WRITING MASOLLAN
A film on the instrumental post-rock band Balmorhea, who released their new album Stranger this past October. The film grew out of my appreciation for the band’s sound and its irrepressible relationship to the landscape. I spent a week with them in a house a few hours outside their hometown of Austin, TX while they worked on the album and wrote what would eventually become the song “Masollan.”
Special Thanks to Rob, Michael, Dylan, Kendall, Travis, Aisha and Andrew for sharing their process with me.
Text from the exclusive premiere on IFC.com:
There are few bands like Balmorhea. It’s fitting that the group named themselves after a tiny town in their home state of Texas. Their music is evocative of West Texas and its wide open spaces and time spent wondering in nature. The band is on the frontier of indie rock, crafting music that is haunting and hypnotic, but never droning. It’s introspective, but never falls into the background music of shoe-gaze. It’s full of emotion without being ponderous. Instead it’s anthemic, emotional, and challenging, filled with swelling melodies, lilting rhythms, and dense textures. The music is heavily influenced by classical music, but is undoubtedly post-rock. Like we said, there are few bands like Balmorhea. Which is why it’s not especially surprising that when it came time to make a music video, they took their own path. The result is something that’s not a traditional music video, and not a traditional making of video. Instead, it’s shots of the group, including founders Rob Lowe and Michael Muller, writing, rehearsing, and playing their song live as they craft the song that became “Masollan.”
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