Since September, Voxtrot have released the songs “Another Fire,” “New World Romance,” and “My Peace.” Today, the indie pop group is back with “Esprit de Cœur.”

“Esprit de Cœur” comes with a music video, about which bandleader Ramesh Srivastava said:

In a rather meta way, my character struggles to come up with a concept for the video itself, writing himself into a variety of hero scenarios that reference well-known movies or genres (The Conversation, Wings of Desire, film noir, etc). After wrestling with this writer’s block for some time, he is finally visited by a trio of celestial angels, who help him to get out of his head and into his body, thus making the journey from the head to the heart, where creativity dwells.

Working with director Ed Dougherty, cinematographer Taylor Washington and their fabulous crew was a wonderful experience for us — ’twas thrilling to be part of such a professional production and to inhabit these different characters and worlds. All scenes were filmed in Austin and Lockhart, Texas.

About the song itself, he continued:

It was initially inspired by a documentary on Charlie Chaplin, which detailed his life in and out of the spotlight. The song explores the ephemeral nature(s) of fame and youth, and the inevitable corollary soul-searching that comes with a career in entertainment.”

Throughout “Esprit” I dip between my post-Voxtrot years in Los Angeles (during which I desperately longed to be “rediscovered”), imaginary conversations with Beat Generation authors (imploring them to understand that separating commerce from art is not as simple as it used to be), and Chaplin’s famous speech in The Great Dictator, which signaled the end of his comedic reign but is considered his most poignant cinematic moment.

Like many artists and entertainers, I have a love/hate relationship with fame; while it is undeniably enjoyable to bask in favorable attention, any attachment to a celebrity identity results in equal anguish when that attention drifts away. On one hand, fame is naturally correlated with success in popular music, and on the other it is the very thing that can most easily distract us from our artistic gifts, which brought success in the first place. In the pursuit of our life’s work, it is important to remember that, beyond achievement, beyond recognition, there is an intrinsic worth to our being, a love that comes from within and needs no external validation.

Last month, Voxtrot joined Stereogum and the Wild Honey Pie in Hunter, NY for a pizza party concert; check out photos from that below, along with the new tune.

 

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