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OK Go

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OK Go

OK Go is a rock band originally from Chicago, Illinois, USA, now residing in Los Angeles, USA. The band is composed of Damian Kulash (lead vocals and guitar), Tim Nordwind (bass guitar and vocals), Dan Konopka (drums and percussion) and Andy Ross (guitar, keyboards and vocals), who joined them in 2005, replacing Andy Duncan. They are perhaps best known for their often elaborate and quirky music videos.

The original members formed as OK Go in 1998 and released two studio albums before Duncan's departure. The band's video for "Here It Goes Again" won a Grammy Award for "Best Short-Form Music Video" in 2007.

History

Formation (1998–2002)

The band's lead singer, Damian Kulash, met bassist Tim Nordwind at Interlochen Arts Camp when they were 11. Kulash was in for graphic design, Nordwind for music. The band name comes from their art teacher, saying "OK...Go!" while they were drawing. They kept in touch after camp, often exchanging mixtapes which influenced each other's musical taste and their future sound. They met the band's former guitarist and keyboardist Andy Duncan in high school, and drummer Dan Konopka in college. OK Go was formed in 1998.

The band served as the house band for the public radio program This American Life on the show's fifth anniversary tour.

OK Go (2002–2005)

The band released its self-titled debut album in 2002. In the United Kingdom, "Get Over It" debuted at no. 21,[1] in the UK singles chart on March 16, 2003, and the band performed it on that week's edition of Top of the Pops. Also that week, the single's video was named video of the week by Q magazine. The single was featured in the EA Sports video games Triple Play 2003 and Madden NFL 2003. Also, their song "Do What You Want" was featured in the video games EA Sports NHL 06, Guitar Hero On Tour, and Burnout Revenge, while their song "Here It Goes Again" was featured in Rock Band, Guitar Hero 5 and SSX on Tour.

The band contributed a cover of the Zombies "This Will Be Our Year" as the lead track of Future Soundtrack for America, a political benefit album put out by Barsuk Records in the fall of 2004. Lead singer Damian Kulash wrote a how-to-guide entitled "How Your Band Can Fire Bush" for bands hoping to help unseat President George W. Bush.

Oh No (2005–2009)

The band's second album, Oh No, was recorded in Malmö, Sweden, and produced by Tore Johansson (The Cardigans, Franz Ferdinand) in the fall of 2004. After recording, in 2005, Andy Duncan left the band and was replaced by Andy Ross, who auditioned for them in Los Angeles. The album was released in August 2005.

Oh No gained popularity for its first single, "A Million Ways", in 2005. The video featured the band in their back yard performing a dance choreographed by lead singer Kulash's sister, Trish Sie. By August 2006, the video had become the most downloaded music video ever with over 9 million downloads.[2] The band performed the dance live on British TV show Soccer AM, as well as on the late-night American comedy show, MADtv.

They also performed a choreographed dance for the song "C-C-C-Cinnamon Lips" at shows after the release of their first album. It was based on N'SYNC dance routines, which they had developed for the cable access show Chic-a-Go-Go, which required bands to lip-sync their songs.[3]

On July 31, 2006, the band released a video for "Here It Goes Again" featuring an elaborately choreographed dance on treadmills, also directed and choreographed by Trish Sie. This video was viewed by over one million people on the media site YouTube in the first six days. As of April 2010, the original video upload for "Here It Goes Again" has been viewed over 50 million times, putting it in 42nd place for the most views of any video and 29th place for most viewed music video as well as the 7th most favorited video and the top favorited music video of all time on YouTube. The band has worked with directors including Francis Lawrence, Olivier Gondry (brother of Michel Gondry), Brian L. Perkins, Scott Keiner, and Todd Sullivan. On August 23, 2006, Damian Kulash appeared on The Colbert Report to talk about the videos "A Million Ways" and "Here It Goes Again". The latter video won 2006 YouTube Award in the Most Creative category.[4]

In OK Go's choreographed videos, their bassist Tim Nordwind lip-syncs instead of their lead singer, Damian Kulash, following the format from the dance choreographed for the song "C-C-C-Cinnamon Lips", which Tim sings. On August 31, 2006, OK Go appeared live at the 2006 MTV Video Music Awards performing their treadmill routine for "Here It Goes Again". On November 7, 2006, OK Go released a deluxe limited edition CD/DVD of the album Oh No. The DVD contains their music videos (dancing and playing instruments), a video of 180 fans performing the "A Million Ways" dance for a YouTube contest, previously unseen footage, and a behind-the-scenes look at their treadmill rehearsals for the "Here It Goes Again" video and for the MTV VMAs.

