Here’s a thrill for York music fans – two of the city’s finest bands have issued stunning music videos.
Up first, superstar-in-waiting Bonnie Milnes and her band, Bonnie and the Bailers, have worked with Luke Downing and Young Thugs Studios to produce this engaging cinematic video for the new single, Baby Drive.
The song was written by Bonnie and performed by her with the Bailers: Anna Patterson (keyboards and harmonies); Adam Holmes (drums); Kyle Cronje (guitar); and bass-player Jack Garry who co-stars in the video.
Bonnie told YorkMix: “I can’t drive so we had to film the driving at Rufforth Airfield.
“Steve Kirton is a local business owner who let us use the airfield for a couple of days. He also loaned us the sick Mazda pick-up. A massive shout-out to Steve and his wife Rachel for making that happen.
“The dance was choreographed by Beth Clark, who patiently taught my two left feet to look somewhat elegant by the end of our rehearsals.”
She added:
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I had a great time filming it with Jack. We’ve been mates for a long time and I’m very comfortable with him.
The song wasn’t written about Jack but it could have been. It’s about loving someone so much that you confuse that with romance and want to test the waters.
The kiss and laugh at the end perfectly sums up the result, I think.
Baby Drive is the latest in a series of stunning songs by Bonnie and the band. You can catch her first York headline show at The Crescent on Thursday (20 February). York singer-songwriter, Luke Saxton, is the support act.
Oz odyssey
Meanwhile, a York band already on the threshold of releasing their first album and major success, The Howl & The Hum, have launched a brilliant, evocative video for their great new single.
Filmed in rural Australia, the video for The Only Boy Racer Left On The Island follows the relationship between a boy, his father and their environment – and what it means to ‘be a man’ at any age.
“We were in the Orkney Isles; and while we were there in our weird little van, one ‘boy racer’ kept coming round and round the island overtaking us.
“We were looking for the friend that he was racing and it turned out that he was racing us! And so, in this strange race, we decided to let him win. So we wrote him this song.”
So, how do you end up with a video filmed in Australia?
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There were a few live videos of the song already on You Tube, but our label thought it could be a chance for a new team to see how they could interpret it.
The brief went out and a relatively small creative team in Australia became involved, directed by Matthew Horne.
It’s shot in a remote Australian location. Even though the song started on one side of the globe, their take on it captures the universal themes of masculinity, family and place.
In just a few days, the video has already been viewed on YouTube by more than 9,000 fans.
The band’s debut album, on the Kobalt label, was completed last month and is just a few weeks away from release.