EG Vines Interview: Beacons | Screen Rant
EG Vines has spent his whole life with music, but didn't begin seriously pursuing it as a career until fairly recently. After releasing a few albums, he's stepped into his newest endeavor, the short film Beacons. The short combines three songs from his album "Through the Mirror" and debuts as a Screen Rant exclusive.
Beacons specifically features the songs "Ride,” “Waiting on the Aliens," and “Peace In This World," and is Vines' first real foray into taking on an acting role as Professor Vines. Additionally, Vines' longtime collaborator Josh Lockhart serves as cameraman on the short. While the COVID-19 pandemic created complications in Vines' musical career, he and his collaborators nonetheless were able to put together a unique compendium of his musical work for Beacons.
We speak to EG Vines on the making of Beacons, the experience of making the short film during the pandemic, and what his musical career has in store in 2022.
Screen Rant: How did you first get started as a musician?
EG Vines: I grew up playing music, and kind of took a detour during college. I didn't really play a whole lot, except for cover gigs. I really just started digging in in these last three years or so, I worked in the corporate world for a solid ten years just until last years. So, I've really been honing in on my songwriting these last three years and I've put out two albums in the last two years.
Your short film Beacons come about is meant as an encapsulation of your album "Through The Mirror", and combines the songs from your newest album "Ride”, “Waiting on the Aliens”, and “Peace In This World". How did Beacons come about?
EG Vines: So, I work with Josh Lockhart, and he and I have done a few music videos together like "The Salesman". I was thinking about doing a music video for one of the songs, and he said to me "I'm really digging these three songs. They're in sequential order on the album, so what if we did a short film on them?" So, I was kind of all ears, and he kind of had a general theme with the professor character I was, and he and I kind of met over coffee and created the rest of the story. It wasn't my idea to do, but that's why I like working with Josh, He's very creative and we kind of bounce ideas off each other to make something better than either of us could've come up with.
Was Beacons done entirely during the pandemic?
EG Vines: We recorded the album early, it came out in August, and we filmed Beacons in August and September.
What interesting stories can you share about the making of Beacons?
EG Vines: We went pretty smoothly. Josh works pretty quickly, so we did it in about three days. Josh had his drone footage that he got, and we just tried to make the professor character as goofy as possible. Ben Cunningham whose the G-Man and kind of the villain character with the beard and the trench coat, he's bass player in my band. My wife was also the professor's wife, so it was kind of fun to have friends and family as part of the filming of it. It was just a loose filming process. We just got together and did it over a couple of days, and it was fun and easy.
Is there anything comparable to Beacons that you've ever done before?
EG Vines: I would say "The Salesman" music video was kind of an entry point into acting, and it had a storyline across one song. I think that did a good job of getting me ready for Beacons, to not be nervous because I definitely don't view myself as an actor but as a musical artist. I think that kind of buffered me up for this.
So, what was the most memorable aspect of making Beacons for you?
EG Vines: It's hard to say for me. It was kind of cool to walk some small town streets and experience some people places that I don't normally encounter and experience. We went to some different places that I don't normally, so that was kind of a cool experience.
What else do you have coming up after Beacons? Anything similar to it in the future?
EG Vines: I think so. We finally were able to start touring again in the back half this year, we had about thirty dates. Next year, we're booking a lot of stuff for the spring and summer, so we'll probably try to ramp that up to sixty to eighty shows next year. We're also recording a new album right now, and I kind of envision videos, whether they're short films or music videos, as being part of it. Growing up in the '90s, that was such a pivotal piece of how music was shown to me in that era, and it's always stuck with me, so I'm always going to want music videos or film to be part of the delivery of how we put out new music.
Source: Screenrant
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