Central Virginia has hiking trails and hills but not much else – and it has even less now that the roadside attraction Foamhenge has been taken down. But your chance to see it with a nice RVA bend is alive and well thanks to Dumb Waiter and Good Day RVA.
Dumb Waiter has been gigging around RVA for the last few years. Their mix of metal, prog and jazz is a rare treat for fans of the weird and wild. And their history with music video production feeds into that motif.
Sure enough, their new video, produced by the nonprofit video collective Good Day RVA, is a welcome addition to the band’s collection.
Shot back in April of last year on both digital and 8mm film, “Greedy As Fuck” feaures impressive pans of the band at the hollowed grounds of the now defunct landmark.
“They have their own universe already built with past videos… and their performances that are already so funky,” said Chris Damon, a founding member of Good Day RVA, about following in the footsteps of Craig Zirpolo and PJ Desutter’s earlier Dumb Waiter video work. “We found this very odd place too fitting for their odd style.”
Shot in a single afternoon, Damon had been in touch with Foamhenge creator Mark Cline for over a year before they brought out the band to shoot.
“[Kline] was all about it, very kind,” he said. “And [he told us] if the cops give us shit, let them know he let us in there.”
But cops weren’t so much a problem compared to the power generator failing mid-song and Damon’s truck dying before it got up the hill.
Either way, the final product is a mashup of the live performance, drone flybys, and b-roll shot with Good Day RVA’s trademark 8mm film. Those 8mm sections, which are noticeably grainy and in standard format, feature fellow Good Day member Kate Rivara alongside Dumb Waiter member Tristan Brennis and his s/o Isabelle Bennett. Dressed in masks and costumes, the actors hopped along the precariously difficult terrain to perform the actions that Damon directed.
The four of them camped out, costumes and all, at The Devil’s Marbleyard, a particularly gnarly bell curve-shaped hiking trail along the Blue Ridge Mountains.
“There’s a mile of climbing rocks that seems like the James River tilted on its side and drained,” Damon said of the trail featured in the video. “It’s one of the most surreal hikes in Virginia and one of the more surreal hikes I’ve ever done.”
You can keep up with Dumb Waiter on facebook here and Good Day RVA on facebook here.
Words by Brad Kutner, image via Good Day RVA
