Today's Pick

The Civil Wars used lost footage from their trip to Paris in March 2011 for "Dust to Dust," the third single off their self-titled sophomore album released last August. The song was used in the 2013 horror/drama remake "Carrie," as well as the ABC Family TV Show, "Ravenswood." In their new video, the defunct folk duo Joy Williams and John Paul White take to the streets of Paris, where we find White alone in a cafe, sipping espresso and penning a letter he ultimately hesitates to send once at the mailbox. His former bandmate Williams is also alone with her thoughts, sipping wine at a bar.
But they're not kept apart for long. Much of the video intersperses shots of the two in the studio together with scenes of them roaming the Paris streets. And for a moment, they look to be in perfect harmony. Even the most romantic city in the world can feel lonesome and uninviting, as you can see in The Civil Wars' latest video, "Dust to Dust." Set in Paris on a drab winter day, the embattled bandmates go about their separate yet hopelessly-intertwined lives, all the while pining for something more.The folk band duo wrote this anthem for the lonely late one night in Birmingham, England. "Sometimes you come across somebody who thinks they are hiding their pain, but if we are all honest, nobody is very good at it," Williams explained. "You're like a mirror, reflecting me / Takes one to know one, so take it from me." According to Williams, when she penned this song with White, they "decided to change the pronoun at the end of the song. We wanted to represent that we all experience loneliness in our lives."
The video's footage was filmed in Paris by Becky Fluke in March 2011 and at The Art House studio by 1504 Pictures in September 2012. Sung in a near-whisper and backed by a tiptoeing combination of guitar and drums, the two characters in the song seem almost afraid to let their guard down. Since the duo announced their abrupt hiatus in the middle of their European tour last November, that tension probably didn't require a lot of acting. "When we re-discovered what we'd once thought to be lost footage from two years ago, these forgotten images from a trip to Paris strangely seemed fitting for the feel of 'Dust To Dust,' says Williams. "For me, it's like stepping back in time."

A bit of good news for folky roots-music fans, The Civil Wars are back with a studio cut clip for their new single, "The One That Got Away," the lead single off their upcoming sophomore self-titled album, is due out August 6. The acclaim for country-folk duo The Civil Wars is probably as high today as it's ever been. They've won Grammys, they've recorded with T-Bone Burnett and Taylor Swift, and their debut album "Barton Hollow" has been certified Gold. The trouble is, the two bandmates Joy Williams and John Paul White appear not to be in a place where they can truly enjoy their well-earned success.
In creating the song, Williams and White just poured the amazing passion they have for music and the band as well as all of the angst and stress they have been feeling into one perfect song about lost love. It is completely stripped of any excessive production so prevalent in music today. What we get is a heartbreaking story about the two people who are singing. The tension builds to the chorus where they end up wailing in a beautifully haunting harmony, "Oh, I wish I'd never, ever seen your face," Williams sings over hard-strummed acoustic guitar, "I wish you were the one that got away."
And while the song is simplistic in its approach, so is the video for this studio cut. It isn't high concept but is as painful as it is beautiful. More of a behind-the-scenes-type presentation, it consists mostly of a series of shots showing Williams and White recording the song in the studio. But it's a painful video to watch because it gets directly at your heart and stays there, as it seems to show that whatever rift exists between these two talented musicians is heartbreakingly real. For starters, as Williams and White harmonize beautifully on the song's often-painful lyrics, they never look each other in the eye. Glances are made back and forth, but there's a connection that's missing.
The Civil Wars have put everything they've got into their new single, "The One That Got Away." What we get is an amazing look at the anatomy of a band on the verge of a break-up. Then again, perhaps we shouldn't get carried away just yet: Judging by "The One That Got Away," not everything is heirloom peaches and artisanal cream between Williams and White now. Whether this is manufactured to emphasize the melancholy mood of the song, or is simply the way things are between them these days, we may never quite know. But either way, "The One That Got Away" is a haunting song you won't soon forget.

Taylor Swift has unveiled a melancholy new video on MTV last night for her melancholy acoustic ballad new song "Safe & Sound," featuring country/folk duo The Civil Wars, and the lead promotional single, from the soundtrack of the upcoming movie adaptation of "The Hunger Games." The film is set in a post-apocalyptic world where teenage boys and girls fight to the death in an annual televised event and is based on Suzanne Collins' young-adult novel of the same title, arrives in theaters on March 23.
The 22-year-old not only won two Grammy awards, both for "Mean," Sunday night, but she also performed her single "Mean" flawlessly. "Safe & Sound" certainly captures the tone of The Hunger Games, which will be filled with the sort of dread that only an uninviting stretch of woods can provide. It's a relief that Swift didn't take the "Mean" route and equate being hunted for the bloodlust of a ruling class to being picked on by internet trolls. Their spare, haunting tune is the kind of song that demands a video full of fireside glow and American Gothic overtones.
Luckily, that's exactly what the clip is - with glum vibes, and seems to have a stark, gloomy, and pensive feel, is an obvious reflection of the 'Hunger Games' setting and plot, which finds adolescents being used as pawns in a sick and twisted battle to the death. It features the country-singing cutie walking through a deserted desolate forest and singing the track, while the clip also shows a split second of The Civil Wars' John Paul White and Joy Williams strumming instruments with the duo being illuminated in a fiery red light from a fire playing on their faces.
The video shows Swift looking very natural with her hair down and not overly styled, looks a bit lost as she wanders a gorgeously-rendered wasteland full of spooky abandoned wells and ungulates who turn to ash through the barren winter woods, Swift looks almost hesitant, walking among leafless brown trees and crunched leaves. She's wearing a cream-colored lace dress without makeup and donning a flowy white gown that makes her look like she's from another time, and it's beautiful yet strikingly simple. She almost looks like a deserted angel in search of a loved one or some sign of life.