Music Video Premiere: Little Sur’s “Ache”
Photo by Mary Kang
Little Sur is the latest little Brooklyn band to be getting a whole lot of buzz. Even though they’ve only recently released their debut album, Modern Studies of Ancient Times, they’ve already landed a song on the fan-favorite sitcom How I Met Your Mother (!!) and received more than their fair share of accolades for their stripped down brand of emotionally resonant folk music.
Today, we’re especially excited to premiere the music video for “Ache,” a gorgeous track whose beautiful melody belies the melancholy nature of its narrative. Watch it — and read our Q&A with band leader Josh Meer — after the jump.
How’d you guys come to start making music together?
We all met at NYU. The band’s gone through many iterations since then, and we have been fortunate enough to work with so many creative people along the way, especially while making records. Meeting at school helped foster a super close-knit environment.
Tell us a little about the making of this music video.
The video was conceived by our close friends Esteban Pedraza and Aaron Pryka, whose production company Movie Time Picture Company is putting together a suite of 4 music videos from the record we released in June, called Modern Studies Of Ancient Times. We had a lot of fun on the shoot — we almost got arrested in New Jersey for driving a commercial vehicle on the wrong highway, spent a record amount of time on the BQE, and my obsession with staying hydrated almost caused a certain kind of accident. Luckily the Popeye’s in Brooklyn Chinatown was there and Aaron made a terrific maneuver to get off at the right exit. Some behind-the-scenes video of that may surface at some point. We shot footage around the city as well as in a studio for some of the performance shots. It was really my first time being in front of a camera for a music video. It was a bit nerve racking, but Esteban and Aaron are the best, so I felt very at ease.
Can you talk a bit about your influences?
Recently, I’ve mostly been listening to music I first found in high school. Old Death Cab For Cutie, Ugly Casanova, American Football, and Yo La Tengo have been in constant rotation as of late. And of course, Steely Dan. Always Steely Dan, though I think I first heard that in utero. Big ups to Mom and Dad on that one. Seriously, the last show we played at Cameo Gallery was particularly fun because the FOH dude was bumping Aja front to back before the show started. A perfect start, but also an impossible act to follow.
Anything exciting coming up for you guys? (Next record? Shows?)
The remaining three videos we made with Esteban and Aaron will be coming out in the coming months, so we are definitely looking forward to that. Olivia Gerber, an original member of the band who left New York for a while, is getting back into the swing of things with us. We’ve been writing and recording a whole new batch of tunes with her for the past few months, so we’re really excited about finishing those up!
