Ok Go singer and guitarist Damian Kulash begins the interview with uncontained excitement. If you thought their last video was epic (the infamous YouTube hit complete with choreographed dance moves on treadmills that has now received over 50 million views), then this one is going to blow your mind... Apparently, it features a giant machine they’ve been working on for 4 months.
Since then, they have released this ridiculously fascinating video for their single This Too Shall Pass off their latest album Of The Blue Colour Of The Sky. Check it out here.
Now I’d hate to make this interview all about the videos - primarily because Kulash is pretty intent on making the point that it’s not really what they are about – but they can’t deny their success has been linked intrinsically to their success as a video band. For a reasonably underground band, they have garnered 8 million (!) views on YouTube for their new video already - in less than 3 weeks.
On a side note, this band and their videos have already singlehandedly impacted the digital industry – the new EMI policy of restricting video embeds on sites other than YouTube (they earn money from views ONLY when viewed on YouTube) just has to be the result of such a success.
Think about it – the treadmill video had 50 million views, and although they earn only a reported 0.004 per view, we’re talking at least $200k. On the downside, since they stopped allowing embedding the view rate has dropped a staggering 90%. Sorry to get all political when this interview is about Ok Go, but you’ll see why this is all terribly relevant to a self-declared DIY band.
All this talk of money is ironic, considering how genuinely earnest Kulash is in this interview. He speaks for 12 minutes about the answer to my first question – and in a resctrictive 15 minute phone interview, that’s a long time. I have at least 10 other questions to ask, and I start to panic about when I will be able to fit them in. Fortunately, his 12 minute answer is genuinely fascinating...
So I wanted to ask you about an interesting quote in your bio – that you were trying to be a DIY band in a post major label world. Do you really think it’s a post major label world?
“It’s post that distinction I think. A lot of people have a lot of very strong feelings about major labels and indie labels, independent releases and doing it yourself... There was a time when major labels had a big stranglehold on access to culture, and so you had to choose: either you were going to go inside the system or outside the system. Now, none of those things are really true anymore. Bands that do their own thing; well, now it has very little to do with where you get your funding from.”
Amazing as this is, I have a kicker of a question I would like to insert here: I want to ask him whether he thinks it’s because of a move towards genuine music in public taste, and whether it’s because of the Internet allowing access to more types of music. I want to ask if he thinks record companies have less power over artists these days, or whether this latest EMI stunt shows that, in a way, they can exercise more; but he doesn’t take a breath. Kulash continues...
“We have pretty vehemently kept our creative control out of the hands of anyone but for ourselves. We make our own videos, direct our own videos, make our own music. We get to do all the things we want to creatively and we don’t let anyone touch that... It’s kind of a freedom and an annoying responsibility [about being a DIY band], I wish that none of our day was spent dealing with logistics or business, it would be great if we could just make our art all the time.
“But that would require putting a lot in the hands of other people... We want to make sure we’re not behind the wall of marketing to ‘promote’ us.... I’m so glad I don’t have to live behind this two dimensional image of me, that some big corporation has erected for us.”
His passion is terribly evident. This band is more than treadmills, YouTube views and some great hooky singles. They are clearly trying to do something here: they are a rare breed of musician.
In the industry we like to term musicians as artists, but not many could live up to that moniker. These guys can; they have branched out into areas as diverse as filmmaking, writing and art.
They have written a play and an essay in the best-selling collection Things I’ve Learned From Women Who Dumped Me. They’ve been published in the New York Times and Huffington Post. They’ve testified before Congress and played in the Senate chambers. They created a charity project where they join fans, walking the streets with food for the homeless.
And regardless of all these glaringly overachieving extra-curriculars, they still seem so… real. Normal. Genuine. I manage to interrupt ungracefully without being too rude, and get at least one more question in:
Ok Go has been linked to a huge range of interesting projects – are you just trying to make other bands look bad by showing off?
“I think that we’re probably on the forward side of the bell curve. I think the world is changing broadly and quickly. The cubbyholes and little boxes that we put creativity into are changing…
“The animating passion of our lives is making things. It’s a pretty broad thrill… The opportunities that this affords us to follow the lead of that thrill is amazing and it’s something that would have been very hard to do before Internet, before direct distribution.”
It’s at this point that we’re interrupted by the warning that there is only 1 minute of the interview left. Dammit! I still have to ask my ‘clever’ question, the lighthearted one that will end the interview perfectly with the best quotable quote ever. I should take advantage of this interruption announcing the time limit approaching to interrupt myself and ask it, but Kulash doesn’t even take a breath.
“[To the announcer]: Thanks, great. [Continuing]: Yeah so...”
[Interrupting again, desperately, looking at the clock which reads 14:55]: So on that note, I have one more question to ask. If you had all 50 million of your YouTube viewers at your service to do your bidding, what would you get them to do?
“Oh man, would I make on hell of a video. Can you imagine? Everyone would have coloured suits and we could choreograph it and shoot it from outerspace…”
Mission: completed.
Ok Go’s new album Of The Blue Colour Of The Sky is out now.
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