s no hidden management consultant. No branding expert. Just our voice. Some people love it. Other people really hate it. That’s how it goes. We make no apologies. But thanks to communities like Vimeo, Tumblr, Twitter and Facebook we’ve been able to build an audience and disseminate the work more widely than we’d ever dreamed. Surely this is to the advantage of artists and record labels? Who knows, while our audience is small and niche, it might actually want to pay for some of the music we expose them to? Believe it or not we are quite good at marketing. Yet the music industry, in monotheistic thrall to Youtube, seems bent on denying itself these opportunities like some crazed ascetic. It’s weird. Almost perverse.

No one wins when our videos get flagged: I have to call someone in the Video Department, who is underpaid and overworked, who in turn has to call someone in Marketing, who is underpaid and overworked, who then has to call an intern in Business Affairs, who isn’t paid at all and overworked, who subsequently has to call the Head of Business Affairs, who is paid a huge salary and is overworked devising ever more vile ways of exploiting artists - like the Expanded Rights Rape euphemistically known as the 360 deal. This process can take up to three weeks. Round and round the merry go round.

The most frustrating thing is that it’s not really anyone’s fault. In these fragmented, straightened times, companies need nimble, flexible structures, but despite their best efforts, the Majors are still set up to get a billion Robbie Williams CDs onto the shelves of Tescos. Well I guess it worked in the 90s. Anyone who’s spent more than five minutes on Kensington High Street will tell you: trying to do anything in a Label is like trying to turn an oil tanker. A nuanced response to anything is impossible. One-size-fits-all.

I guess all I’m saying is Think Before You Flag.

It’s all love. I’m just strung out. Being a parent means you get up earlier than Greggs.

See you at the UK MVAs on Thursday. We’ve got 23 nominations.

#1 Stunna

Mon, 22 Oct 2012 21:17:00 +0100

Director Vincent Haycock (pictured above) made a video for Calvin Harris’s single ‘Sweet Nothing’, which went to NUMBER ONE in the UK charts on Sunday. Cop it below.

I love NUMBER ONES. If you work at a record label a NUMBER ONE means that you might not get made redundant for at least another week. In times gone by, a NUMBER ONE also meant that you might be able to enjoy a glass of champagne at the Monday morning label meeting. I don’t know if that happens anymore? Likewise a NUMBER ONE represents an armistice of sorts: a brief period of respite where the Sword of Damocles is lowered, before your MD resumes his daily persecution of you. Do you know how fucking lucky you are to even have a job? Sony just fired ten thousand people. If we don’t deliver this album we’re fucked. P45 fucked. Job centre fucked. Have you been to a job centre recently? They stink of piss. And AIDS. Yes, sadly the prevailing atmosphere in the Dream Factory - AKA the Fart Machine - is one of fear, paranoia, frustration, jealousy, acrimony and larceny. But for a few precious hours a NUMBER ONE makes it feel like everything is gonna be OK.

On a side note, while Vincent Haycock is one of the nicest, mellowest guys around, you definitely don’t wanna fuck with him. He will get punchy if provoked. His wife Stephanie tells a story of an evening in a downtown dive bar in NY. They were having a few dranks. Getting lean. Fucking around. Dancing a bit. They accidentally barged into one of those bitchy, effete, metro-sexual, hipster types. Low cut vest, hairdo, winkle-pickers, spray on batty-man jeans, angular weasel features. The guy took exception to this and poured a full pint of lager over Stephanie’s head. Vince politely asked him why he felt the need to have done that. He got all up in Vince’s face. What? What? Boom. Vince popped him in the face. Sharp jab. The dude staggered back, blood pouring from his nose. He started screaming and sobbing. Oww. Fuck. Fuck. My nose. I just got a nose job. My fucking nose.

[Baby] James Bond, Jackie Chan, and that bitch, MacGyver
[Wayne] Private planes, Jaguars, Bentleys, and Prowlers
[Baby] I’m the # 1 stunna!
[Wayne] Wh-what, wh-what, what?
[Baby] The # 1 stunna!
[Wayne] Wh-what, wh-what, what?

Collage of the Week

Sat, 20 Oct 2012 23:25:27 +0100

Over the past month Somesuch associates have killed the internet here, here, here, here, here & here.

Roman Gavras got given a gold computer by a Libyan potentate.

With Yuletide approaching we’ve decided to rinse some Christmas adverts.

And we’re hopefully about to sign some new directors, none of whom look like this:

While I’m on paternity leave I’ve been taking the opportunity to brush up on my business skills by reading The 48 Laws of Power. Apparently it is one of the most requested books in American prison libraries.

