Third Man Records has spent the past few years dramatically expanding the parameters of their discography, with the Jack White–founded label expanding from their early garage-rock output to accommodate recent releases from artists ranging from The Raincoats’ Gina Birch to metal interlopers Boris. Among their most recent signees we also find the American-primitivist project North Americans, whose acoustic guitar and pedal steel invoke warm, slow nights on creaky porches far from the nearest urban center (OK, I guess that sounds pretty central to the Jack White ethos). Patrick McDermott continues along the dusty path he set for himself in 2018 on his LP Going Steady with the recent announcement of the new record Long Cool World—his second since signing with Third Man, as well as the second to feature pedal steel player Barry Walker as a core member.
Much in the same way the disparate sounds of garage-punks The Paranoyds and dope-smoking doom-metellers Sleep converge on their label home, the video for the latest acoustic mediation from North Americans titled “The Last Rockabilly” (despite all this talk of genre, the single doesn’t actually fit into the category of uptempo rock ’n’ roll) sees the duo soundtracking placid images of a handful of individuals slowly making their way toward each other from a diverse set of backgrounds.
“Our video for ‘The Last Rockabilly’ aims to bring the meditative nature of the song to the forefront while the experimental narrative reflects upon each character as they traverse through existence,” share filmmakers Rocco Rivetti and Gilles O'Kane. “The initial concept came from the hypnotic feeling one gets while driving and forgetting how they’ve traveled from start to finish.”
Check it out below, and pre-order Long Cool World here.
