March 21, 2007
Hello? Is there anybody out there?
After another bout of being away from desk and generally up to the proverbial eyeballs in work I am back at Sigma HQ and delighted to be home. Absence does indeed make the heart grow fonder (even if my presence may well have been out of sight out of mind) and to be back in the bosom of my filmmaking family is indeed a lovely thing.
Download this voucher, print it out and get 40% off any wine in Threshers. Don't get too drunk though.
I've been off working for Hugh and Stormhoek (they're responsible for the booze voucher above) as well as scheming with various interesting people in London and Glasgow. World domination? It's too early to tell but there are definitely interesting things afoot.
In the meantime I have some more great music for you aural pleasure. There is so much talent on the internet that it seems mindless to use the stuff I hear on the radio in my films. Plus there is a certain sense of enjoyment from finding up and coming artists and working with them first - 'I knew them before they were famous blah blah blah'. So in exchange for a little publicity, and a little wine in the case of people who provided music for the Stormhoek jobs, I have been using music from artists I have found online.
I should also add that I have not been doing this alone, my good friend Robin Pigott has helped enormously by doing some of the research for me. So a big thanks to Robin.
Here are some links so you can go find these folks for yourselves:
As for news on Hallam Foe, well, this is inevitably a quiet period so far as fun stuff is concerned, the gap between finishing the film and it coming out at the cinema is hardly a news worthy part of the proceedings. However, I am reacquainting myself with the goings on in the office and should hopefully be able to report back with some snippets of goss in the morning.
Hallam Foe, a film by David Mackenzie starring Jamie Bell
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February 1, 2007
Dandelion Blow - Franz Ferdinand
'Four guys who met in Glasgow and formed a band'
- that band was Franz Ferdinand.
As many of you will know they have written a track for Hallam Foe, a 'personality ballad'. They have just posted the track on their myspace page.
www.myspace.com/franzferdinand
You're going to love it.
This just in from the Franz Ferdinand Fan Club:
Check out the forthcoming edition of the FF:FC magazine, for lyrics and chords to the track, as supplied by our Alex.
Hallam Foe, a film by David Mackenzie starring Jamie Bell
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December 7, 2006
Scottish Artists Screening
Last night the Scottish artist camp went to the cast & crew screening at the GFT. In attendence were Sons & Daughters, the Bill Wells Trio, Ganger, James Yorkston, Cinema & UNPOC.
I asked them to get back with thier views Adele from Sons & Daughters said it was 'Beautifully shot, funny yet very dark on the whole' calling the whole thing 'amazing'. James Yorkston thought it was 'surreal' to sit there & watch the film with music they performed featured. A thought echoed by Stuart from Ganger who was slightly disturbed that their song was used to soundtrack 'arguably the darkest part of the story...not sure i'll be able to listen to it in quite the same way again.'
More news as I get it...
Hallam Foe, a film by David Mackenzie starring Jamie Bell
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December 1, 2006
Juana Molina
Juana Molina, Segundo
It feels like a while since I have covered one of the bands that feature in the film. Today I thought I'd choose Juana Molina.
Juana Molina
I used to listen to this as I ran my errands around the streets of Edinburgh earlier in the year, particularly good on the rare occassion it wasn't raining snowing hailing and a bit of sun beat down.
The track is called Quien and is from the album Segundo.
I give to you a meagre 40 seconds of this magic, something to make the beautiful nightmare that little more beautiful...
Quien by Juana Molina
Hallam Foe, a film by David Mackenzie starring Jamie Bell
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November 23, 2006
Further dispatches from South London
A quiet moment in the office so time for another post. Matt Cooper, Domino’s esteemed & bearded designer has been piecing together bits & bobs from David Shrigleys drawings. Supplied with shots from the opening sequence he has been cutting & pasting until his fingers have turned blue & if all goes to plan I’ll have something to show David's McKenzie & Shrigley this week.
Matt Cooper looking into the mirror & not liking what he's seeing
Talking of David (McK) having my first meeting with him, Gillian & UK distro next week so we can synergise (cough) our marketing plans & put faces to emails & all that.
The following day I finally get to see the film. Hurrah. Also in attendance will be a gaggle of the bands involved in the soundtrack. It will give me a good opportunity to grill them about the film, once I have extracted their feedback I will cut, trim, amend & then post up here.
