Jazz Emu to release 30-minute music video

To go with his new album Ego Death

Comedy musician Jazz Emu is to release a new album, Ego Death, accompanied by a 30-minute music film.

The ten interconnected videos - each complementing a song from the album - were written over 2024, and shot over the course of October, having been financed by Kickstarter donations.

Directed by Hunter Allen, the film follows the ‘true story’ of self-described ‘musicological phenomenon’ Jazz Emu, the alter-ego of comedian Archie Henderson.

In character, he said: ‘How did I come to add this work to my oeuvre? Fantastic question. Whilst meditating in East Asia earlier this year, I suddenly realised I’d undergone a canonical ego death, and was now completely without ego. In fact, The Monks who were there actually said it was the best ego death they’d ever seen; they’d never seen a more impressively or indeed aesthetically dead ego.’

The cast of the film includes a host of comedy names including Harry Enfield, Alex Horne, Al Roberts, Charly Clive, Ellen Robertson, Phil Dunning and Will Hislop.

Here’s a trailer:

Producers Country Mile say Ego Death ‘seeks to take the likes of Beyoncé’s Lemonade, Prince’s Purple Rain, and The Lonely Island’s The Unauthorized Bash Brothers Experience, and push the parody-ripe field of self-indulgent concept albums into newer, weirder places.’

It will premiere at The Rio Cinema in Dalston, East London, on January 23 (tickets here), the day before the album’s release. Grub in Manchester will host another screening on February 8 (tickets here).

Order Ego Death here)

Published: 26 Nov 2024