"With 'Sweat' we wanted to convey a sense of rawness that inherently lives in this track, a live take in a bathroom studio," says Ry X of his latest video, co-directed with long time collaborator Dugan O’Neal. "I tend to go more linear with ideas, Ry wants go as abstract as possible but the same creative energy is there," adds the Los Angeles-based director O'Neal.
O’Neal has previously provided visuals for The Acid, the enigmatic electronic three-piece that Ry X aka Ry Cuming is the vocalist for. One might not expect the duo to be such close creative bedfellows. The former’s filmography consists of a dive bar dance-off for electro-funk jokers Chromeo and a web series about park rangers with dreams of becoming the next Scorsese. The latter is an emotive songwriter and acoustic artist. But, like its subject, the making of the video was a romance—or, more succinctly, a bromance—in its own right. “In many ways Dugan and I have become brothers,” says Cuming. "I generally have a thread and bring it to Dugan, we sew it together over lunches and teas, and then go shoot.”
Captured around Glassell Park and Downtown LA, the video is just the latest in a long series of vines, music videos, and songs created by the pair, most of which has never seen the light of day outside their own circles. “We always have a lot of fun,” says O’ Neal. “A lot of jokes. One of the most memorable was when Ry actually cried on camera, it was deep—then we went back to jokes.”
"Sweat / Love Like This" is out today on Dumont Dumont and Ry X is on tour across Europe kicking off in Berlin, Hamburg, Amsterdam, Brussels, Paris and London from February 13 through 20, 2015.