In this month’s Memphis Magazine, I wrote about the rebirth of the Clayborn Temple. As part of the program to breathe new life into the Downtown landmark, the On Location: Memphis Film Festival is sponsoring a 15 week film series.
Sebastian Banks of Black Rock Revival in Verge
The series kicked off last Thursday with the acclaimed Fruitvale Station, and most of the works screening in the storied sanctuary share some element of social awareness in their theme. This week’s offering is Verge, a music documentary by Lakethon Mason that made its debut at last year’s Indie Memphis Film Festival. Verge tells the story of several independent Memphis musicians struggling to get ahead in the modern music industry, including Black Rock Revival, Faith Evans Ruch, Nick Black, and Marco Pave.
Day 2 of Indie Memphis continues the distinctly Memphis vibe set by The Invaders and the IndieGrant shorts bloc on day 1. Today, the focus is on music.
Sebastian Banks of Black Rock Revival in Verge
There are a lot of documentaries about Memphis music, but Verge is different in that it’s not a historical documentary. First time director Lakethan Mason set out to make a movie about seven musicians who are adding to Memphis’ musical legacy today. “The subjects were chosen by spending time with the music community,” Mason says. “We started off with about 13 individuals that we sought out from their social media presence. There were also artists I had known over my years as an artist manager that I wanted to capture. Of course, the film would have been six hours long if we’d gone with 13, so we narrowed it down to seven exceptional artists: Nick Black, Brennan Villines, Faith Evans Ruch, Kendell MacMahon and all the bands she’s been a part of, Black Rock Revival, Marco Pave, and Kia Johnson.”
Verge director Lakethan Mason
Verge follows the artists through performances and their day to day struggles to make it in the industry. “It’s not just about the music, it’s about what’s behind the music. We went behind the scenes and got to know these people. I wanted the world to know they’re more than just artists, they’re people, too.”
The most fascinating thing about Verge is the insights it gives into the depths of the musicians personalities that you don’t get to see from the audience, like Brennan Villines’ work for St. Jude, or Faith Evan Ruch’s nursing career. “What I was most impressed with, was that each of these individuals are creating their own path to success,” says Mason. “We often define success as, you’re going to be performing in front of hundreds of thousands of fans in arenas. But these people are defining their own success.”
Singer Nick Black performs in Verge
The film was produced with support from executive producer J.W. Gibson. “Verge is a homegrown project, from the artist to the filmmaker to the visionary,” says Mason. “There’s a tenacity of spirit that I see in Memphians. If they want to do it, they’re going to do it. We’re a maverick city. We’ve got the indie spirit. We do it our own way, but we don’t fit into a box. We don’t play well with the industry that wants to churn out sameness.”
For our final Music Video Monday of 2015, I’m counting down the ten best videos of a fantastic year of collaboration between Memphis filmmakers and musicians.
I’m not usually one for lists, but hey, it’s the end of the year, so why not? This Top Ten list has13 entries, which just shows you how bad I am at this whole list thing. So here it is, the best Memphis music videos of 2015, arbitrarily chosen and ranked by me:
As with most things created by the time-travelling aristocrunks, this clip will have you asking where parody ends and actual decadence begins. Then you just won’t care.
For his latest entry in his solo project Vending Machine, Robby Grant enlisted some of the best directors in Memphis to create music videos. The best of the bunch, and the best Memphis music video of 2015, is this clip created by G. B. Shannon, with cinematographic help from Ryan Earl Parker and Edward Valibus, and ace editing by Ben Rednour.
“The song is simple if you want it, take it. Freedom, quality of life, and the right to express yourself,” says Black Rock Revival’s Sebastian Banks. “What could better express the push and pull of life than a wrestler?”
This clip for the band’s new single, “If You Want It”, produced by Banks and helmed by Atlanta-based director Nina Stakz, combines some hardcore wrestling action with moodily lit performance footage.
“We shoot this in a one-day, 10-hour shoot,” Banks says. “The planning was key, with storyboards, fight choreography, and locations. We also where going for things we don’t usually see, an all-Black cast for a hard rock video. The action had to match the speed and intensity of the guitars and commanding vocal. Hopefully we made something MTV worthy and Memphis strong.”
Music Video Monday: Black Rock Revivial
If you have a music video you would like to see featured on Music Video Monday, email a link to cmccoy@memphisflyer.com.
