Admittedly, I wasn’t much of a bluegrass music fan in my younger years. I have always been a rock and roll guy. But many years ago, my friend Ben Morrison and his brother Alex followed their musical influences and started a blue grass band, The Brothers Comatose. I still remember standing in muggy, hole in the wall bars in San Francisco, watching this new band play to just a handful of family and friends. Their music and the genre of bluegrass started to grow on me and soon I found myself stomping my boots as the fellas picked away on stage.
Apparently, I wasn’t the only one who was digging the tunes. I started to notice there was less and less floor space at every Brothers Comatose show I went to. Fast forward seven years and the fellas are headlining music festivals and selling out almost every show they play on their seemingly never-ending van tour.
So when I heard the Brothers Comatose were headlining the Sawtooth Valley Gathering this summer in one of my favorite places on the planet, Stanley, Idaho, I couldn’t resist getting a media pass to go photograph it. But lucky for me, The Brothers Comatose happened to have a new single in the works, ‘Don’t Make Me Get Up And Go,’ and asked if I would film the music video, right there in the Sawtooth Mountains. Of course, I jumped at the chance to show the fellas, and their fans, the beauty of Idaho.
So I packed up my Nissan Xterra and off I went to Stanley. As soon as I arrived at the festival, I was blown away by how perfect of a location this was for a music festival. The stage backed up to the jagged Sawtooths, giving festival goers a premium view while they jammed out to some incredible bands over a picturesque backdrop. The festival is still relatively small, which is hard to believe considering the gorgeous scenery and its close proximity to Sun Valley.
The two-day festival runs on a Friday and Saturday and The Brothers Comatose were headlining on Saturday night. So with only a couple hours before they had to prepare to take the stage, I took the boys to the hot springs behind our hotel, the Mountain Village Resort to shoot our opening scenes and work out the details of the video story.
The hot springs are housed in a small wooden pool house and sitting in the warm water yields a perfect view of the Sawtooth Mountains. After a nice relaxing soak, the fellas decided to take a stroll in the Salmon River’s runoff, the Valley Creek. But, oh no! The roaring rapids are too much for stand up bass extraordinaire, Gio Benedetti, and he stumbles and falls before being swept away by the massive current. What will the boys do now that their bassist is floating down Idaho’s roaring rapids? A quick glance over at some ladies on the shore provides the answers they seek.
I won’t spoil the whole video, but needless to say, The Brothers Comatose wound up finding out why Idaho is an outdoor lovers dream. And as the band mates told me that their brief time in the Sawtooth Mountains indeed had them saying ‘Don’t Make Me Get Up And Go.’
Check out more from the Brothers Comatose on their website, Facebook and Instagram.
All Photos and Music Video by Michael Bonocore. See more on Instagram and Facebook.
1 comment
saabhk