Brooke Candy Made a Stylish-As-Hell Video for Her Track “Volcano”

What do you get when you mix Hollywood, the founder of Hustler magazine, a shit-ton of bondage gear, metallic angel wings and a zero dollar budget? Brooke Candy's new video for "Volcano", apparently, which we are premiering in full below.

The stylish, five-minute visual – which was filmed throughout a number of iconic locations in LA, as well as within the decadent walls of Larry Flynt's office and penthouse – sees the singer return to the no-holds-barred, DIY roots that gained her a cult following online back in the day when she broke out with tracks like "Everybody Does" and "Das Me". The track itself mixes an uplifting, robotic chorus – co-written by Sia (you can hear her stamp all over it) – with a jagged, rapped verse, the two components blending to create something club-ready and quintessentially Brooke Candy.

You can watch the video below and scroll down to read our Q&A with the singer, who tells us about the making and concept of the clip, as well as what she's up to next. While you're here, you can also read our Brooke Candy profile from earlier this year.

Noisey: Brooke! I love all your outfits in this.
Brooke Candy: Thanks! My best friend Seth made all the costumes. He made the angel wings out of paper; it took three days and he cut each individual feather out of metallic paper and then stuck it together with wire.

Wow, it looks like metal. So, let's chat about the song…
I made this track about three or four years ago with Jesse Geller, who helps me write all my raps. He's a sick artist – we've always collaborated together. The hook is actually written by Sia – it's the first thing we ever did together.

Yeah, I can definitely hear her sound all over that chorus…
Before I even had a proper relationship with her I told her that I was making this song and asked her to help with the chorus and she literally came in, walked into the booth, sang for five minutes, then left. I was like… woah. That's genius. I also think it's a good mix between the harder, edgier stuff I did at the beginning and the new pop shit.

You put this video together yourself, right? How did you come up with the premise?
There are two key components, I think. I wanted to do something that represented how women are portrayed and fetishised in the media by men. But some of the shots we didn't plan out… they just happened, and they were fucking perfect and totally tied into the concept and also just work visually.

Tell me about the character you're portraying – who is she?
She is a badass; she's not perfect but she doesn't fucking care – she thinks she is. She wants to tear up the system from the inside. She wants revolution and she wants real change. She is rambunctious and angry and feisty. I guess she's an extension of myself, but the amped up caricature version of how I feel on the inside.

Why did you ask Larry Flynt to get involved?
Hustler has always been part of my story – every time I've been interviewed, it's always been a topic of discussion – so on the one hand it felt quite funny to be like "alright, you guys want to bring this up all the time, I'll give it to you." Another component was that this video was shot guerrilla style – it cost zero dollars to make – so we had to make sure it was visually enticing and Larry's penthouse and office are so beautiful and decadent, so I thought it would add so much visually.

I guess being DIY has always been part of your appeal as a musician anyway… so I love that you did this guerrilla style.
Totally! It's just the way that I make art. When I signed to Sony, the art changed so much because I was no longer able to do that DIY shit. There were too many cooks in the kitchen and dinner wasn't getting made! I have to make art the way I want to make it, and when I do it from my pure, authentic self, people respond really well. I've learnt that through trial and error and a lot of mistakes.

I feel like there's a very heaven-hell, good and evil thing going on in this video…
I don't believe in good and evil, I think they're both an illusion. But I guess visually, I totally play with that in this; my shadow self and my angelic self. Conceptually, I do not live my life like that. But visually, hell yeah! I like the devil imagery as an uplifting thing and as a rebellion.

So what's next for Brooke Candy?
I'm going to put out a second EP in August, and I've got a few more videos coming out. Sony and I parted ways – I made an entire album with them, but technically they own that music. So when that happened, I was like "well, I'm not going to let that stop me!" so I got back into the studio with some rad producers that I used to make music with and we made five songs. This is music from my heart and soul; it's fun, it's harder, it's tough, it's honest. I feel like I can finally put out the music that I want to put out, and although it might not reach as many people I will have been my authentic self and there's nothing more powerful than that.

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(Lead image courtesy of Brooke Candy)