In May 2006, they toured with Panic at the Disco; in September they were in the U.K. supporting Motion City Soundtrack, and continued their U.S. tour supporting Snow Patrol into Spring 2007.

On February 11, 2006, OK Go and Trish Sie took home a Grammy award for "Best Short-Form Music Video" for their music video "Here It Goes Again".

In 2007, OK Go wrote the fight song for the Chicago Soccer Team, Chicago Fire S.C.. The song was offered on the team's official website as a free download. Also in 2007, OK Go covered the Pixies "Gigantic" for American Laundromat Records "Dig For Fire – a tribute to PIXIES" CD.

In 2008, Damian Kulash said that the band had not produced the YouTube videos as part of any overt "Machiavellian" marketing campaign. "In neither case did we think, 'A-ha, this will get people to buy our records.' It has always been our position that the reason you wind up in a rock band is you want to make stuff. You want to do creative things for a living."[5]

After visiting New Orleans in 2006, the band recorded an EP with New Orleans funk rock band Bonerama, to raise money for musicians who were still displaced by the 2005 Hurricane Katrina. The EP, entitled You're Not Alone, was released on February 5, 2008.

Of the Blue Colour of the Sky and Paracadute Recordings (2010–present)

On October 12, 2008, OK Go announced that they had finished writing new songs for their third album and were in the studios in upstate New York with producer Dave Fridmann (The Flaming Lips, MGMT).[6] The band previewed their third album, titled Of the Blue Colour of the Sky, on a short sling of dates on the East Coast of the United States that March, starting in Philadelphia on March 6, 2009 at the TLA Theatre. They have stated that these songs are the "danciest, most anthemic, most heartbroken, and honest songs", of their career, and the album itself takes a much more funky, dancy, yet melancholy sound to it, drawing influence from Prince. On May 7, 2009, a song from the album, titled "Skyscrapers", was released for streaming online.[7] The first single, "WTF?", was released on November 10. On January 8, 2010, OK Go appeared on The Tonight Show with Conan O'Brien and performed a song from the album, "This Too Shall Pass". Of the Blue Colour of the Sky was released on January 12, 2010.[8]

On March 10 it was announced that OK Go had cut ties with EMI and Capitol and formed the independent label Paracadute Recordings.[9] Of the Blue Colour of the Sky was re-released on April 1, when the new label took over the promotional campaign and all distribution responsibilities for the album.[10] While the official statement was that the two parties were departing on good terms, it was speculated that the split was caused by the band's discontentment with the major label over efforts to block viral distribution of the music videos from Oh No and Of the Blue Colour of the Sky.[9][10][11] On January 12th, 2010, the first video for the song "This Too Shall Pass" (University of Notre Dame Marching Band Version[12]) was released. On March 1st, 2010, OK Go released their second video for "This Too Shall Pass"(Rube Goldberg Machine version). On June 15, 2010, the band released a music video for their single "End Love".[13] On April 29th, 2010, the group appeared on The Colbert Report where they performed "This Too Shall Pass". On May 6, 2010 The Baltimore Sun reported that OK Go is selling USB Flash drives with recordings of each show on the Spring 2010 U.S. Tour [14]

Music videos

OK Go has earned considerable fame for their creative but often low-budget music videos, most of which have been promoted through Internet video sharing sites like YouTube.[15] Many of these have become viral videos; the 2006 video for "Here It Goes Again", where the band performed a complex routine with the aid of motorized treadmills, has received over 50 million views four years later.[16] Samuel Bayer, who produced many music videos in the 1990s, asserted that OK Go's promotion of music videos on the Internet as akin to Nirvana's ushering in the grunge movement.[16] Many of the videos also use long or single-shot takes, which Salon's Matt Zoller Seitz claims "restore[s] a sense of wonder to the musical number by letting the performers' humanity shine through and allowing them to do their thing with a minimum of filmmaking interference".[17] The success of OK Go's music first won the band the 14th Annual Webby Special Achievement Award for Film and Video Artist of the Year.[18] The video was named both "Video of the Year" and "Best Rock Video" at the 3rd annual UK Music Video Awards.[19]

