One pervy frog man gets down in the music video for Weaves‘ “Motorcycle”, where vaguely sexual lyrics turn into an animated tale of a naughty amphibian’s newfound, crotch-heavy love for his newfound motorcycle. This animated short is the product of a collaboration between the band and director Jason Harvey, who, for a change of pace, put away his video camera and took out his Wacom tablet. In the featured Q&A, Harvey, along with Jasmyn Burke and Morgan Waters of Weaves, share their perspectives on meeting, the creative process, and the final horny result.
One pervy frog man gets down in the music video for
Weaves‘ “Motorcycle”, where vaguely sexual lyrics turn into an animated tale of a naughty amphibian’s crotch-heavy love for his newfound motorcycle. This animated short is the product of a collaboration between the band and director
Jason Harvey, who, for a change of pace, put away his video camera and took out his Wacom tablet.
In the featured Q&A, Harvey, along with Jasmyn Burke and Morgan Waters of Weaves, share their perspectives on meeting, the creative process, and the final horny result.
Weaves – “Motorcycle” Music Video
Weaves (Musicians)
Jason Harvey (Director)
How did the collaboration for the music video form, and how much of an exchange of ideas was there?
Jasmyn Burke: I hadn’t actually met Mr. Harvey prior to this collaboration. I had really liked a few videos in the past few months from Mac DeMarco, No Joy, and Prince Innocence and looked into who had made them; turns out they were all by Jason Harvey. So I guess I just kind of knew in some way that I wanted to work with him and thought he would be the perfect fit for this kind of song.
I sent a cold email and essentially he started working on ideas right after we agreed to work together. It just felt like he would understand the playfulness of the song and yeah, he did a great job.
Jason Harvey: I suggested using animation because all the visuals I saw in my head would have been too challenging expensive or impossible to do in real life, so I thought we just make it inside the computer you know?
How long did the creation process take, and what programs or tools were used to create the video?
Jasmyn Burke: …I guess essentially he would send us gifs of some ideas that he had, and as they came in, we liked every image, so we just gave him free range to do what he wanted after the first few emails.
But funnily enough we, by fluke, we met on Canada Day! Drinking beers on the beach with a mutual friend and then we sort of said hello for the first time. Posi vibes.
Jason Harvey: The whole thing took about six weeks to do; I had a few rough sketches I did with actual physical pen and paper, but for the most part I used a Wacom tablet to draw stuff right into Photoshop then manipulate and animate things in After Effects.
Using a stream-of-consciousness method of writing, could you write a couple sentences describing the main character?
Jasmyn Burke: What I like was that the motorcycle became the blue-eyed dream. Almost like the ride took away any type of emphasis on a particular person or place and placed it on this intangible entity. Gust or gusto.
Morgan Waters: Dumb green beast, lookin’ for thrills in a shitty town.
Jason Harvey: Non-gendered pansexual anthropomorphic frog/dog mammal thing, super horny.
Do you know about the phenomenon of people being in love with inanimate objects? http://www.buzzfeed.com/natgeo/10-people-in-love-with-inanimate-objects-5n1c + http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Object_sexuality. How does this idea tie into or change your interpretation of this music video? 😀
Jasmyn Burke: Woah that’s kind of a dark post. Hah.
We all gotta looooove. Imagine marrying a video game, redundant.
Jason Harvey: I didn’t really think about it before in the context of this video, but object sexuality is something I find pretty interesting; I respect love in all its forms. There is a pretty good documentary about this very small community of (mostly dudes I think) all over the world who are sexually and romantically attracted to cars. I think it’s called
My Car Is My Lover. There is a really good scene where the production crew wakes up to figure out a guy has had sex with their car in the night. This is it →→
http://topdocumentaryfilms.com/my-car-is-my-lover/
What are some of your favorite scenes or details in the video?
Jasmyn Burke: I have to say overall it made me feel nostalgia towards my childhood. Owning a spacemaker for my desk and writing on my hands and using marker to colour my hair. But generally, I like that really long still shot of the frog’s crotch on the motorcycle.
Morgan Waters: Jar Jar Binks Memorial Bar and Grill.
Jason Harvey: My favourite part is at the end when everybody dies; I thought it was a poignant way the end things — to tack on the death of every character at the end when the song itself kind falls apart and dissolves into noise. I like the illusion to a life beyond death, to the unknown and infinite reality of the universe.
The “Motorcycle” single is out now on Buzz Records.
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