Viewer Discretion Advised: EXCLUSIVE City City Behind The Scenes

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We’re very excited and proud to announce that one of OurStage’s own, City City, recently wrapped their first music video for the track “The Network.” As many of you surely know, the trials and tribulations of a talented yet “undiscovered” band are nothing to be dismissed. Hard work, strong bonds and a little bit of craftiness go a long way on the road to stardom.

Our friends in City City love us just as much, so they’ve given us the exclusive on the behind-the-scenes footage that went into making this killer music video. The band teamed up with the very talented director Bo Mirosseni, the man behind some of the hilariously viral Skittles, Starburst and Virgin Mobile commercials (see below). “The Network” includes everything we think a good music video should have, right down to the ironic mustache. The entire video was shot for $1,500, and when you see the finished product below, we know you’ll be blown away. When starting out, its important to rely on the kindness of others, and the band experienced this first hand with a camera rental hookup by a friend (normally this would cost $1,000 a day).

Jeff Kirchner (keyboard, programmer) is a teacher by day, and schools his students in Pro-Tools and audio production. Vocalist Dan McCollister works as a counselor for inner-city gang members. No doubt karma was in full swing as Jeff’s skills doubled their workload for this music video’s efforts, and locations were shot pro bono through McCollister’s non-profit.

Editing on the video was done for free and another friend worked on set as a production assistant, doing everything from running errands to making sure the floors were shiny enough for the performance shots.  But connections and relationships only bring you so far and shooting a music video is a lot of work. Originally intended to be a 2-day shoot, rain set in on the second day and band had to scrap the intended outdoor performance shots for inside scenes.

“We had to be up at the ass crack of dawn figuring out what the f*** we were going to do…where we would shoot. The liquor store in that video? Normally a location like that would cost like $500. Jeff goes there like every day and talks to the owner. They let us shoot for a while. We had to do a third day (about 2 months later) because we were poor…it would cost more…camera rental…and we had no prospects. We FINALLY got an opening with our “hookup” and he let us do it for $450. It was stressful. It was like a giant stink smog cloud that always followed you around.

“Not having done much as a band yet, taking months off to make a video was a thrilling but completely ignorant decision. We had no idea what this all entailed. All the people involved. It is still a bit unreal but exciting as I’m just now realizing that it’s finished. Lots of band meeting nights. Coffee Bean. Driving here and there. Location scouting. Awkward phone calls with the producer and director about budget…..”

Luckily all their hard work paid off. You can find City City‘s official video for “The Network” below, as well as on all of their networking sites. Go ahead and give these guys some love, they deserve it. You can also find the Bo Mirosseni-directed commercial for Virgin Mobile below (simply because it makes us giggle).