Vol 10. Edition 5
News from CannaTown
Page 15
Do you feel like you've ever done something of this magnitude before? Andrew Oliver (AO): What made this project so intense is that not only were we producing a feature lm, but we were also trying to simul- taneously break a world record. Logistically, one of those alone would’ve been enough to keep our hands full by itself. So doing them in tandem created an insane level of intensity, and honestly raised the stakes dramatically because we had the public counting on us to succeed, but also a ton of nances tied into the success of the attempt for the lm, too. Dan Johnson (DJ): I was fortunate enough to hear Brother Oliver play live back on what I believe was April Fool’s Day, 2017. If you watch the lm, you’ll hear the song that hooked me at the end of their set. Aer that I basically started throwing my photographer self at them. My work clicked with them, and over time we just slowly morphed into inner circle friends and business partners. To me this is just a natural next step to the progres- sion we have been on so far. Stephen Oliver (SO): e moment we walked out of the news station it hit me like a bag of bricks. is isn’t going to be easy, and the likelihood of failure was probably higher than success. All eyes were on us and we had to succeed for ourselves and everyone else. is project had an impact on a level I didn’t fully understand until aer the fact. Did you unearth a 'community' of similar record-breakers or other mandolin players that really get jazzed about the records? SO: I discovered that the Guinness World Record book carries a lot of nostalgia for people. So the “cool” factor of a world record is one thing, but the nostalgia people have from reading the book as a kid was another thing. I’ve had countless people tell me their stories of reading the book as a child and how they always imagined their names being in the book (I had the same experience as a child). e guy who held the record that I broke, Kuntal Raj Chakrabortty, is from India. And from what I can tell, India loves world records. I think it culturally means a lot to them, more so than here in the US. Kuntal became aware
of my record attempt during the attempt. He was very supportive of me which meant a lot because the record clearly meant a lot to him. I have since developed a friendship with Kuntal and we have a bond as the only people in the world to understand the diculty of playing a mandolin longer than anyone else in history. Breaking a world record is never easy. It oen takes a team and an inhuman level of mental toughness. ere’s a bit of a “freak show” element to world records so I think they will always interest people. How has the lm -- and the quest in general -- circled back to a ect your musical careers? AO: It’s something that’s so outside of the box. As a band, people expect an album or some singles and a handful of tour dates. But we wanted to try and break the traditional mold and do something totally beyond the scope of what’s considered ‘normal’. But we also did it for ourselves. It was something we thought would be ful lling on a personal level, and so that’s what drove us. You had to act in all capacities (stars, produc- ers, etc.). Did that make things harder? Or did it feel more like a better sense of control? DJ: My younger brother watched the lm when it was nearly nalized, and had to jab me with “do you think you could put your name in the credits a couple more times?” He was clearly just jealous, but I think that speaks to how we took on this project. All of us handled multiple large roles in order to keep the lm in our hands, and I don’t think we would rather have done it any other way. I will say though that the world record attempt itself was not just us. at took an incredible amount of e ort from our friends, family, and fans to pull o . Did you ever feel the lm was about to fail, or you'd bitten o more than you could chew? DJ: ere’s one moment you’ll see where Ste- phen just stares blankly at some bad news on the screen and doesn’t blink or move for what feels like an eternity. ose moments of fear ended up being a huge part of the story and of what made the whole thing so special to us. Find trailer and release dates for the Brother Oliver lm at howtobreakaworldrecord.com.
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