This one's for the dogs!
For their new song "White Knuckles," the band Ok Go continues their tradition of making brilliantly quirky videos (2006's "Here It Goes Again" features the band in a complex choreographed number on treadmills), but this time around, they've pulled off something mind-boggling — a dance number, all in one shot, with dogs (watch above).
After five years in the making, six weeks of rehearsing, myriad dog treats and 128 takes, the video has gone mad-viral since its premiere on The Ellen DeGeneres Show earlier this month. And, to give every doggie his day, a portion of proceeds from the video goes to the ASPCA.
(Follow this link to the band's home page, where you can purchase the video and donate to the ASPCA).
UsMagazine.com spoke exclusively with band member Damian Kulash and the video's director (and Damian's sister), Trish Sie, about working with these canines (all of which are rescue dogs) and teaming up with the ASPCA.
UsMagazine.com: Tell Us about the inspiration for the video:
Damian: Me and my sister, Trish, have been wanting to make a dog choreography for a long time. So when we recorded this album, I went over to her house with my dog and the guitarist came over with his dog and my sister has dogs, and we just played the whole album and watched how the dogs moved. And ("White Knuckles") was the song that matched the playfulness of our dogs.
Us: What was working with the dogs like?
Trish: Honestly, how hardworking these dogs are, they are so conscientious. They are so focused. They are, I've never seen anything like it before. We saw what the dogs liked to do because obviously when you're doing something like this, the most important thing is the dogs have to have fun. For them it's a big frolic. They don't give a shit about videos or YouTube, they just want to have fun.
Us: How did working with the ASPCA come about?
Damian: We knew that potentially millions of people were going to see this in a very short period of time, and that a universal human love of animals was sort of going to waste. We wanted an organization that anyone, anywhere watching it could understand was working in their community. It's like "please help the dogs of the world," and so we called up the ASPCA.
Trish: It had been such a fairytale experience that we just felt really moved to sort of do something, for the lack of a less cliché word, to give back to the animal community. We just wanted something that pretty much everyone can agree is a good thing for animals… Watch this video and you know dogs deserve it. They are truly man’s best friend. It just makes you feel like, okay give $5 dollars. We just wanted to help dogs.
