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August 22, 2007
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Finger Eleven puts a new spin on the "guys playing in a room" video style by populating the screen with hundreds of computer-generated balls that float and dance around the band as they rock. The balls alternately line up in orderly rows and gather into clusters, often reacting to movements from various members of the band. The effect is akin to that of modern art meeting The Matrix meeting blood cells, and it's quite hypnotic.
We shot a few questions to guitarist James Black of Finger Eleven about the making of the "Falling On" video.
On the inspiration for the video: It was based on an art installation. The director sent us a photograph of a field of colored balls that had been set up at an art museum in Europe. The idea was to have the band perform in this infinite field of balls. The original video concept also involved some dancers. As I understood it, the balls would at some points be incredibly dense, then a space would appear in the midst of them and that shape would eventually become the outline of a woman dancing to the song. I imagined the balls to be like a swarm of bees that would randomly turn into dancers grooving to the song. I thought the dancers would come off like the opening credits of a James Bond movie, very graphic. But that was not the case, it was nothing like that. It ended up coming off like a cheap way to have girls in the video, so we axed the idea.
On the significance of the imagery: I don't think there is much significance to it. We just thought it was a great visual idea, we just thought it looked good.
On the experience of making the video: It was a great learning experience; we learned never to be aimlessly gratuitous. Watching girls dance to your song is great but it doesn't make for a good Finger Eleven video. I also learned it takes a lot of balls to make a video like this.
