OK GO Partners with Samsung on Animated Video ‘Last Leaf’
OK Go, The Most Downloaded Band In History, Partners With Samsung On “Last Leaf,” An Animated Video, Premiering On Myspace Homepage in the US & UK Tomorrow, November 9th
Band Appears In Special Segment Of NBC’s “TODAY” On November 18th
Headlining Tour Wraps Up On November 27th
At Los Angeles’ Club Nokia
OK Go Wins Two UK Music Video Awards
“Last Leaf,” the latest video from OK Go, will premiere tomorrow, November 9th, on the homepage of Myspace.com at10:30 a.m. EST. Fans can check it out at www.okgo.net/lastleaf. The animated clip is a significant departure from OK Go’s trademark one-take, live action videos, which have won numerous honors, including a GRAMMY®, a Webby, and, most recently, UK Video Music Awards for “Best Rock Video” and “Best Video of the Year”for “This Too Shall Pass (Rube Goldberg Machine version).” OK Go’s clips have been viewed more than 125,000,000 times online.
NBC’s “TODAY” show has tapped the band for a special segment in its upcoming weeklong series of reports on YouTube phenomenons. OK Go will appear on “TODAY” next Thursday, November 18th, and they’ll debut a video they recently shot with the hosts of the show.
The “Last Leaf” partnership began with a simple question from Samsung® executives to OK Go: “What’s your next project?” OK Go expressed interest in working with Nadeem Mazen and Ali Mohammad, founders of Serious Business Design, on an animation idea they’d been dreaming up, and after some dialogue, Samsung turned OK Go loose with its latest innovation in premium camera technology, the Samsung NX100 camera. Each second of the video is a sequence of fifteen Samsung NX100 photographs, which OK Go shot with Mazen, Mohammad and a crew of interns. The band then worked closely with Geoff Mcfetridge, founder of Champion Graphics, on the hand-drawn animation. Mcfetridge is an award-winning, multidisciplinary artist whose work encompasses logos, poetry, animation, graphics, large-scale sculpture, textile and wallpaper, and paintings. His work is in the collection of the SF Museum of Modern Art and has been exhibited internationally, including the Cooper Hewitt National Design Biennial and the California Design Biennial. Throughout the process, behind-the-scenes footage was captured with a Samsung NX100. You can check out the documentary episodes here.
“Last Leaf” will be embeddable, like each of the videos created by the band to accompany songs from its latest album, Of the Blue Colour of the Sky, which debuted in the Top 40 of The Billboard 200. It’s been hailed by Spin as “ambitious” and named by MTV as “the best album of the year (so far).”Of the Blue Colour of the Sky Extra Nice Edition, which features the original album and a second disc packed with alternate versions, demos and covers, was released last week.
The new video comes on the heels of OK Go’s “White Knuckles” clip, which has been viewed over seven million times online since its world premiere on “The Ellen DeGeneres Show.” “White Knuckles” is a Top 20 hit at MTV, mtvU, MTV 2, VH1 and Much Music. The clip features OK Go performing a synchronized routine with trained dogs provided by Talented Animals (http://www.talentedanimals.com). Fans can purchase the “White Knuckles” clip at the band’s website. OK Go is donating a portion of net proceeds from these sales to the ASPCA, specifically for the support of animal rescue.
OK Go recently partnered with Indaba and Rock Band Network on a remix contest for “White Knuckles.” Weekly winners were selected by Dave Fridmann, who produced Of the Blue Colour of the Sky. Thegrand prize winner – “The Big Robot” of the United Kingdom – will have their remix mastered and made available for download in Rock Band and receive a gaming console, a copy of Rock Band 3 and a set of Rock Band instruments. You can check out the winning remix here.
The band also played a special acoustic set at the opening night celebration of “YouTube Play. A Biennial of Creative Video,” an exhibit of the most groundbreaking video work being created and distributed online during the past two years. OK Go turned the darkened room at the Guggenheim Museum in New York City into a veritable planetarium, performing atop 25-foot-high ladders, attired in suits with fiber-optic lights sewn into them to approximate twinkling stars.
OK Go – comprising Damian Kulash, Tim Nordwind, Dan Konopka and Andy Ross – is in the midst of a headlining tour, which concludes at Club Nokia in Los Angeles on November 27th. The band will also open for Metric on three Canadian dates this month and play a series of radio station holiday shows in December.
OK GO – FALL 2010 NORTH AMERICAN TOUR DATES
11/5 in Nashville, TN @ Mercy Lounge (Those Darlins/Samuel supporting)
11/6 in New Orleans, LA @ Tipitina’s Uptown (Those Darlins/Samuel supporting)
11/8 in Fredericton, NB @St. Thomas University-Aitken Center (supporting Metric)
11/9 inPeterborough, ON @ Trent University-Memorial Center (supporting Metric)
11/13 in Victoria, BC @University of Victoria-Market Square (supporting Metric
11/19 in Santa Barbara, CA @ The Hub @ UC Santa Barbara (headlining)
11/27 in Los Angeles, CA @ Club Nokia (headlining)
12/3 in Boston, MA @ Paradise Rock Club (WBOS Radio 92.9’s Christmas in Paradise)
12/5 in Providence, RI @ Lupo’s Heartbreak Hotel (WBRU’s Holiday BRU-haha with Neon Trees)
12/8 in Phoenix, AZ @ KEXX Concert Series @ Gila River Casino with Smashing Pumpkins
12/11 in Colorado Springs, CO @ Stargazers Theatre (103.9 RXP’s Xmas Ball)
12/13 inMilwaukee, WI @ Eagle’s Ballroom (WLUM’s Big Snow Show 5 w/Cake & Switchfoot)
Links:
http://www.okgo.net
http://www.myspace.com/okgo
http://www.facebook.com/okgo
http://www.youtube.com/okgo
http://www.twitter.com/okgo
