Behind the scenes on the set of Cloud Boat's new video

Cloud Boat are releasing their debut album, ‘Book Of Hours’, through R&S sublabel Apollo Records later this month, and the lead single preceding it is Youthern. At the centre of the single are the inescapable chants of “come down with us”, and the beauty of this simple refrain is channelled into the video’s production. Both the band and the video’s directors You Ness spoke exclusively to Dummy about their experiences and vision for the clip. Read their chat, stream the video and see some photos from the shoot below.

You Ness: “I love songs that create emotions – we get excited, sad, happy, unable to sit still, unable to not sit still, a song can make your mind go blank or it can fill it up with visuals that you never seen before. It is from this notion of how a song makes you feel that I can write my music video treatments. When I first got the track Youthern I really had a hard time expressing the powerful and beautiful emotions that the song created within me. I listened to the song repeat and finally I could put words to what the song made me feel. What I wrote down was ‘breathtaking’, ‘mysterious’, ‘dreamy’, ‘powerful’, and ‘simple’, and these are all the parameters that makes up the video Youthern for Cloud Boat.”

Cloud Boat: “We can find the video process quite difficult as neither of us know an awful lot about filming or visual art. So what was important was that we gave the project to someone who understood us and the song, someone we could trust to carry it out from start to finish. You Ness decided that the simplicity and direct nature of the song should be reflected in the video and it all became an interesting experiment in trying to convey as much as we could through as few elements as possible. It was really enjoyable to watch it take shape.”

Tom: “In terms of the actual shooting of the video it was a different experience for me. I’m sure all involved would agree that I was possibly the opposite of what you would call ‘natural’ in front of the camera. I’m never really in control of my whole body at any given time which made it quite difficult. I understood though that it was important for the video to show me singing the song. It’s one of very few elements in the track and would’ve lost something if it wasn’t shown in the way it was created I think.”

Sam: “We had a great time making the video for Youthern. It was our first video to feature both of us, so it was nice to see how things really work on a long shoot. It’s always really nice to see how someone else interprets our music, especially visually and in this case watching the dancer shots being filmed was very moving. We’d both like to take this chance to thank everyone involved for everything they’ve done on the video, and for putting up with us on the day!”

Apollo Records will release Youness single on May 20th, followed by Cloud Boat’s debut album ‘Book Of Hours’ on May 27th.