David Lockhart. Singer-song writer, incredible lyricist, guitarist, bassist, violist...Probably a lot more than listed here. My first shoot with Lockhart was at Finnegan's Pub in Hoboken, NJ for his song, "Rattle the Cage." It's very catchy, especially while drinking at an Irish pub.
The times I've worked with him, he prefers to capture the sound of the moment and and the visuals to match. "Rattle the Cage" was filmed in a bar during a live performance.
I love the documentary feel of recording live sound to go with the visuals, rather than just to playback. Yea, it doesn't have that sweet polished studio finish (which is also great), but it has an emotional layer of that moment captured with it. (Bar sounds, patrons, glasses clinking, etc)
"Ghost Ship" was the same. We captured the first performance in our studio and then layered more performance shots on top of it. If it sounds like it was recorded in an empty warehouse space, that's because it was. The song was written as a dedication to those impacted by the Ghost Ship fire in Oakland, California in 2016: an artist collective housed in a warehouse, known as Ghost Ship, caught fire during a concert taking the lives of 36 people.
We had to shoot after bedtime, so he could put his two boys to bed, with his wife Courtney, each night. (melt my heart.) and with a bottle of red. I love it.
Dave told me he wanted to play the song and look like the room was catching on fire. The unsung hero of the shoot, is Jack Breslin. I told him I wanted to create fog that lifted from the bottom like fire and he laid on the ground, take after take, and released the fog.
I loved this shoot, and I highly suggest listening and following Dave Lockhart.