5 Seconds Of Summer
[Photo via YouTube]

Join 5 Seconds of Summer's psychedelic paradise in the "Wildflower" video

5 Seconds of Summer are keeping the C A L M train rolling. The current stop— a “Wildflower” music video. 5SOS didn’t let the coronavirus quarantine slow them down as they just dropped a technical marvel of a video. 

5 Seconds Of Summer dropped “Wildflower” as the final single from their album C A L M two days before its release on March 25. 

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“Wildflower” ditched the anthemic, pop-rock sound we’ve come to love from 5 Seconds Of Summer and traded it in for a sweet new 80’s whip. 

The song’s catchy hook oddly omits certain words to heighten the romantic tension. 5 Seconds Of Summer’s bassist Calum Hood discusses the idea behind it. 

“We wanted to make the chorus kind of a choose-your-own-adventure, where some words are left out and then accentuated by these big stabs of synth,” Hood says. “It lets everyone come up with their own interpretation, and fill in whatever they think those missing lyrics might be.”  

Originally, the music video was supposed to have a large crew and an even bigger budget. Not all dreams can come to light as California’s shelter-in-place order derailed those plans. 

So what do you do when your new album is a massive success and you can’t shoot a music video for a hit song? Also, all of your band members are separated in their own homes. Well, you pass around a green screen and a camera, disinfecting it after each house of course. Then, you meticulously cut it together and even learn how to create new special effects. 

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5 Seconds Of Summer’s “Wildflower” was directed by Andy DeLuca who describes the process below. 

“Our original plan for the Wildflower music video consisted of a big budget, a full crew, and a giant studio,” DeLuca starts. “But it was cancelled due to coronavirus and we were forced to make something under the challenging conditions of quarantine. Michael[Clifford] had a green screen sitting in his closet, so I figured that could be enough to make something. Since the song has a pretty distinct 80s/90s tone, I came up with the idea of making an 80’s/90’s MTV-style music video. A ‘music-video-themed music video’. The stuff I grew up on and loved.” 

“So we passed around the disinfected green screen (with the help of our teammate Kat Gallagher), and everyone filmed their parts at home with an iPhone and later sent the footage over to me.” 

“In the meantime, Sarah Eiseman and I began working on the art for the video. We quickly learned animation and drew up several blooming flowers, and also created the trippy colored backgrounds using milk and food dye. I then spent the next couple of days/nights editing nonstop until my eyes bled and the video was completed. It definitely has pushed us to create something we normally wouldn’t, using only our brains and our hands.”

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5 Seconds Of Summer certainly embraced the lo-fi psychedelic vibes in the ’80’s and ’90s with “Wildflower.” Multicolored flowers, rainbows and everything else populate the video from start to finish. 

Hood describes what the song means to them on the record and how the video relates. 

“Wildflower was the wildcard of the album,” Hood says. “A song that has opened new avenues for this band to explore. Most importantly it just feels good to listen to and disconnect for a minute. We really feel this video reflects that too and hope you all enjoy!”

Without further ado, check out 5 Seconds Of Summer’s trippy new video for “Wildflower” below. 

Tell us what you think of 5 Seconds Of Summer’s “Wildflower” video in the comments below! Don’t forget to let us know your favorite song from C A L M. 

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