Singer-songwriter Pete Yorn has come a long way since his hit 2001 debut record "musicforthemorningafter," and now his music is hovering over Earth, in a sense, with the new lyric video for the song "I Wanna Be the One," which exclusively premiered on Space.com. The setting for the video is footage from a March 2017 International Space Station spacewalk conducted by NASA astronauts Peggy Whitson and Shane Kimbrough.
The director of the video, Leo Lovely, was immediately drawn to an out-of-this-world idea when he listened to "I Wanna Be the One," which is from Yorn's latest record "Caretakers." He told Space.com, “my first thought when I heard the song was space. I felt like it was about a spaceman stuck, looking down at his daughter, who he so desperately wanted to be with."
The idea bloomed into a unique lyric video that features a text edit app with the lyrics being typed in real-time while they are being sung. Lovely added, "I chose to present the lyrics that way so it could feel like a message being transmitted live, down to someone on Earth. The video is meant to be you watching this lonely spaceman contacting his loved ones thru a little message box on your computer."
To date, Pete Yorn has created seven full-length solo albums and has also collaborated with actress/singer Scarlett Johansson on another full-length record called "Break Up," and he worked with her again on a 2018 EP called "Apart." But he's never gone to low Earth orbit with his music, and it sounded very fitting after I was told by Yorn's publicist that his 4-year-old daughter has expressed an interest in space recently.
Space.com reached out to Yorn and the video's director in an email Q&A to find out more about how it came to be:
Space.com: Looking to stars has inspired many artists throughout time, and the visuals being sent down from the cosmos since the dawn of the space age are constantly changing our perspective on the Universe. How do you feel about "I Wanna Be the One" being interpreted as a love letter from "above" in the new video, and how were you involved in its creation?
Pete Yorn: I loved "Interstellar" (the film) and how Leo the director without knowing my love for that film, and the father daughter relationship in it, just naturally tapped into it.
Leo Lovely: I just found out that Pete loves "Interstellar." I love it too, but hadn't even thought of that correlation to the movie until just now, but ya, that's a perfect connection.
Space.com: I've heard that your young daughter has expressed an interest in space and that you've been reading to her about it. If you don't mind us asking, what sources are you drawing knowledge from?
Pete Yorn: She has expressed an interest in space and planets and the night sky. The first time she was out at night and i showed her a planet that was visible (Venus), she became ecstatic … jumping up and down yelling ... "i just saw a planet for the first time! I just saw a planet for the first time!!" She had so much joy. We have been reading National Geographic's "Little Kids First Big Book of Space." She's 4 now and she loves it.
Space.com: Thinking about fostering the next generation, how do you feel about humanity making the next giant leap to Mars and beyond, and where would you like to see us in a 100 years?
Pete Yorn: The prospect of visiting, terraforming and inhabiting mars or beyond is of course exciting and inspiring as a possible scientific and human achievement. In my heart however, I do hope humans can reverse the damage to our own wonderful planet and help to keep it inhabitable and sustainable for many generations to come.
You can follow Pete Yorn on Instagram, Facebook and Twitter and stream his latest record "Caretakers" here.
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