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Denai Moore 'Cascades' by Samuel Douek

Promonews - 20th Mar 2020

Denai Moore descends into a wonderfully warped, highly stylised world in Samuel Douek's fantastical vision for the singer's Cascades. 

The track is based on Moore's troubled, troubling worldview: she sings about literally getting engulfed in sadness and depression, the sonic background shifting from optimistic to ominous, ending in a haunting, slowed-down acapella outro. At the same time, in the video her surreal, Alice-like adventure, encountering a cast of colourful characters after she luminously-lit car, gets darker. She is looking to find her way out of this dystopian maze.

DENAI MOORE:

“I really wanted the Cascades video to translate like a weird, surreal dream. The song is about feeling visceral sadness and being too caught up in your own headspace. 

"Samuel and I collaborated on the concept of me literally melting myself as a kind of metaphorical self-destruction. Samuel cast my face the night before the shoot and it really put me into the headspace of the world we were creating. 

"Sonically this song was tricky to work on. Alex and I did a lot of crazy modular twisted noises, but ended up stripping it back and have tinkles of noise in the song. In the ending of the song, we actually slow it down a couple of bpm and the outro is acappella.”

SAMUEL DOUEK:

“With Cascades, we follow Denai as she descends into deeper levels of her subconscious. She is both trying to lose herself in this bizarre world and looking to find herself by uncovering her own face (or mask) which ultimately frees her from her mind. 

"I was very much inspired by surrealist films from the 1930s, and high fashion photographers like Tim Walker and approached the film from an architectural perspective, planning a large scale inflatable in which to house the different distorted domestic scenes.”

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Promonews - 20th Mar 2020

Tags

  • Director's notes
  • New Director
  • Performance
  • Surreal
  • Alt-Pop

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Credits

Production/Creative

Director
Samuel Douek
Producer
Eolande Diaz
Production Company
BELIEVE MEDIA
Executive Producer
1st AD
Ty Hack

Camera

Director of Photography
Ruaraid Achilleos
Focus Puller
Bradley Stern
2nd AC
Elisa Spigariol

Lighting/Grip

Gaffer
Jerzy Gudjonsson

Art

Art Director
Louis Simonon

Wardrobe

Wardrobe
Joel Palmer
Hair
Rohmarra Kerr
Make-up
Billie Mackenzie

Grading

Colourist
Ben Rogers
Colour grade company
Gramercy Park Studios

Agent

Director's Representation

Commission

Commissioner
Rhian Emanuel
Label
Because Music

Other credits

Sparks

Jeff Celis, Alejandro Celis

Runners

Jens Nielsen, Miles Lacey

Art Assistant

Sacha Nicette

Set Builders

Michele Baron, Gianmarco Losco

Stylist Assistants

Anairin Kaines, Auryn Reeve, Gilliam Sevenkov

Mask Vinyl

Charlie Parker

Make Up Assistant

Clemintine Beclier

Cast

Akuac Thiep; Webster Laker; Merlin Glozier

Promonews - 20th Mar 2020

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