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James Franco is set to release an album and film inspired by The Smiths, with collaborator Andy Rourke.
The project will see Franco's band Daddy release an album accompanied by a series of videos. Each song is based around poetry the actor wrote, which was inspired by the legendary band. The project is called Let Me Get What I Want.
“We took a ten-poem sequence called ‘The Best of the Smiths: Side A and Side B,’” Franco explained to Vice. “I originally wrote this sequence as a way to use one medium (music) to influence another one (poetry). The Smiths’ songs provided inspiration for the poems, lending tone and situation. Once I had the sequence, Tim and I took the material one step further and turned the poems inspired by songs, back into songs of their own.”
Watch the video for 'This Charming Man' below
The album will feature The Smiths bassist Andy Rourke playing on each track, as well as Franco's musical partner Tim O'Keefe. If viewed in sequence the videos will form a narrative and tell a full story.
“We created the record at the same time James’s mom ran a program teaching kids how to make films [at Palo Alto high school],” O’Keefe added. “They developed scripts out of the same poems that we made songs out of, then shot film based on those scripts… While they were doing that project, we took all of the raw footage we had for each song and brought in editors to put together our film.”
