“Every day you wake up and leave your loved ones to fight to keep us safe”
The Used have released a video for their song ‘The Lighthouse’, featuring blink-182’s Mark Hoppus.
After initially asking frontline workers to send in videos with the message “Every day you wake up and leave your loved ones to fight to keep us safe. We want to showcase them in our new music video”, the result is a celebration of the incredible efforts that so many are putting in to look after and protect us all in these uncertain and testing times.
Vocalist Bert McCracken added this to the video:
“It is not in the stars to hold our destiny but in ourselves.” – William Shakespeare
“Doubt can be an avalanche. It can cascade out and infect everything it touches. Inspiration is also infectious. The original chorus lyric was “I can’t be your lighthouse” until I was reminded by my 6-year-old daughter that I can be and I am. It helps to remember that we all have the capability to inspire someone in our own way. Please enjoy our song The Lighthouse as much as we do.”
Have a watch below:
The track is taken from the band’s new album ‘Heartwork’ which is out now via Big Noise/ Hassle Records.
We recently spoke to Bert all about the record. You can read the full interview HERE, but here’s a little snippet for ya:
When you’re able to create a record that is able to produce that many feelings and thoughts and questions and answers, it must be a joy as an artist to be a part of it…
“It’s always been what I love about art. The ability to find you in a story or a song or piece of art is what makes that story or song or piece of art. It’s what makes it yours. That’s why we love music because we hear our lives in those stories. We had a bit of a concept going into making this record but we then abandoned whilst in the studio with Feldmann because we wanted this record to fit in that world which the first two records existed in. Those songs are as close to personal that you could possibly get, yet they are still so very open. It’s general enough that somebody can take those lyrics as their own. It’s just what we all share as humans.
“It helps that we have found a little bit of humility within the longevity of the band. Being around for 20 years has made us feel like the connection with the fans is because we have simply been ourselves. I don’t think there’s ever been once where we tried to flex on someone. It was always about connecting to that human story and pondering the human connection.”
Were there any moment in the last 20 years, or even the last 10 years, where you thought that this is what form The Used would be taking at this moment in time?
“I think so. I think there are always these small incremental steps, but in the back of my mind I’ve forced myself to think that I was good enough to always have a place in music. I think I’ve surprised myself along the way, and there would have been moment along there, maybe 12 and 18 years ago, where I definitely thought ‘I can’t keep this up’. This music always seemed like the inevitable next thing though. Though if I think too far down the road, like what does The Used look like in 10 years, I barely get a minute into the thought process.”
Well the beauty of ‘Heartwork’ is that there are moments that people may never have thought they would have heard on a Used record, and the same for you. That’s why you shouldn’t look too far ahead, because anything can happen…
“I think that the experience for us was worth the chance to do anything. We approached the recording process with the mindset that we will say yes to everything. There’s not a day that goes by that I don’t think how lucky I am to know a person like John Feldmann with whom I can still make music in that way. I know that there are people who would literally die to do what I do. Just sit around and drink coffee with friends and write songs about whatever the fuck we want. I think it’s my goal to be grateful for that and put my entire physical, mental and emotional self into this and to take it very seriously. That’s what we’ve continued to do and it feels good.”
You can pick up the record on beautiful vinyl from our good friends over at EMP right HERE
