After giving listeners a sample of his solo transformation with his debut single, “Icarus In Motion“, JOSCH is beginning to illuminate the surreal and irreverent visual element of the project with the cinematic music video for the track, premiering today on Live For Live Music.
The “Icarus In Motion” video, directed by Dani Barbieri of Two Truths Productions and captured on Super 8mm film in Brooklyn, NY and Miami, FL, expands on the track’s lyrical retelling of the Greek myth of Icarus with a bewitching montage of eerie, evocative imagery, nods to obscure cinema, and metaphorical interpretations of the cautionary parable that fall somewhere between modern dance and retro-stylized psychedelia.
With JOSCH—real name Josh Schwartz, a former member of Turkuaz and present player in The Horn Section and Cool Cool Cool—in the role of Icarus, the video lays out the star’s hedonistic rise and ultimate downfall due to his excessive pride and lust for pleasures of the flesh. We see JOSCH as Icarus washing up on the beach in an embryonic, cocoon-like state, evoking images of mythological origin stories. We see Icarus’s gritty upbringing as he lurks around the streets of Brooklyn. We watch him rise to adoration as the spiritual object of a ’70s sex cult-inspired congregation that conducts mystic, erotic rituals on his naked body in a display of primal, carnal ecstasy (“the universe just keeps on giving / hungrily grasp for more / the endless spoils of war”). Throughout the video, we see glimpses of Icarus soaring through the sky (“you soar on gilded wings / keep score with gods and kings”) only to watch him plummet from great heights (“as the sun destroys your wings / see the angels beckoning”). Finally, we see a lifeless Icarus being cast out to sea on a golden bed by two golden goddesses from a stormy shore.
As Barbieri explained, the video tipped its hat to an array of cinematic styles and works. The final shot, when Schwartz drifts out to sea, was inspired by Chilean-Ukrainian filmmaker Alejandro Jodorowsky’s 1973 film The Holy Mountain. The cemetery sex cult scene was conceived as a nod toward Netflix cult documentary Wild Wild Country. The striking reveal of JOSCH’s posed, naked body late in the video was an homage to Terminator 2: Judgement Day. In the video’s final act, a team of women clad in white break out into a pillow fight around JOSCH, scattering plumes of feathers across the beach. The women in white, Barbieri noted, were intended to represent the clouds, while the falling feathers illustrate the dire results of Icarus flying too close to the sun.
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The music video was shot in Miami Beach as well as Brooklyn, with the flying/falling shots captured in front of the LED video walls at Volvox Labs in Greenpoint, NY. The video was edited by Ticking Clock Productions in New York. “I’ve been a part of many music videos before but never as the main character,” JOSCH explained. “It pushed me to my limits physically and emotionally but was so rewarding, especially after seeing the finished product. I put my body through some intense stuff in the name of art and I’m so glad I did.”
“I love that Dani and I shot it in both NYC and Miami,” Schwartz added. “This video in a way represents my departure from my lifelong home of New York and the surrounding areas to the sunny shores of Miami where I now call home. I was so fortunate to have the help of so many amazing friends both new and old in both locations to fill the screen with beauty and movement. Under Dani’s visionary direction, I think we all made something really cool.”
Schwartz will be back to his old New York City stomping grounds today and tomorrow, Friday, October 13th and Saturday, October 14th with Cool Cool Cool for a pair of performances at Brooklyn Bowl alongside Andy Frasco & The U.N. where, JOSCH hinted to Live For Live Music, attendees may hear a sneak peak of his second single, “No Beginning, No Conclusion”, due out in November. Tickets for both nights of Andy Frasco & The U.N. with Cool Cool Cool at Brooklyn Bowl (10/13, 10/14) are on sale here.
Watch the newly released music video for “Icarus In Motion” by JOSCH, the new solo project from Josh Schwartz. To keep up with further JOSCH releases, follow him on social media (Instagram, Facebook, Spotify).
JOSCH – “Icarus In Motion” (Official Video)
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