News

Lostprophets Appear In Gritty New Drama

• 29th Mar 2010

Lostprophets have taken a totally new direction in their new video for forthcoming single “For He’s A Jolly Good Felon” in producing two different versions of the video – one as a raw music video, and one as an extended mini film with a storyline and characters.

Director Charlie Lightening chose to shoot the gritty film on the streets of his home city of Manchester, and also in East London where he is now based.

Charlie says, “from the start the band wanted to do something different with the track and the mini film was inspired more by the realism of Shane Meadows than the witty scripture of polished Uk dramas”.

All of the characters in the film are raw and real – with Simon (Sie Haworth), the main character, being literally plucked from the street to be in the production, coming from a background of street fighting, boxing and gangster lifestyles…the tattoos and stab wounds he sports in the videos are one hundred per cent real.

Alan Forward (Brick Top from Snatch) also appears as a cameo of a gang boss…but ad libbed his brutal speeches as opposed to being tightly scripted.

Alan says “When I was invited to take part in the filming of For He’s a Jolly Good Felon, I had never heard of the Welsh band Lostprophets. I contacted my Welsh nephew, a musician himself who told me all about the band, how Wales is very proud of them and how their releases and touring has made them big on the international stage. This made me feel very flattered to know that they are fans of mine. The filming was tough. It was a hard and fast shoot on a fiercely cold day, close to the canal in north London . All in all, I am delighted to be part of the project.”

Charlie, having worked with bands such as Kasabian and now working on a documentary with Paul McCartney, has been impressed with the bands approach to how they make videos, and respected their decision to take a different approach to the Felon promo. “Its obvious that the band, 4 albums into their career, have made a lot of videos, but I was really impressed with their approach to this. Ian especially. He has such a strong vision for the band – through the video and artwork. It’s a pleasure to work with them all though, as they know what they want – it makes my job easier and gives us more options and more creativity. It’s a really exciting project”.