Music Video: A haunting Cass McCombs video featuring the late Karen Black

Date
17 January 2014

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We like Cass McCombs. For his name, mainly, then his music, then for his ability to make powerful songs like this one that pay tribute to spectacular actresses like the late, great Karen Black. Karen was one of those oddly sexy women who commanded every film she was in with a magical kind of electricity and force, she was a mysterious dark horse that never really got the level of notoriety she deserved. Cass penned a track with Karen, then asked her husband Stephen Eckelberry to help make an extraordinary video to accompany it.

Stephen says of the project, “Cass McCombs emailed me in late November 2013 and asked if I would create a music video for Brighter! using classic clips from her movies. It struck me as an opportunity to explore a theme that interests me – the relationship of film and memory. We watch a movie and the images from that movie become part of our memory stream. An image came to me: Cass himself becoming a screen for the projection of images of Karen – as if his memories of her were playing themselves out over his body. I found a clip I had shot with my iPhone when Cass was over at our house rehearsing the song with Karen, and I combined that with clips of her movies, some iconic, some more obscure."

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Cass McCombs ft. Karen Black: Brighter! Directed, shot and edited by Stephen Eckelberry

Above

Cass McCombs ft. Karen Black: Brighter! Directed, shot and edited by Stephen Eckelberry

Above

Cass McCombs ft. Karen Black: Brighter! Directed, shot and edited by Stephen Eckelberry

Above

Cass McCombs ft. Karen Black: Brighter! Directed, shot and edited by Stephen Eckelberry

Above

Cass McCombs ft. Karen Black: Brighter! Directed, shot and edited by Stephen Eckelberry

Above

Cass McCombs ft. Karen Black: Brighter! Directed, shot and edited by Stephen Eckelberry

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About the Author

Liv Siddall

Liv joined It’s Nice That as an intern in 2011 and worked across online, print and events, and was latterly Features Editor before leaving in May 2015.

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