The trio debut their music video for “More Than Your Dog,” exclusively with C&I.
The song: “More Than Your Dog,” off Five Letter Word’s latest album, Siren.
The band: Stationed in Portland, Oregon, Five Letter Word is a folk/Americana trio comprised of Leigh Jones, Clara Baker, and Audra Nemir. Their blended harmony-driven music was awarded with the top prize in the 2018 Northwest String Summit Band Competition.
The story behind the song: “The main line, ‘You've got to love me more than your dog,’ came out of a conversation we had at some point about dating,” Jones says. “One of us was dating someone who would never come to her house because he always had to go tend to his dog. The other two of us had similar experiences to share, and we talked about how, when you look at someone's online dating profile and every picture is of him with his dog, you have to wonder if he could ever love you more than the dog.”
About the video: “The video was directed, designed, produced, filmed, and edited by Darryl and Hillary Jones of High Dive Studio. They are friends of Leigh’s from North Carolina who now live in Oakland, California,” Nemir says. “Leigh reached out to them and they liked the song and were excited to get onboard. We had originally had a few ideas for this song but didn't know very much about video production. Once we started talking with High Dive, everything clicked. They came up with all the scenes and the story. Hillary in particular took charge of set and scene design, and came up with the ideas for the different color schemes and props. She assigned us different color clothes to get, and we spent several hours in thrift shops collecting items. Meanwhile, she found and created all the props we ended up using, which was super impressive! The two of them came to town and we spent two long days in a studio shooting footage, with the help of two awesome production assistants, Pete Fitz and Aarica North.”
Stories from the video shoot: “We shot the video on a big piece of AstroTurf, and apparently one of the dogs didn’t understand that it wasn’t real grass, because when we were cleaning up at the end, there were some wet spots under the AstroTurf,” says Jones.
“The dogs in the video belong to friends of ours in Portland who volunteered to bring them in for the final couple hours of shooting. At the end of the video, there is one scene where you see all the dogs running around our legs. Trying to get that take was total chaos! We were standing there playing through the song while the production assistants were tossing dog treats past our legs to try and get the dogs to stay in frame, while also throwing confetti and blowing bubbles. The dogs were running for the treats and were confused by the confetti and bubbles and bumping into us, but we had to stay focused on getting the take and performing the song,” Baker says.
“Another crazy story is that Darryl and Hillary drove in the night before, and when they parked in Leigh’s driveway they left a bin of props strapped to the car. In the morning they realized it had been stolen, so they had to get creative and come up with new props at the last minute. We were blown away by their resourcefulness, and it all came together in the end,” says Nemir.
Why we like it: Who doesn’t like a song and a feel-good video that revolve around man’s best friend?
Get an exclusive first look at the video “More Than Your Dog,” below.
For more information on Five Letter Word, visit their website. Photography: Courtesy Little Green Eyes.
