Last year I was lucky enough to spend three months touring around the North-West of WA again with my wife Andrea. I had the intention of shooting some footage for the Red Dirt Road video seeing as I would likely be in an ideal location at some point.
Trouble is I had no idea how to put the story into pictures and knit that together with a music video. I racked my brain for weeks trying to come up with a film script and came out blank, so I just took a lot of videos and pics of the stunning scenery all around us and hoped I could use some of it.
At some point I realized that I’d probably need some footage of me playing the song (as it was supposed to be a music video). I reluctantly succumbed to the idea and started looking for a location even though I still didn’t have a script.
About a week before we were due back in Perth we stumbled upon a disused sand quarry a few kilometres outside Carnarvon. It was perfect. There were huge piles of red dirt everywhere that made for a perfect backdrop. It also doubled as a free campsite for about four days.
The day of the shooting we were both sick. This was our last chance to get footage while we were in red dirt country so we had to go for it. Poor Andrea got roped into helping me with the camera and she also did a couple of cameo performances in the video (or was she an extra? Not sure what the correct movie terminology is).
No that’s not a wind machine and rock star sunglasses. The wind was howling and it was freezing cold even though the sun was super bright. I played along with a rough mix of the song I had blaring through the PA system set up in the background while Andrea ran around with the camera, and then I synced it up later with the finished audio master.
We got the footage after a few takes. We also both got VERY ill from being out in the wind. I mean REALLY sick. We still had almost a thousand kilometres to get back home and another weekend of gigs to do. It was hell for both of us but we laugh about it now.
Months later I sat down to edit the video still without a proper script. I’d got the intro and outro shots which came to me while we were in Carnarvon so it helped to set the scene and the story started to play out as I listened to the song, then the ideas started to flow. Finally it got to a point where it seemed to work and I had a video. Apart from getting sick it was a lot of fun putting this video together. I hope you like it.
