WELCOME TO LEVEL 2 OF THE MINESHAFT RABBIT HOLE !
Today we dig even deeper into the Mineshaft Rabbit Hole. Things get dark and sticky in Level 2 – you are 40 feet underground! Watch your step.
You’re probably wondering who (and what) Kilroy and The Cowboy are in our videos.
The Cowboy is an “everyman” walking through life, not knowing what awaits him. He is you and me and gets to wear a hat. Kilroy sort of looks like a crow-man. He’s a derby/plague mask/monk-robed/heavy overcoat wearing Angel of Ominous Happenings. He shows up in our videos as an omen of stormy skies ahead. In a way, he’s where I store my Dark Americana / Western Gothic ideas. An alter-ego of sorts. Pretentious? Yeah, probably. And it’s impossible to see out of that damn mask. Or breathe, for that matter.
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DRAGGING THE LAKE
(on the Day of the Dead)
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The video for "Dragging The Lake" will eventually be shot in New Orleans. But isn't this album about the desert? Well, yes, however New Orleans shares that same seductive threat of watching where you sin and waiting for you to dawdle when the bottle runs dry. Maybe operating the levers in the Afterlife takes time to perfect; maybe there is a staging area where you're trapped in a dream before back-falling into the Final Release. Can we really reach out to our loved ones while we're in the waiting room? "Dragging the Lake" does not have an official video yet, so Hunter has created a potpourri of AI images for you based on the lyrics of the song. Look closely at the photos - they grow odder under scrutiny.
Since we haven't shot video yet for "Dragging the Lake, we don't have any outtake video to show you. So instead, I have put together a 3 1/2 minute composite of four versions of "Dragging the Lake". It went through dramatic changes over the course of nearly a year. After starting as a horrendous attempt at zydeco called "Ya Ya," it got less horrendous with each passing version. Happy Day! So I hope you enjoy this Frankensteinian Fritter.
ARE THEY DIGGING YOUR GRAVE (or are they digging mine?)
This song was slated for the first Dark Americana album, but I couldn’t finish it in time. Probably for the best, since this gave me time to craft the foot stomp hand clap foundation better. There is a different hiphop-ish version of this track in the secret outtakes page, along with five other outtakes (including the dreaded "Ya Ya") and alternate versions. You get access to the secret page if you buy the deluxe MP3 version of “Mojave” from the website's shop, or you buy the CD or vinyl versions of "Mojave". Those come with QR codes to access the secret page. Pretty slick! "Digging Your Grave" features some odd instruments, in particular a tourist's balalaika that I created a primitive buzzing bridge for, added two strings and tuned the strings to AA E AA, so now it sounds like a teensy sitar. Put that together with the dulcimer and banjo and you have, well, I guess singing bees? So here is that guy again…
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The footage for "Digging Your Grave" was shot on a cliff edge in Palos Verdes, in a truly pitiful old graveyard in Palmdale, a truly spectacular graveyard in Virginia City, Nevada and in an old miner town called Calico outside of Los Angeles. I suppose it's true for any area where people struggled to survive that a couple hundred years later, those places become cute tourist destinations. All the gunfights get reenacted and everything gets a Star Wars /Harry Potter sheen instead of detailing the crimes and losses of real people. The true beauty of the American West is it seems far more ancient than it actually is. These ghost towns are barely 150 years old. Somehow it feeds into a mythos most other countries have been nourishing for thousands of years. The creation of America's Wild West might have been this country's most successful export.
"Digging Your Grave" outtakes are kinda fun! Here are a few - we are always at the mercy of a location's popularity, so sometimes we are shooting among other people. Since this is Los Angeles, people are used to things getting filmed everywhere. We shoot most things with our phone cameras, so I suppose most people figure we're making tiktok videos. EVERYONE in Los Angeles is making tiktok videos. BEARS are making tiktok videos. Anyway, this brief reel shows Kilroy stumbling (as usual) and some nice footage of Hunter calling to wild horses by making kissy sounds (this part was shot in Nevada).
SEE YOU TOMORROW IN LEVEL 3
