[RH First Glance] Eryn Allen Kane: "Hollow"
If you've been really paying attention to RubyHornet and the Midwest music scene, you may have heard of Eryn Allen Kane. If not, you'll most definitely remember her once you have. The 23 year old singer/songwriter has spent the past year quietly working on her debut project in the annals of Chicago's Fox & The Mule studios. With the project nearly ready and slated for a Spring release, Kane and co. decided to release this video for "Hollow", a vocal avant-garde piece, inspired by expressionist paintings and shot by the talented Austin Vesely. According to Kane, the piece came together naturally; "Robbie Mueller and I were just messing around but I eventually came up with a solid melody using original lyrics, as well as lyrics from two of my favorite jazz songs," said Kane. "I went home, played it back and recorded the melody into my computer. I don't know how to play the guitar so I just sang the guitar riffs. Then I vocally arranged the rest of the back vocals to make it sound like a full song. One night we decided to record it at the studio and it ended up sounding pretty cool so we figured we'd put it out as some what of a teaser for the rest of my project and not a single." Teaser indeed, the track and accompanying video certainly create suspense heading into Kane's full project, which according to her will share a minimalist approach with "Hollow" but with more variety and instrumentation.
This is not Vesely and Kane's first time working together either, having previously collaborated on the Vesely-directed short film "Sex Tape Day" that garnered over 15,000 views in a week and made it to the front page of Funny Or Die. The idea for "Hollow" came from a video in which actors are painted to resemble expressionist artworks. "We picked up some paint, headed back to his house, listened to led zeppelin and shot a video," explained Kane. "We both knew exactly what we wanted which made this pretty easy. We make a good team. He's the man." Check out the video below for yourself and keep it locked to Ruby Hornet for the latest from Eryn Allen Kane.
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[Short Film] "Sex Tape Day"
You may not know Eryn Koehn yet; but you will soon. The 23 year old Detroit born songstress has been building a steady following among those in the know in Chicago since arriving to attend Columbia College for acting where she earned her B.A. of Arts. Known around Windy City film and music circles for her sultry voice and appearances in a variety of short films, Kane has taken things up a notch lately, shooting a video earlier this year with Davy Greenberg for her cover of BJ the Chicago Kid's song "Her Pain" and garnering a feature on ProbCause's album The Recipe Vol. 2 where she handled the hook on "Motivation".
It was while doing a scene for an Onion web series that she caught the eye of vaunted Chicago videographer Austin Vesely, who was immediately struck. "Working with Eryn is great because she's never been afraid to commit to a joke, even if it's kind of absurd," said Vesely. The video, shot in 8 hours at Vesely's small apartment on Chicago's Northside, was a crash course in cinematography for Koehn, as Austin carefully handled the sound, direction, framing and jokes alongside everything else, switching off with Koehn here and there to shoot the video in full. The scenes were planned for the most part, mostly written by Vesely months earlier but the majority of the interactions were true improvisation, playing to Koehn's strengths. For those familiar with Koehn and Vesely, it should be no surprise that they were able to produce something of this caliber. Check out the 10 minute piece below and keep it locked to Ruby Hornet for the latest from the pair in the coming months.
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