We’re all lovers of great music here at STANDBY, which is one of the reasons why we love working with musicians and bands as much as we do, especially local artists!
Having collaborated with Gold Jacks a number of times before, we thought we’d ask them to stop by and say a few words explaining who they are, and to share their experiences working with the crew here.
How do you know STANDBY PRODUCTIONS?
We’d seen (film director) Ash’s work while he was filming a local festival we were playing at and got to know him. We got chatting and before we knew it, we were sitting down discussing ideas for music videos. We’ve now worked on a number of videos with STANDBY and we’re currently discussing the next batch!
What have you worked on with STANDBY and why?
We worked on a number of music videos for our band to accompany single releases and to get some great looking content out there. As a band starting out, it’s all about content for social media and your website, so we’re always looking to make films.
Tell me about how the band works day-to-day?
We’re always writing, rehearsing, recording or performing basically! This year we’re concentrating on two single campaigns in 2015 – one in the summer and one in the autumn.
What kind of music do you make?
We guess people would say it’s got a blues rock feel to it. It’s been described as groove-heavy in the past as well. We try and write music that’s all about energy and performing live. We’ve got a few sides to us though – we tend to write these big, dirty riffs, but every now and then we’ll write something a bit more melodic.
Tell us about Gold Jacks?
We’re a four-piece based in Manchester. Been around for a couple of years now and we’re starting to get some traction on the ‘scene’ we feel now.
What are your thoughts on music these days and the general industry?
We think there’s a growing pool of talent in Manchester. We know of quite a few bands, signed and unsigned from the area – in that regard it’s quite healthy. We’re still getting our heads around the industry to be honest. We’re certainly more clued up than we were. It’s a strange one these days – it’s so easy to record and distribute your music and get it out there through social media, which would have been so difficult for band in the past I guess. It does mean you have to really stand out from the thousands of acts that are out there and get your content spot on in order to get noticed. It can be quite easy to get lost in the pack.
Tell me about music and film and what you think makes it work together?
Difficult one. We think that for the music industry, it makes your songs more accessible in the sense that a great looking video will catch the eye first and perhaps will be the reason somebody listens to the track. We don’t know what it is, but we find that visual-based uploads are so much engaging to people than say, just a link to a Soundcloud page, so for a band it’s so important to make sure you get that part spot on.
What’s next for Gold Jacks?
We’ve got a single release in the summer for a track called ‘Take It Back’ so there’ll certainly be a music video on the horizon. There’ll soon be details about the launch party on our Facebook page and website. We’ve also got a few festivals lined up which we can’t wait to get stuck in to. In the meantime, we’ll be filming a few acoustic sessions with STANDBY which is sounding really promising.
Final thoughts on working with us, and would you recommend us?
We’d certainly recommend you! It’s very easy to work with you guys, you bring a lot of ideas to the table and the filming process is easy for us so you must be doing something right. That’s not even mentioning the quality of the films. There are a lot of bands out there on the local scene and I’m yet to see one with a video that comes close to the quality that we’ve got.
How do people get in touch or see you at work?
You can see us at our single launch in early August! Details to follow but if you get in touch via our facebook page or website we’ll let you know in due time!