The inspiration, ideas and story behind Raz’s music video ‘Candle Light’

As an instrumental trio, Essex-based multi-genre band Raz seeks to portray a narrative through music without words in their first music video ‘Candle Light’.

Raz is formed of Dan Goldstone on guitar, Pera Frank on bass, and George Krethlow Shaw on drums. Prior to filming the music video for Candle Light, they discussed what exactly it was that they wanted to portray in the video. The idea was of light and dark meeting for the first time in an alternate dimension in which dark travelled to the world of light. The theme dimension was used as the first CD Raz released, which was part of the production of this music video. It was titled ‘Parallel Dimensions’ (2016) featuring their 3 demo tracks ‘Purple’, ‘Candle Light’, and ‘Early Riser’.

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The video begins with the introduction of the trio dressed in black, representing the dark or ‘serious’ nature of the band, appearing in search of their light and ‘easy-going’ counterpart of the trio.

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The dark trio wanders through the greens in search of their counterparts in this unfamiliar dimension where the light trio simply exist and are playing in the field. This is depicted by the trio dressed in white and playing pots, brooms, and mops in place of instruments – approached with an easy-to-understand humour.

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At first, the light trio play their ‘instruments’ atop a hill. As they sensed their dark counterparts approaching, they stand up and leave to find the dark trio to investigate.

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As the music video progresses, the light and dark are seen facing each other off in a ‘musical’ or ‘sonic’ battle.

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Being equally rivalled by each other and getting nowhere, both sides eventually drop their instruments and make a run towards each other to settle things for once and for all – taken away by a flash of light to produce the end result of the light and dark merging to create ‘colour’.

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Light and dark wakes up to find themselves now merged into one being, in which they quickly came to acceptance, then turned around to continue their journey of existence.

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Since the production of Raz’s demo CD ‘Parallel Dimensions’ in 2016, the band has also self-produced their debut album ‘A Touch of Obscure Colours’ (2018) which also featured a remastered version of the three tracks from ‘Parallel Dimensions’ including ‘Candle Light’. The album includes 12 original tracks 'Wool', 'In Side in Vain', 'Bass Face', 'Towards Home', 'Cloak Without Body', 'Never Left', 'Early Riser', 'Purple', 'Candle Light', 'Lala Bye' 'A.M.C.', and 'Space Surfer', which provide a different narrative of variety in contrasting sounds from one another. It is through this album that Raz will realise their mission to crossing musical boundaries and put forth this message through their music.

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Raz have composed pieces in the genres and combinations of Rock, Pop, Jazz, Reggae, Funk, Surf, Dance, Fusion, Experimental and drawn inspiration from Eastern and Celtic influences. Examples of Funk composition include ‘Wool’ and ‘Radar of the Funk’. Jazz Funk pieced are represented by favoured tracks such as ‘A.M.C.’ and ‘Bass Face’ to Jazz pieces such as ‘Off with the Hat’, ‘Gecko Paradise’ and ‘7 Times Lucky’.

Of course, Raz does not “limit” themselves to purely instrumental music to convey a story and express imagery. Songs that use lyrics in storytelling are demonstrated in ‘Never Left', ‘Towards Home’ and ‘Lala Bye’ which all centre around the theme of being united and separated, with ‘Lala Bye’ lyrics conveying how the divorce of parents can result in best friends becoming physically distanced – only to reaffirm that friendship can still be preserved despite this.

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In practice, Raz's compositions are usually sparked by the band member's initial ideas, and then further developed as a team effort. For example, ‘Starlight Slush Puppy Express’, often referred to as ‘SSPE’ by the band due to its humorous track name, was the result of the drummer George’s idea to use a fusion of different rhythms. ‘Purple’, the band's first composition, was started by the guitarist Dan's melodic and harmonic guitar sections, which then progressed and developed within the band with the addition of bass and drums.

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The band often discuss how to use their music to paint pictures in people's imaginations – to allow their audiences to construct a narrative without it being explicitly asserted through their own verbal and lyrical delivery, all the while challenging the boundaries of music as we know it to create something new, exciting and enjoyable with no language barriers.