A Western Front "Mrs Vening" - leave a comment

WORLD PREMIERE! Choose "watch in high quality". A very Beatlesque song that I hadn't originally planned to make into a video. But I had 3 hours to kill in an editing suite back in 1983 and a very limited amount of shapes and effects to work with and I liked the song. So I constructed a nonsense video from footage from other videos and these adjustable special FX. Final image is of accomplished actress Samantha Follows in her first role. Tim Alexander was the singer/songwriter/guitarist/leader. Other band members include Robert Cota on bass and backing vocals, John Pop on skins, and the late great Dale Strachan tickling the ivories.

AWF apparently prowled the rock clubs and record studios of California for many years. That would make this video and music their "Love Me Do" phase, but I would describe this era of their music as being closer to Help or Rubber Soul, with a smattering of Revolver and Magical Mystery Tour. I still have an AWF vinyl EP from 1982 where they cover Strawberry Fields F'rever. AWF's Sgt. Pepper/White Album/Abbey Road era is represented well on youtube in 3 mind-blowing psychotronic video clips. They remind me of early Tubes, early Split Enz, even Mike Patton!

Tim's later work can be found on the website and myspace page of his latest project, Swedelife.

If you liked this video, you'll love my 'real' AWF video, Joan of Arc, also circa 1982-83:

http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=F9uP2QRgOrI

Director, Marc Friedlander

Category:

Music

Tags:

• Beatles
• Western
• Front
• Mrs.
• Vening
• Tim
• Alexander
• Dale
• Strachan
• Marc
• Friedlander
• Samantha
• Follows
• awesternfront
• Robert
• Cota
• John
• Pop

[xtcpino]

Was this shot at USC or SMCC?

[SheldonLefkowitz]

Neither. I put this together at a pro editing suite in Carson, Ca. I used to produce a TV show there called "South Coast Live" featuring The Poorman from KROQ and I edited this together for the show. They're a great band and this is a fun song, but it's a dumb video because I just threw it together in a couple of hours. Soon I'll upload an interview Poorman did with Tim & Dale from AWF. BTW, how did you know I went to USC Cinema? I took 1 class at SMCC, but I shot music videos at LMU & LACC.

[SheldonLefkowitz]

I have a few more unseen unuploaded gems cluttering up my closet classicks. I also have a few duds that are actually worse than this dumb video! Those will never be uploaded. I have another channel for my conventional event video demos and uploads:

amazingprovideo

Are you a fan of mine or just someone collecting ridiculous videos on youtube?....or are you a former classmate?

[hididdlyho82]

got a kind of the beatles byrds thing going

[myrookitten]

I love your keyboard player!!!!

[skalih]

Hi Marc. Wow, it's good to see this stuff after 25 years or so.

I do feel it necessary to correct something you've written, though. The Keys (yes, mellotron) were played by Dan Sanders, who played with AWF between 1982-3. The late Dale Strachan, who played with AFW after Sanders left the band, was primarily a guitar player and songwriter.

Sanders, Strachan, and Glogovac (along with Joe Frengel) later played together in a band called "The Larry Tate Experience" between 1986-8.

[itsbeach]

so great to see this man! great stuff!

[phantomofthedrivein]

well I just favorite anything I would want to watch again. Is this your band?

[phantomofthedrivein]

are you going to put up some more bands?