The Idea Girl.

The official music video for 'Atlas Hands' the lead track from 'A Million Miles Out' EP by  new artist Benjamin Francis Leftwich. (Double click the video to view full screen)

Half a job for an artist is to create beautiful, entrancing music. The other half, is to create an even more beautiful music video - it creates a concept, a story, a foundation for the lyrics to build from and most importantly, lets us see what the artist was thinking when it was written. Granted, some music videos don't reflect this at all, but it is the most meaningful songs with the most heart-felt lyrics that always shine through on screen.
This video is a mesmerising mix of childhood playfulness combined with a wistful glance on life's possibilites. 'Make Believe' springs to mind everytime I watch it - the idea that if belief isn't made, nothing can ever be true. You have to believe in the 'making' of anything, otherwise nothing you can do would ever turn out the way you want it to. Make-up design and styling are fantastic, keeping a 'back to basics' approach yet still retaining playful props such as the masks, rope and feather to capture the child-like memory. The plaiting of the hair and twisting of the rope at the beginning is such a simple technique in symbolising the procrastination of thoughts from the girl about whether she should stay or leave.

I have entitled the blog as 'The Idea Girl' as my viewpoint on the concept of the video is that all the characters in it symbolise the woman in white. The children are personifications of her childhood memories, the man letting the ship free at the end is symbolising her mind letting go and the ship itself is a metaphor for herself, her own limbs and ultimately, her own life.
Collectively, they make up a woman who is letting herself free from any worries and stresses. A woman that truely does have an atlas in her hand, the world at her feet, and an idea to sail away to...