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GONZO make progressive metal music video
Date: 2008 March 31st Monday [17:13] | Posted By: Joe
We've been sent some interesting details about anime studio GONZO, who have produced a music video for progressive metal band Dream Theater.
Full Story
Press release as follows:

Japanese animation studio GONZO and director Yasufumi Soejima (the unreleased Mardock Scramble project) have created a music video for the Dream Theater song "Forsaken". The video's executive producer, Joey Goubeaud of Amusement Park Media, coordinated the efforts between Dream Theater and GONZO. The video was premiered on MTV2's Headbanger's Ball program in the USA.

The band based the song on Ivan Turgenev's "Phantoms" short story about an enigmatic woman who haunts a man as he travels the world. However, instead of the 19th century setting of the short story, the band agreed with Soejima's decision to place the music video in a future science-fiction setting. Soejima said the video's male lead is an innocent man abandoned and jailed by an "inhumane world." The female lead (who is described as "an apparition, a restless soul, an evil spirit, a sylphide, a vampire" or something else entirely in Turgenev's story) is "an android that was made as the toy of [an] ancient regime."

Dream Theater guitarist John Petrucci elaborates:

"The song 'Forsaken' is essentially a vampire story based on an early 1800's short story by a well known Russian novelist. It centers on the main character Leo, who is visited nightly by a phantom named Alice. He is both intrigued and horrified by this ghost like image of a woman whom seems hauntingly familiar to him. Her seduction entails nightly mesmerizing journeys into the dark past where she floats through the skies weightlessly along with Leo visiting such places as Paris and ancient Rome. All the while she repeats the words, 'I have come for you' and 'You are mine.' So captivated is Leo that he doesn't even feel the sting of her vampire kiss and his body slowly gives itself up to the phantom as the story goes on.

"In the anime video created for the song, the director chose to give the lyric a futuristic twist, and play with the storyline a bit. Now, our main character is visited by a demon like harvester of human blood. Her purpose is to supply otherwise lifeless mannequins with this blood so that they may live and reenact some of the darkest moments in history.

"I always knew that an animated adaptation would be the perfect avenue to colorfully illustrate this horror story. Working with the director and choosing Japanese style anime as the artistic medium was an incredible opportunity. From the modern interpretation to the character development, storyboards and finally the animation, it was a unique and exciting experience to be a part of. I'm really happy to see the song come to life and I think people will enjoy this entirely new and unique perspective that was created for 'Forsaken'."

Watch the video online at:
http://media.roadrunnerworld.com/DreamTheater/DreamTheater_Forsaken_450.wmv

For more info on Dream Theater visit:
http://www.roadrunnerrecords.co.uk/artist/Dream+Theater or
www.myspace.com/dreamtheater