On glamour related business Jeremy from Junior Boys (as featured in Hallam Foe shocker!) popped round for a cup of tea & to admire the Brazil -esq decor of the office. He gave the thumbs up.
Jeremy JB & filing cabinet, fan, bin & assorted paperwork
Hallam Foe, a film by David Mackenzie starring Jamie Bell
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November 20, 2006
Domino Speaks!
Colin has kindly asked if I would contribute to the blog, I work for Domino and as you might already know the Hallam Foe soundtrack was compiled by David with music from the label. I look after the marketing of many of the bands here & my job is to pull all the elements together to produce a finished soundtrack CD & once that’s done try & flog as many as possible. In my posts I hope to illuminate the world of the music industry.
At the present moment Clare in our licensing department has been working hard clearing all the tracks David selected.
Whilst I’m putting together various artwork ideas together to get the wheels in motion. We’re looking to release the S/T same time as film release, so things are starting to hot up. I don't know if you saw The House Of Chanel fly on the wall doc on BBC4 recently? I'd imagine it will get a bit like that as we start heading deeper into Christmas...cue breathless french voiceover...
(We are currently in the midst of an office move, so please forgive our appearance)
Hallam Foe, a film by David Mackenzie starring Jamie Bell
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November 16, 2006
Blog hits NME
Now I have to plead a little surprise here. I do not consider myself any kind of authority on music at all, so to be sent a link to the NME this morning that directly quotes the blog I find pretty amusing.
Hallam Foe, a film by David Mackenzie starring Jamie Bell
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Sons and Daughters
Franz Ferdinand are not the only Scottish band to feature on the soundtrack. Joining their august company are up'n'comers Sons and Daughters.
Sons and Daughters
This is a band I've been aware of for a couple of years now (Scotland being a small place and the band having originated in Glasgow). I'm not going to write some kind of review, you will be well versed in the hopelessness of my music journalism by now, why flog a dead horse?
click pic to have a fighting chance of reading the text
But I have been out hunter-gathering for a few links, some pics, an old article, a sample of their music and a video clip.
The sample is from a track called Royally Used and (apply cheesy voice-over voice now) features in the motion picture soundtrack for Hallam Foe - coming to a cinema near you SOON.
Hallam Foe, a film by David Mackenzie starring Jamie Bell
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November 14, 2006
Music to my ears
Domino (always worth a click for news about bands on their label) have started to push their link with the film and the blog is starting to get little mentions all over the place. The Hallam Foe blog now features on the front page of the Franz Ferdinand site. They are doing a bit of promo at the moment (probably because Alex has a new book about food out) so they are in the press quite a bit and chatting about what they've been up to - Hallam Foe song writing as it happens.
Sons and Daughters
Sons and Daughters sport the same press release and will be the next focus of the little musical samples I put together. These take a bit of time to put together so it will be out either today or tomorrow.
Hallam Foe, a film by David Mackenzie starring Jamie Bell
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November 2, 2006
Four Tet
As promised here is another sample from one of the bands whose music will be in the film. I don't personally know exactly which track(s) are being used yet but I thought I'd just use my own judgement and pick something I liked as a sample. More accurate info will follow shortly for those who want the jump on more detailed info.
Pause album cover
The band in question today are called Four Tet and are signed to Domino. Long term readers will know that this is part of our music deal that has come out of David's relationship with the label and the kind of music he has been listening to for the last couple of years.
This little snippet is from a track called Twenty-Three from the album Pause. Wire in, this rocks, gently, greatly, in a journeyman meets lullaby kind of type way. (I owe all my music journo prowess to Smashie 'n' Nicey, they taught me everything I know.)
Hallam Foe, a film by David Mackenzie starring Jamie Bell
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October 19, 2006
Fantastic Franz
Going to the cinema first thing in the morning is quite an unusual experience. Todays morning cinema trip was made doubley unusual by the fact that I was sitting next to one of the leading lights of the UK music scene, Alex Kapranos of Franz Ferdinand.
As is customary for me to do, I asked if I could get a terrible photo with my phone for the blog.
