Easter

Owen Duff talks us through his inspiration for special Easter tune The Resurrection (Easter Sunday).

I have an unhappy relationship with Easter weekends, as being a spontaneous (okay, chaotic) type I tend not to plan ahead, relying instead on a serendipitous collision of available friends, perfect weather and wonderful free (and ideally not-too-busy) cultural happenings which in fact rarely occurs. The time of year which most clearly illustrates the gap between my aspirations and reality is Easter. It creeps up, I plan nothing, and everyone leaves town. Such was the case a couple of years ago when I found myself completely abandoned on the long weekend, sauntering aimlessly around an East London that seemed less like a place than a time in the future when I and everyone I knew had died. To make matters worse it seemed that a lot of new people had arrived in the area who looked somewhat similar to people I knew, but only from a distance. Somehow that made the loneliness more intense, like the feeling when you go casually to open a window for a little air, then suddenly feel you’re about to suffocate as you realise it’s locked.

Being a songwriter the default response when faced with emotionally distressing circumstances is to sublimate, which I did, eventually turning that feeling into a song. It doesn’t solve anything of course but at least you end up with a song, which is better than getting nothing for your trouble. I recorded it last year – in my head it started out as a country song with Tammy Wynette on vocals, perhaps you can imagine it that way too if you really squint your ears.

Anyway, my favourite creative process in some ways is making videos, so I decided to make one for this song. I film most places I go that aren’t home or work, and have amassed hundreds of hours of footage, some good, some terrible. I knew I had a sequence I wanted to use which I’d shot in the Venetian lagoon, mainly on the “garden island” of Sant’Erasmo. Maybe it’s a swinging place in summer but come October, when we visited, it is bleak. On a desolate stretch of beach we found a pile of rocks, a kitchen chair and an abandoned velour slipper with gold embroidery on it. Anyway, the footage took some work but eventually a narrative suggested itself (the imperious cat helped), along with imagery that provided a counterpoint and in some cases an illustration to the lyrics. I made it turquoise (or teal?) for mysterious reasons! The journey back was magical, you’ll see it more or less unedited at the end of the video.

The Resurrection (Easter Sunday) is available as a free download from Bandcamp.

Written by Amelia Gregory on Friday April 3rd, 2015 10:29 am

Categories ,Bandcamp, ,East London, ,Easter, ,Easter Sunday, ,Owen Duff, ,Sant’Erasmo, ,Tammy Wynette, ,The Resurrection, ,The Resurrection (Easter Sunday)

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