Other live members

  • Burleigh Seaver – keyboard, percussion (2002)
  • Ara Anderson – keyboard, percussion, trumpet (2002, 2004)
  • Tom Brislin – keyboard, percussion (2004)
  • Jerry Welborn - guitar, drums [only during the band's break]

Discography

Main article: OK Go discography

Studio albums

Awards

  • Grammys:
    • Best Short Form Music Video (2007) for "Here It Goes Again"[20]
  • YouTube Video Awards:
    • Most Creative Video (2006) for "Here It Goes Again"[4]

Nominations

OK Go has also been recently nominated "Best Music Video That Should Have Won A Moon Man" for their hit video, "Here It Goes Again" in the 2009 MTV Music Video Awards.

References

  1. ^ "OK Go – Get Over It – Music Charts". αCharts.us.
  2. ^ Kaufman, Gil (2006-08-29). "YouTube Faves OK Go: The Band Least Likely To Become Famous For Their Dancing". MTV News. MTV. Retrieved 2008-03-26.
  3. ^ Maney, Kevin (2006-11-28). "Blend of old, new media launched OK Go". USA Today. Retrieved 2007-03-25.
  4. ^ a b "YouTube Presents First Awards". CBS News. 2007-03-26. Retrieved 2008-03-26.
  5. ^ Kirsner, Scott (2009). Fans, Friends & Followers: Building an Audience and a Creative Career in the Digital Age. Boston, MA: CinemaTech Books. p. 88. ISBN 1442100745.
  6. ^ "The Rock is Cooking". News. OK Go. 2008-10-12. Retrieved 2008-10-15. [dead link]
  7. ^ Pastorek, Whitney (2009-05-07). "OK Go's Damian Kulash talks new album, plus exclusive stream of 'Skyscrapers'". Entertainment Weekly. Retrieved 2009-05-09.
  8. ^ "Shooting the Moon with OK Go". LivInTheLimelight. Retrieved 2010-01-13. {{cite news}}: Check date values in: |date= (help)
  9. ^ a b Peoples, Glenn (2010-03-10). "OK Go Splits With EMI". Billboard. Retrieved 2010-03-10.
  10. ^ a b Karan, Tim (2010-03-10). "OK Gone: OK Go leave EMI; create their own label". Alternative Press. Retrieved 2010-03-10. [dead link]
  11. ^ Collins, Clark (2010-03-10). "OK Go depart EMI following criticism of the company, set up own label with two dogs". Music Mix. Entertainment Weekly. Retrieved 2010-03-10.
  12. ^ http://ndtoday.alumni.nd.edu/site/c.gsJJKXPJJtH/b.5692351/k.2905/OK_Go_Collaborates_with_ND_Band.htm
  13. ^ "OK Go To Make History This Weekend". Antimusic. 2010-06-10. Retrieved 2010-06-17.
  14. ^ Sessa, Sam (2010-05-06). "OK Go Sets Out On Its Own". Baltimore Sun. Retrieved 2010-05-22.
  15. ^ Jones, Nate (2010-11-10). "Ranking the OK Go Video Catalogue: Are the Videos Always Better Than the Songs?". Time. Retrieved 2010-11-26.
  16. ^ a b Elan, Priya (2010-09-25). "Here they go again: new OK Go video is a White Knuckle ride". The Guardian. Retrieved 2010-09-25.
  17. ^ Seitz, Matt Zoller (2010-09-21). "Can OK Go save the movie musical?". Salon.com. Retrieved 2010-09-25.
  18. ^ "14th Annual Webby Special Achievement Award Winners". Webby Awards. 2010-05-04. Retrieved 2010-05-04.
  19. ^ "OK Go win video of year award". The Daily Telegraph. 2010-10-13. Retrieved 2010-10-13.
  20. ^ "49th Annual Grammy Awards Winners List". GRAMMY.com. The Recording Academy. Retrieved 2008-03-26.
  21. ^ "Nominations for MTV Europe Music Awards announced". NME. 2006-09-19. Retrieved 2008-10-14.
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