Shape Up

Mon, 14 May 2012 12:05:05 +0100

I love going to the barber. I love getting my head shaved. You’d imagine that this would be a simple procedure - ‘a bit like mowing the lawn’ - but you’d be surprised how easy it is to fuck up a crop. A good crop needs to be tight. The barber needs to keep going over it with a comb, checking for stray hairs that the clippers might have missed. No one wants that mental patient, picky head look. If the clippers start to catch on the scalp then they need some Wahl oil to help the flow. The final pass should be done free-hand with a big pair of scissors, almost like a tailor’s shears. The critical part is the sculpting of the sideburns and the line around the ear and nape. For this the barber needs to draw for the outliner. He needs a steady hand: one slip with the ultra slim trimmer could leave you with some Vanilla Ice tramlines on your dome.

In my opinion, at least where London is concerned, the Turks have got the barber shop game sown up. At Pasha’s on Stoke Newington High Street - the one where all the rudeboys go - you can get the following for a tenner: they hook up your fade or crop; they singe off your ear hair with a burning swab soaked in methylated spirits; they trim your eyebrows and nose-hair; they squeeze your black-heads; you get a hot towel compress followed by an application of eucalyptus moisturiser; they douse you with that after shave - ‘chili sauce’ - that makes your face sting; and lastly they rub your shoulders and crack your knuckles. For a tenner.

Going to the barber has become something of a compulsion. I now have to go every two weeks without fail. This can create problems when I’m shooting abroad as I’m forced to explore whatever tonsorial options that city may have to offer. Recently I was in Miami with Daniel Wolfe shooting an HTC commercial for Mother when my two week cycle elapsed. Fuck man, I’m gonna have to get all indigenous up in this piece.

The third shoot day was a night shoot in Little Haiti. As the call time wasn’t too arduous, Daniel and I decided to head out a little early and visit a barbershop in the neighbourhood that we’d found by chance on the recce. There was no signage outside and the windows were covered by a metal grille, but the door was open. Inside was a long, narrow room with taupe linoleum floor tiles, three battered Belmont chairs, fluorescent strip lights above the mirrors, a couple of old photos tacked straight onto the glass, a TV showing sport, and no sinks. A purist joint. Two men greeted us. We were seated immediately and wrapped in white capes. Both barbers wore white Dickies, white socks, and Nike slide sandals. Standard. My guy had a Short Afro Temp Fade; Daniel’s rocked a flawless Dark Caesar. Daniel got straight into it.

‘Half all over. And natural please mate.’

‘Aight. I got you.’

Daniel is a barbershop veteran. The key word here is ‘natural’. Afro-Caribbean barbers have a tendency towards precise hairline sculpture. The sharp lineup. Tight. If you don’t want that, you need to make it clear.

As I sat down my barber launched into some Creole patois.

‘Komon ou ye? Kisa ou ta via?’

I mumbled, confidence draining.

‘Number one please boss. And, yeah natural too.’

‘Kisa?’

‘Natural. You know. Normal. Yeah?’

‘Oke. Pa gen pwoblem.’

Fuck. The head nodded, a friendly smile beamed, but the eyes betrayed the fact that he had no idea what I was talking about. Fuck.

He ran the clippers over my head in methodical sweeps, starting at the crown and then working his way across the temples. Back and forth, back and forth. I relaxed into the chair and slipped into the familiar barbershop reverie, my mind emptying until it felt woolly and nice, calmed by the gentle buzzing. This is gonna be OK. I barely noticed when he switched to the trimmer. Buzzzzzzzzz. It lingered on my forehead, small chiseling motions shaping the filaments-zzzzzzzzz, before describing a wide arc down to my sideburns. With steadfast ease the graver etched its line.

Before I knew what was happening it was too late. I didn’t need to look in the mirror. The realization came. I look like a white version of this:

OK. Not that bad, but definitely like this:

‘I met this girl on Monday
Took her for a drink on Tuesday
We were making love by Wednesday
And on Thursday and Friday and Saturday we chilled on Sunday’.

Daniel Wolfe’s HTC commercial will now be out in June. Look out for the four minute version. It’s tight.

Temple of Doomed Leisure Time

Mon, 07 May 2012 15:49:17 +0100

Three months ago I got addicted to Temple Run, a game designed by Imangi Studio for the IOS platform.

Richard Kylea Cowie and Wayne Rooney are also adherents.

