Watch the new Nile video for "Papyrus Containing the Spell to Preserve its Possessor From Attacks Against he Who is in the Water," then check out guitarist and vocalist Dallas Toler-Wade's comprehensive essay about the clip. By the time you finish reading, it should be just about time for the video to air again on Saturday's Headbangers Ball on MTV2. The video for "Papyrus Containing the Spell to Preserve its Possessor From Attacks Against he Who is in the Water,"was shot on November 18 by Juan Punchy Gonzalez and features actual Nile crocodiles.
So it all began with a few e-mails about possible treatments for the "Papyrus..." video.
We were already behind on getting a video together because of the non-stop touring we have been doing since before the release of our current release, Ithyphallic, and given the fact that our drummer, George Kollias, was in Greece and Karl Sanders, Chris Lollis and I were in South Carolina, getting together can be hard. We only had a month between our Ozzfest tour and the European tour I'm on right now. During that month, we went to Japan and destroyed the Loud Park festival with the full of legends mega-group, Heaven and Hell. The concept of doing a video seemed crazy when rehearsals that included new songs needed to be done first. The video had to be done locally and fast.
Delivery of the video had to be done while we would be touring. This meant seeing potential edits would be difficult because we would be in a different European city every day while the video was being finished in the U.S.
All these treatments were being thrown around on e-mails. Some were really funny. One of them had to do with 'an old man [who] holds a piece of paper while he builds a wall around himself.' Nothing to do with the lyrics whatsoever! I wanted live crocodiles. While we were in Japan, Punchy, our Tour Manager/Sound Engineer, noticed in the e-mail chain that these video treatments were as silly as we thought they were. He's a pretty connected guy. So Punchy offered a treatment that actually was based on the lyrics and the way the band wanted to be represented musically. What a Concept!!! A video that actually has something to do with the lyrics. Jokingly, I said to him, 'I want live crocodiles.'
Video Production: T-minus 2 weeks and counting until Europe
As soon as we got back from Japan, our tour manager/sound engineer and now video director stepped into a pen of live Nile Crocodiles at Gator Land Zoo in Florida. Oddly enough, it was less than an hour from Punchy's house. He managed to get permission to film during feeding.
The animals, which were set in a pen with live papyrus plants and Egyptian river point markers, hunted him and the camera guy while they rolled tape. The camera man for the crocodile shoot just happened to be starting a Film Museum in Florida. This museum just happened to have some props and scenery from the 1961 film "Cleopatra" (starring Elizabeth Taylor). Punchy convinced the museum's curator to load them in a trailer and bring them to South Carolina for the shoot. The actors were shot in Florida at a nudist resort that used actual Egyptian papyrus plants as a natural privacy fence. All the pieces seemed to be fitting together.
By the time Punchy, his wife Jennie Jolly Gonzalez (props, lighting), and Brian Bourke (director of photography) arrived in South Carolina with the props, Nile was in rehearsal mode... minus a drummer. George's plane was delayed from New York, where he was shooting pictures for the new Sabian catalog. The next day was the shoot.
Shooting Day: T-minus Two days and counting until our plane leaves to Europe for the tour
George's part of the shoot was first. It went really quickly. Everything on the band shoot was fast -- set changes, lighting changes, guitar changes. The shoot started at noon and was over by 8 p.m. Not enough time to practice that night, and too tired to do so anyway. Instead, we all went out for some steaks after the set was torn down. As soon as we got back to Punchy's hotel room, editing began. The next day we rehearsed until our hands were blue to catch up. The editing went for a straight 30 hours. At the end of the rehearsal (roughly hour 24), George and I went to the hotel/editing suite to see where they were at on the video. The video was great looking so far. But six hours later, the first edit was complete. Keep in mind that was just two hours before we were all supposed to be flying to Europe.
When we got to Helsinki, Finland, we looked at the video again. The band all decided, "WE NEED MORE CROCODILES!" Nile completed the first section of our tour in Finland and settled in Venlo, The Netherlands at our merchandiser, Rob Dirkx's house. During that time, Punchy fired up his laptop and began frantically adding "insane quick-cut" style crocodile footage. After roughly 12 hours of non-stop cutting and rendering, the video was complete. In his spare time, Punchy also created and edited the "Making Of" video that you see here on the Headbangers Ball Blog.
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