Praise for Cavan following music video release
Check out the behind the scenes footage.
The director behind a new music video has heaped praise on the local community and showcased Cavan as a prime location for cinematic works.
The video, filmed by director Finn Keenan, was for singer-songwriter Declan McKenna's latest track, ‘Nothing Works’, and was released last week.
‘Nothing Works’ is a track from his Englishman's third studio album, 'What Happened to the Beach?', due out next year.
Born north of London, and the youngest of six from an Irish background via Cavan and Cork, McKenna's paternal grandmother is a native of the Breffni County and he still has cousins living in the Lavey area.
The 'Nothing Works' video was filmed by the award winning Cavan director Keenan who, with cast and crew, commandeered the Imperial Nightclub as a backdrop.
The local Vincent's shop also helped out by providing costumes for some of the extras.
“The idea of match cutting between someone sleep walking and the dream they're having had been knocking around my head for a while. But there was never the right song or the right artist. And then Declan McKenna came along!” explains Finn of the creative plan for the video.
“To be honest I was surprised at first that he was up for doing such a ridiculous idea. The whole thing relied on him fully committing to both roles. The sillier he looked sleep walking, the funnier it’d be cutting back and forth between the slick version of him. And by god did he commit!”
Finn says the idea of shooting in Cavan was also his, and he pitched it to their label. The three-day shoot was “frantic and chaotic” across multiple locations, but Finn was keen to highlight the input of so many, all of whom received a written credit for their efforts.
It's not the first time Finn has filmed in Cavan, and he extolled its many virtues as a potential location and background setting.
“I suggested shooting it in Cavan to the label and luckily they were up for it! It was frantic and chaotic but there was an amazing vibe on set. The amount of support from local people and businesses was absolutely incredible.”
He adds: “It felt great bringing a production back to my home town and I could see the label and crew from UK were all blown away by the sense of community in Cavan. I really can’t thank everyone enough!”
When speaking to the Celt previously, McKenna described the experience of filming in Cavan, a place he'd only last visited in his early teens as “very unique”.
“It’s different, such good fun, very friendly, very open, very chatty. Everyone is positive to be around and just constant joshing around really.”
Finn has previously worked on commercial projects for Nike in China and Discord in LA.
Unveiled during the Tokyo Olympics, the Discord project saw Finn travel to Mexico and then LA where he rubbed shoulders with main feature characters - Danny DeVito (It’s Always Sunny in Philadelphia, Twins) and actress, rapper and comedian Awkwafina (Crazy Rich Asians, and Jumanji: The Next Level).