Temple Run is straight up divorce in an app. IOS crack. You might as well free-base your iPad, douse yourself in 151-proof rum, and then set yourself on fire. It will ruin your life faster than a night out with Michael Barrymore.

In the game you play an explorer who steals a precious idol from a temple, thereby invoking the wrath of a troop of demonic monkeys from whom you have to escape. While pursued you dodge obstacles and attempt to run as far as possible without getting caught. Along the way you collect gold coins to score points and try and grab various ‘power-ups’ to enhance your abilities. It’s basically some Indian Jones shit. Initially you get to pick from three different characters, but if you gather enough coins you can unlock others.

I like playing as Barry Bones. He’s got a wicked gait. Although, I also unlocked conquistador Francisco Montoya, and pigskin wielding grid-iron star Zack Wonder. Zack is a rude boy.

Writer Tom Bissell identifies what he calls iPad gaming’s Movement Problem, ‘whereby precision navigation within a given game-space is complicated by the necessarily imprecise nature of tracing your finger along a touchscreen’.

This isn’t really a concern with Temple Run. It should be taught in remedial video game class. Before the Sony Playstation brought an ineluctable sophistication to gaming, dilettante players were able to get by with button mashing on 16-bit consoles. Street Fighter 2 was the worst. Some chief could just play as Blanka, pound the controller like an ape, and somehow grapple the shit out of you before you had a chance to bust out your Hurricane Kick, Dragon Punch combo. Temple Run is even more primitive. It flows inexorably forward and you can only move left or right, or duck or jump. As the game gets progressively faster, so your spasticity seems to increase. After running for a couple of minutes you find yourself launching uncontrollable swipes at the iPad’s screen. What the fuck am I doing? Smack. Smack. Pause. Then another palsied attack. None of it seems to matter too much. As long as you time your blows, and they’re vaguely in the right direction - horizontal or vertical - it tends to work out.

But, holy shit, it’s addictive. I was staying up to 3.00 am playing it. And when I wasn’t playing it I was thinking about it. Constantly. Not since Grand Theft Auto: Vice City came out in 2002 have I been so hopelessly obsessed by a game, and it pales in comparison to that masterpiece. I played Temple Run so much that it made me feel sick. As I went to bed and closed my eyes, the ocular spasms would kick in. I could see Barry Bones running in my mind’s eye. Nauseated I’d drift in and out of consciousness until I found myself floating on a raft inundated by 3D monkey chimeras, screaming and scratching, like Klaus Kinski at the end of Aguirre, The Wrath of God, caught in a fucking animated sui generis temple fever dream.

During the day I didn’t fare much better. I played as soon as I woke up. I played on the bus. I played when I went for a piss. My motor reflexes were so fuse-blown that I couldn’t concentrate on anything for more than a few minutes. I had persistent headaches. And I still didn’t manage to clock it.

I truly have no idea how you can achieve the final objective of scoring 10 million points without spending £699.00 on ‘In App’ gold coin purchases.

Maybe you need to be a premiership footballer. Or a rapper.

Anyhow.

We’ve made a ton of new work in the past few months that I should have got round to posting and writing about. You can find it here.

Adverts for HTC and Stella Artois drop in the next few weeks, as well as a new video from Romain Gavras.

I also wrote a piece about our Cobra shoot in India here.

Ice cold.

One picture is worth ten thousand words

Mon, 30 Jan 2012 22:33:00 +0000

Fred R Barnard was working late. He was on deadline for a print ad in the trade journal Printers’ Ink. Ideas never came too easily to Fred. His favorite adage was: ‘I had two ideas today; the second was to shit-can the first’. That kinda summed him up. He pulled hard on an Old Gold and thought for a minute. Gaspers always helped him get shit straight in his head. Fuck it. He cracked open the container of his Benzedrine inhaler. Inside was a thin paper strip, which he rolled into a ball and swallowed. Jesus. It tasted like shit. He took a slug of cold coffee and that didn’t taste much better. He’d never been much of a hop head. But baby, bennies were a whole different deal.

Fred stared at his note pad for a minute and then settled back into his chair. He was starting to feel good. Really fucking good. His mind wandered. The other night he’d been to Grauman’s Egyptian joint to see ‘It’. Damn. Clara Bow. ‘The It Girl’. What a great picture. He’d always had a soft spot for flappers, but she was something else. By all accounts Clara loved the hooch. And heavy necking. He even got a kick out of the more discreditable rumours, the accusations of incest and lesbianism. Man, he wanted to ball her so bad. The thought made his nuts ache.

