THE SKIN I’M IN – DAVID SHURR

Introducing David Shurr…

He’s a lovely talented singer/songwriter who works on amazing projects around the north west, I asked him about his latest release ‘The Skin I’m In” here’s what he said.

It’s difficult to actually detail eloquently what this project means to me, as it has developed considerably since it’s initial conception. I actually recorded the track over a year ago and scrapped it, rather unhappy with the takes. They lacked potency; the words were written but the page they sat on was whiter than a moon. I think I needed dirt, not moon dust. But then my friend Victoria said she’d be interested in making a video, and I really love her work, and I’d been playing a lot more and dipping in other sonic ponds than just the acoustic guitar, so I felt ready to pick the song back up.

Victoria makes a good point in reference to the personality she wanted to portray in the video. Initially within the film, the differences between the characters are very tangible to a judging eye. This is only natural as the song is at it’s lowest dynamic, mirrored with the distinct lack of movement in the shots Victoria edited together so beautifully. I wanted all these different people that had agreed to shoot with us to sit before the recording eye with little direction. I wanted their insecurities to show as well as their confidences. It’s very stark to me, almost jarring to witness people in such a naked state, regardless of whether they’re taking ahold of their portrait or retreating within it (I feel there is both within the film). I really love this awkwardness. I feel like if I’d worked with a videographer who was more focussed on getting clean imagery or a storyboarded sequence together it may not have worked out, because I’m undoubtedly attached to the lyrical make up of the song and that personal bond, or familiarity or whatever it is, couldn’t really have been absent from the video either. It’s crucial. Everybody that came to shoot over the 2 days was so patient and amazing and didn’t really question the obvious insanity of the whole thing. I feel like all of their personalities, whether premeditated or not, are oozing out of the screen throughout.

Even within the singing section where we just sprung it on the cast to strip down and mime, “If you want to show me, I’ve the perfect body”; People really embraced it and did their bit and dug it. That section is really crucial to me too. All of the characters’ visual differences and varying emotions are broken down; they’re stripped bare and their likenesses are brought into a much wider context where I feel there is a larger presence overhead of them all. Driving, driving, driving. Suddenly everybody’s individuality seems to make them only more similar. And with identity blurred, perfection fades away. Suddenly it doesn’t seem so unattainable, perhaps it was there all along…

Obviously the special effects are minimal because we made the video for next to nothing, but I think it’s really effective regardless. For me, at least, it was really powerful to see that sequence finished and laid to the track… That beast has grabbed ahold of me lots of times performing the song live, it’s almost a hypnoses for me, and there was something so satisfying about transferring that to the faces of others after developing such a familiarity with it. Like being proud of a good friend or something. I won’t comment much on what the track is about to me… because I don’t think that’s really important. Besides, I’ll never be able to hear it the way anybody else will because it’s my own voice there, which has always been a real love/hate thing. But I do think the work as a whole, with the music and visuals, tells a fairly clear story.

Maybe that’s just my take on it and you watched the video and you thought it was nice and all but not very thought provoking, or maybe you thought it was absolutely bonkers and switched it off immediately, or maybe you hate black and white photography. But that’s the question the song asks, I think: What are you, really? What light hits your eye? And does it only do so because you looked towards it? Or because it chose to fall on your silly old face?

David Shurr

The Skin I’m In – Out Now for Free Download on http://davidshurr.com Also available on iTunes: http://tinyurl.com/skinnydave and all major digital retailers.

Carl Brown, a member of the onefiveeight collective did a remix of the song for the B-side for this single. Check It out…