Alex Kapranos
As you will know, if you're a regular reader of the blog, FF are writing a track for the film which we heard a version of when Nick McCarthy came to a screening a few weeks ago. It is really a great track, very different from the sound that I associate with band but an aspect that has always been present in their music.
Alex will be working on it this afternoon, deadlines are now getting pretty tight so we need it soon to get it into the mix. Hopefully I'll be able to share a snippet of it here within the week.
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September 4, 2006
Franz Ferdinand
Nick McCarthy - Farnz Ferdinand
The gang in the Hallion
I am currently in the Hallion again for another meeting post-screening. This time with Nick McCarthy from Franz Ferdinand, plus the usual suspects, of course.
David and Nick outside the screening
He has been working on a track for us to use in the film, David describes it as a 'personality ballad', which I think is a kind of genre approach to writing from the 60's, I think I may have to do some research into that though to be sure.
Nick McCarthy
It's a cool track in a pretty rough form, no lyrics and some pace issues still to be reconciled, all part of the writing process. It's really not the kind of thing I was expecting, a kind of lyrical drunken waltz rather than the angular fare that I associate with a FF sound. Very cool indeed.
FF are soon going off on tour to South America so that is where the finished track will be recorded, probably in a studio in Sao Paolo.
Posted by colin kennedy at 1:33 PM | Comments (2)
August 31, 2006
Something for the ears
It seems that the deal with Domino is coming together.
Nearly all the tracks we've asked for have been cleared and there are some great bands in there. But it's complicated stuff working out all the deals, music is a complicated business that, if I'm honest, has been explained to me a number of times, but discussion of recording and publishing complexities leaves me cold and seems to differ in every individual case so I turn off and consequently don't understand it.
Anna and Brian are working to bring it all together though and soon we will have the completed list which I will share with you as soon as I have it and put you in touch with all the bands involved.
Psapp
In the meantime here is a little sample of one of the tracks from one of my favourites on the list. The band are called Psapp and are sublime in my humble opinion.
This track is called Tricycle and is from their new album The Only Thing I Ever Wanted We were given a copy in pre-production to have a listen to. Fantastic I'm sure you'll agree.
They also have a page on MySpace.
David has chatted with me about the ideas behind the music in the film in previous blogs - click here to read his thoughts.
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May 8, 2006
Domino Records
We are working with Domino Records on the music for the film.
A while back I spoke to David about what this means and how this slightly unconventional way of using music will impact on Hallam Foe.
Check out the site for a truly eclectic selection of music www.dominorecordco.com
D.
I’m looking forwards to having a chance to DJ the score. In normal circumstances one gives a film to a composer... Now, doing a contemporary film its fantastic to have a chance to put the music I’ve been listening to for a long time, over the last few years, maybe into the film.
Laurence & Jacquie from Domino
I’ve been inspired by my relationship with Domino Records and we’ve been trying to arrange a way that everything I do in the film musically comes from them and their sister imprint Geographic, which is run by my friend Stephen Pastel.
I’m hoping that we do the whole film without relying on any scored music. What worries me, of course is an action sequence or something like that when you need to have it really shaped to the sequence. But still the challenge myself and my editor face is to construct even those sequences within the music that we have within that Domino spectrum.
So I hope it goes well.
Q. From that point of view would you consider, having identified specific tracks, then working with specific artists for specific scenes?
D.
One of the things I talked to Lawrence about, who runs Domino, is about in some cases instead of getting masters of the songs is getting the Pro Tools files to go in there and do a certain amount of editorial work ourselves – obviously with the consent of the musicians involved. The other thing is that my sound editors, Savalas, they’re quite a musical bunch themselves and they’re always providing me with sound design which in the normal case I actually find regularly gets dumped ‘cos the music gets put on top of it and you can’t really here the sound design anymore and what you can hear just clouds up the music. So you end up without a lot of the things they’ve worked on. So I’m actually hoping in this case there’ll be a space for those things to be there, so the kind of weird sounds and bumps and clangs and tensions are things they always do create in the sound design but I’ll be able to bring to the foreground this time because I won’t be having score to kind of cope with that.
I’m very excited by it and I hope that its an experiment to gather rather than create and that’s a different kind of thing.
The are one or two well-known bands but I can’t name names now.
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