Robbie Robertson has released a music video for his song “Once Were Brothers”, which just so happens to also be the title of the forthcoming documentary about the musician and his time with The Band.
The song comes from Robertson’s 2019 album, Sinematic, and the video successfully attempts to be as far removed from the film as possible. Rather than turning the music video into a movie trailer, Robertson teamed up with indie director Kevin Kerslake to center it around a different conflict of once-close parties–the American Civil War.
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The song itself features a slow, simplistic rhythm accented by a harmonica and a lone snare drum. The relatively empty sound is then filled by Robertson’s voice as he sings of his own conflicts, “Once were brothers, brothers no more/we lost our connection after the war/there’ll be no revival, there’ll be no encore/once were brothers, brothers no more.”
The resulting video is caked in a sepia tone to give it the appearance of looking over 150 years old, with footage of soldiers dressed in opposing North and South uniforms with former contortionists from Cirque De Soleil. It also features grainy footage of Robertson in his studio, clutching the same guitar he played at The Last Waltz as his own historical reference.
“I didn’t write the song for the movie and the movie wasn’t being made around the song,” Robertson told Rolling Stone last summer. “They just drifted together at a certain point and it felt right. I’m talking about the brotherhood with the group.”
“We wanted something atmospheric, a tone poem,” Kerslake said. “We wanted to create a trance-like experience.” Robertson himself says he wanted to go in “a different direction.”
Watch the music video for Robbie Robertson’s “Once Were Brothers” below.
Robbie Roberson – “Once Were Brothers”
[Video: RobbieRobertsonVEVO]
For up-to-date information on new music from Robbie Robertson and future tours, visit his website.