Meet the mad genius behind this Hamilton band's viral videos

John Smith is the conceptual force behind Young Rival's unusual videos

Media | Meet the mad genius behind Young Rival's viral videos

Caption: John Smith is Young Rival's bassist and the conceptual force behind their unusual videos - he's taking you behind the scenes of their new one, "Elevator".

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John Smith is the bassist in Young Rival(external link), a band hailing from Hamilton, Ontario. Smith is also the conceptual brain behind Young Rival's often-viral videos, like "Two Reasons(external link)" and last year's "Black is Good(external link)".
Why do they draw so many views? There's always a pretty simple concept at the heart of Young Rival's videos, courtesy of Smith. "Oh Nancy(external link)" took the band on a journey to find the inventor of Chuck E. Cheese's terrifying and gleeful animatronic band, The Rock-afire Explosion(external link), so the (obviously insane) animals could play and sing Young Rival's song. If you're lucky enough to be able to a) cross your eyes and b) see those frustrating Magic Eye posters of dolphins and such at your local mall, you'd be delighted by "Black is Good," where the band plays for you in dizzying 3D.
These are high-concept, low-budget (mostly) videos, and the new one the band is releasing this week, "Elevator," is in keeping with the others. It was made on a dot matrix printer(external link) (ask your parents if you don't know what that is), and became a labour of love for John and the band for the last couple of years.
In the above video made by filmmaker March Mercanti(external link), John Smith explains the whole process. (You can do it yourself, if you have infinite patience and about four very vintage printers.)
Young Rival(external link)'s new video "Elevator" will be released this week — check here(external link) or here(external link).
March Mercanti is a film director based out of Toronto. He graduated from the Toronto Film School in 2013. He enjoys documentary driven projects that are able to maintain a strong visual aesthetic.
Watch Exhibitionists(external link) Sundays at 4:30pm (5 NT) on CBC.