Thou bassist/filmmaker Mitch Wells is in the right band. If Thou makes some of the darkest music ever, Wells complements it with the darkest tour videos. Okay, not so much dark as… well, not really dark at all. Funny. Weird. Tense. Goofy. Tastes of sea water. Or something.
During a recent tour with Thou, The Body and friends Heat Dust, Wells shot some interview footage and other moments, then cut them together to memorialize the time the bands spent together. As he says:
“From October 15th through November 1st, we toured with The Body, performing as one band. This was our 2nd time doing this. It’s really fun. For this tour we brought along our good friends from New Orleans, Heat Dust. They’ve done a handful of tours up the East Coast, but have never been out west.
“The idea for this video was to interview two bands – The Body and Heat Dust – and get two vastly different perspectives on what being in a touring band is like. Everything went according to plan while spending time with The Body. I got to interview Lee and he gave me a lot of great, if not depressing, insight on what touring for 16 years feels like. Honestly I wish I had spent more time doing this because it was incredibly interesting and I feel like there’s a lot more to get into. Maybe for the next collabo tour…
“When I hopped in the Heat Dust van, “The Dust Bus,” I had every intention of interviewing them the same way, but it never happened. We spent too much time laughing and swimming, and hiking, and basically just “living in the moment.” I really enjoyed being with them because everything felt new again. When they had a great show, I had a great show. When they jumped out of the van to see the Pacific Ocean for the first time I jumped out and felt just as excited as they did.
“All this isn’t to say that touring with The Body is a huge bummer – it’s not. It’s equally as amazing, just for different reasons. Anyway, so by the end of tour I had no interview footage from Heat Dust. I was going to do a phone interview, but I feel like it’s not really necessary. This is not exactly how the video was supposed to turn out, but I don’t think it could’ve gone another way.
“Also, Jasper den Hartigh, one of the singers/guitarists of Heat Dust wrote a very detailed tour diary and can be read at this location. It’s a great companion piece to the video and I encourage everyone to read it! And thanks so much to you guys at Decibel! When I become an Oscar award winning documentarian I’ll be sure not to forget you guys!”
Oh, and here’s the actual video…