Neil Claxton has gracefully pulled the plug on Mint Royale, the project he co-founded with Chris Baker in 1997 and kept going on his own after Baker left in 2004. Fortunately, on March 10 Claxton released one final gem and this week published an accompanying video. The stellar single "Time" features fellow Brit Tom Cane on vocals and is a superb swan song. Thank you for the music.
It seems fitting to post three additional sublime videos/tracks from the brilliant Mint Royale catalog: the hypnotic "Ring", featuring the inimitable voice of actor Willem Dafoe as well as the haunting "The Effect on Me", featuring the sampled vocals of outstanding American soul singer Jean Wells (from her 1967 hit "Have a Little Mercy").
My personal favorite however is the glorious song "Show Me", featuring Pos (1/3 of De La Soul) for which one of the greatest music videos ever was made back in 2001. The clip was created by acclaimed Swiss director Ben Hibon who at that time worked at London design company Unit 9; (he has since launched his own company, Stateless Productions, also in London.) Yates Buckley, Tom Sacchi, and Piero Frescobaldi were also part of the team who put together an ambitious interactive project for the Mint Royale website that included 42 fantastic animated characters inhabiting the colorful world of Star Island where the story in the "Show Me" video takes place.
https://itunes.apple.com/us/album/time-feat.-tom-cane/id1092591077?i=1092591096
Read Claxton's poignant explanation for why he decided it was time to turn to the key:
http://mint-royale.com/#sthash.MzmTzJIX.dpbs
NOTE: Claxton will no longer be posting on Facebook, but will continue his Twitter account.
https://twitter.com/MintRoyale
https://www.facebook.com/mint.royale/timeline?ref=page_internal
http://www.statelessfilms.com/films/4575889119
http://www.unit9.com/