And then, quite unexpectedly, a single line of copy snuck into his head. ‘One picture is worth ten thousand words’. Holy shit. In one abrupt movement he lent forward and grabbed his pad. It was a pretty good line. He wrote it down and carefully considered it again. Yep, it was pretty fucking good. He laughed.

The advertisement ran in Printers’ Ink on 10th March 1927.

The phrase is probably truer now than it was then.

Here’s a good example:

Here’s another:

And here’s one more:

The above image is by British photographer Ewen Spencer.

We have now signed him for commercial and music video representation. Check out his work here.

Bad Man Ear Warmers

Wed, 25 Jan 2012 11:13:20 +0000

‘I’ve been examined ever since I was seamen
They took a sonogram and seen the image of a demon
At birth the nurses surrounded me with needles
And drugged me all up with the diseases of evil…’

क्रिसमस और नव वर्ष मंगलमय हो

Just got back to yard after five weeks in India. I now look like this.

But after a week back, I feel like this (c/o Micah Walker).

And weirdly I’m dressing like this. Oi star, borrow me that tracksuit.

We were in Bombay shooting a Cobra commercial with Daniel Wolfe for Beattie McGuinness Bungay. It was absolutely buck wild. We spent four days on a train at the behest of the Indian Railway Authority. They’re a lunatic mob. Choo choo.

The advert should be finished soon. Twitter will tell you when.

Trevor Beattie came on the shoot. It was great to meet him. A pure don. Unfortunately McGuinness and Bungay couldn’t make it.

Man, we loved India. So much so that Bombay is going to be the subject of our next guide. In fact we’re going to publish it as Issue 2 of the Somesuch & Co fanzine. Hopefully it’ll be done in the next few weeks. Hit us up if you want us to mail you a copy.

A bunch of other work drops soon, including Kim Gehrig’s feature documentary for Coca-Cola: ‘Beat 2012’.

We’re going to have a screening at the end of February. Hold tight for invites.

And a two minute version of the accompanying commercial airs during the annual gack gala otherwise know as the Brit Awards. I hope Ed Sheeran doesn’t wet himself. All the A&R men present will be dreading their next label meeting. That’s when the recriminations start. ‘Why the fuck has no one here signed the NEXT Ed Sheeran. You’ve all got AIDS’. How I’ve missed the music industry idiom. That last invocation of HIV plus is apparently how one well known executive at Universal used to address his beleaguered boys. Cute.

Roman Gavras’s new video for MIA will also launch soon. I’ve seen a few excerpts. It will injure your mind.

Finally, we might be making a commercial for Palace Skateboards. If that happens I’ll retire. There won’t be anything else I want to achieve.

Stay big. Anon.

Smiths Court

Mon, 05 Sep 2011 13:55:36 +0100

Ah man. Shitty draws in the courtyard. The tarmac’s dashed with shitty wet-wipes. A pigeon pecks at one. Fuck man. A few feet away, gold spray paint describes the outline of a pair of shoes. The drizzle causes a rivulet of gold to run away into the drain. Shitty rain.

Last night a balding man of indeterminate age squatted in the corner of the courtyard, kecks around his ankles, and took a shit. He had a scar that ran from the corner of his mouth to his ear-lobe. Half a Chelsea smile. Half as funny. You could barely register a strain as he heaved the pale, quarter-pounder poo onto the floor, adjacent to the McDonalds box strewn nearby. The street cleaner on his break didn’t see - slumped over his cart, he was far too engrossed in a giant Stephen King novel to notice the shitty ghost wiping his arse.

Shitty rain continues into the afternoon. The man limps back through the alley into the courtyard. He and his suit are painted gold. Tracks of sweat streak his face revealing the pallid flesh beneath. He carries a gold-painted suitcase and a small wooden plinth.

Earlier that day he stood on the Southbank. Hold still you cunt. Oi shit cunt. Statue-man. A shitty camera went click pap. Fuck he thought: cotch off a Jubilee Gardens break. In the shadow of the London Eye Golden Wonder drew on a Benson, sucking it up. Later a kid smacked him in the goolies. Then silver-robot-man clocked him. Maltese beef. Oi l’oxx. I’m talking to you. F’oxx ommok. Son of a shit cunt whore. Knuckledusters and a screwdriver glinted in the sun. Ilaqli l-bajd. OK OK. Better bounce. Shitty luck.

The rain starts to abate. The man sits on his plinth and carefully removes a blackened crack pipe from his coat pocket. His fingers are blistered and scorched. No prints for the feds to ink. He packs the gob-stopper bowl with dirty grey rocks. The glass is tacky. Torch it bruv. The crystal chunks melt away and he sucks the vapour as it escapes from the cylinder. His pupils stretch. Far-flung-ghost-face. Out of reach.

