Music

Watch the premiere of Del Bel's video for "Old Magic"

by Mark Teo

Back in 2013, Wavelength’s Jonny Dovercourt told AUX to keep an eye on Del Bel, a Toronto-based outfit who’d spent time in the Toronto collective’s incubator. Two years on, and Dovercourt’s recommendation proved prescient: The band dropped their Del Bel LP last February via Guelph’s Missed Connection records, and it’s brimming with haunting, cinematic tracks, led by head composer Tyler Belluz and singer-composer Lisa Conway.

Their widescreen approach to music—the band’s membership reaches into the double digits—shares an essential quality with Ontario gospel-noir supergroup Bruce Peninsula, so it’s not surprising to see the latter appear on two Del Bel tracks: Bruce Peninsula lend their vocals to “Sails of Gold” and “Old Magic.” And we’re stoked to premiere the video for the latter track today.

Edited by L.A.-based Jeremy Weinstein, the video compiles the work of Lutz Mommartz, a German director who made all his work available under a Creative Commons license. Here, Del Bel and Bruce Peninsula—who themselves scored the uber-creepy Small Town Murder Songs—live up to their billing as cinematic acts, with Belluz and Conway’s music serving as a score to Mommartz’s work.

“So my old friend and college roommate Jeremy Weinstein is the one that made this video. He lives in LA editing movies for a living,” says Belluz. “I asked him a while ago if there is a way to add [the title of] director or producer for this video and he said that everything involved on his end is all under the category of editing.

“So essentially Jeremy went through many movies of free content and edited this down into a music video.”

Watch the video below, and when you’re done, listen to (and buy) their excellent LP on Bandcamp.

Catch Del Bel on the following dates.

Saturday March 28th, St. Catharines at Detour Music Hall, with Northern Primitive
Thurs April 2nd, Hamilton at This Ain’t Hollywood, with Allegories
Friday April 3rd, Peterborough TBA
Saturday April 4th, Ottawa at Mugshots, with Scattered Clouds
Sunday April 5th, Montreal at Casa, with Dumb Angel, Sunfields
Saturday May 2nd, London at First Spiritual Church, with Lonnie and the Garden