Beat that Animation! (Dave Wakeling’s Birthday)

As a little surprise for Dave Wakeling of The (English) Beat, I created this little animated card using his music (plus The Four Tops) and my original sketches. It just so happens that my notorious hot pink, black, and white are also The Beat’s brand colours, as seen in this iconic album cover:

and this…

I hand drew all the figures and each letter separately on my iPhone 5 in Paper 53 app, then made the stop-motion in Apple Keynote, exporting to Quicktime and changing speed/ adding sound in iMove.

Here is the result:

As you can read, the inspiration for the beginning came from an anecdote Dave shared with me about the first song that really moved him- “Don’t Walk Away Renee” by The Four Tops. Apparently he sat in his father’s car and cried, he was so overcome. Now he asks people he meets:

What song makes you cry?

I have to say that since “Can’t Get Used to Losing You” (The English Beat version) was probably the first breakup song I experienced way back in 1984, that might be on my top 10 list. Don’t even get me started with Lara’s Theme from Dr. Zhivago!

I am so privileged to have had the chance to meet and chat with Dave personally, especially since his unique voice was such a big part of my formative years. He has some excellent thoughts on politics, philosophy, and society –  I wish he’d write a book! Wishing him many more music-filled years to come…

#birthday #DaveWakeling #mod #eighties #music #ska #paper53 #animation #TheBeat #amyburvall #TheFourTops