A few hits later, however, and he doesn’t feel so nice. The familiar irritability and paranoia set in. He stands and paces - cracky spider walk - before resting his forehead against the brick wall. A nasty case of the Ekbom’s ensues. Fuck man. The crack bugs creep. Weaver ants elbow their way through his dermis, the hard carapace of their bodies grazing the lymph vessels. He starts to scratch furiously.

In the coming weeks the bulldozers will arrive in Smiths Court, clearing the way for a shitty new retail area, where Mambo and Fred Perry will compete for our cash, and this man will be forced to smoke elsewhere as another vestige of old Soho dies.

Come and visit us before we have to move.

The Raw And The Cooked

Thu, 26 May 2011 05:48:07 +0100

Food is incredibly important to Somesuch. Sally’s parents - Jim and Wendy - run an award winning restaurant in Martinborough called the French Bistro. If you’re ever in New Zealand make sure you go there and order the duck a l’orange - it’s an unruly banger. And Sally is a wonderful cook in her own right. Anyone that’s been to our house for dinner over the years will attest to this. Yep. We love food. Somesuch Restaurant is the dream.

Luckily our directors share this passion; none more so than Daniel Wolfe, who trained as a chef and worked under Paul Kitching at Juniper. I’m told Kitchens are rough, full of bruisers. Cock sure. Work, go out, drink, eat a gross of oysters Batali-style, sniff gack, eat Ambien, valium, sleep, get up, prep, work. It’s grueling. A pranging sous-chef flips his fucking lid and tries to blow torch you in the face. Creme-brulee-head. The fuck are you doing? Cunt’s laughing. Sorry cuz. I was only joking around. But as Daniel says, none of this dims the passion. It starts and ends with food. So he made a film about it. We had some short ends and half a day with BAFTA winning actress Vicky McClure: the result is ‘The Raw And The Cooked’, a tribute to blow, depression, disappointment and retro dishes.

The Raw And The Cooked from Somesuch & Co. on Vimeo.

Mixtape Hype Volume 2

Thu, 12 May 2011 19:19:28 +0100

Oh shit. It’s here: the Slipmatt mixtape, made exclusively for Somesuch & Co.

RAW.

For those that don’t know, Slipmatt is a pioneering DJ and producer. He was also one half of SL2 who in 1992 blessed the world with one of the seminal breakbeat hardcore anthems, ‘On A Ragga Tip’.

We met Slipmatt at a hardcore revival night while researching Daniel Wolfe’s ‘Blind Faith’ video for Chase & Status. He was so wicked. He very kindly came to Manchester and DJ-ed the rave and in the process blew the minds of a whole new generation of wild-eyed bean aficionados.

Warning. Warning. While listening to this mixtape you will hear part of ‘Spliffhead’ by the Ragga Twins. When this came out in 1990 on the Shut Up & Dance imprint, Dance Energy was my favourite program, and I wore Chipie chinos and trainers like this:

(I actually ended up meeting Flinty Badman; Daniel street-cast him on Riddley Road market and put him in the Plan B ‘Recluse’ video.)

Anyway, you are about to listen to half an hour of absolute fucking bangers.

Hold tight and keep it locked.

One love Slipmatt.

Slipmatt Old Skool Mixtape May 2011 by somesuchandco

‘Amnesia haze is a next bud trust me’ -...

Wed, 13 Apr 2011 14:51:14 +0100

‘Amnesia haze is a next bud trust me’ - Wiley.

Watching the new Palace promo video - ‘Gangbanging At Ground Zero’ - will probably be the wisest investment of 06:29 that you make today. It features all your favourite members of the Palace team shredding in New York City. It will instantly remind you of that time when skateboarding - and its documentation on video - was good, namely the mid 90s.

In other hood-rat news the director AG Rojas now rides for Somesuch. You can watch his showreel here. He’s also just made a video for Travis Barker that drops in the next week or so.

AG is our Shiloh Greathouse. Or Daniel Castillo.

Mixtape Hype

Sat, 09 Apr 2011 23:49:21 +0100

This is the first in what will hopefully be an ongoing series of mixtapes made for us by our friends and collaborators.

The Shoes very kindly put this together for Daniel Wolfe after he worked with them on the ‘Stay The Same’ video. We can’t thank them enough. It’s fucking wicked. Enjoy.

The Shoes Mixtape by somesuchandco