311215 by Shura Lyrics

FAQ & Knowledge Song “311215”

• ℚ. What was the concept for this music video?

  Verified CommentaryShura

  Lyrically, “311215” is very bleak, and it talks about the relationship between my parents not always being perfect, and being afraid of dying, and yet the video is a montage of really beautiful moments that I’ve shared with my mom and my dad and my brother as I was a kid. The difference between what you’re seeing and what I’m describing is enormous, so it’s like, something’s changed and what is it? Is it just that I’ve just remembered all the bad things and am not interested in the good things—which is the opposite of what I say in “What Happened to Us,” which is about how when you talk about romantic relationships that ended that you didn’t want to end, you’re always like, “Oh, you were so great, we were so great together, why are we not still doing this?” The opposite normally happens with family, where you’re like, “Oh god, my family’s awful, my family’s crazy, and everything is so shit,” and yet how come everyone’s family is crazy?

• ℚ. What have the artists said about the song?

  Verified CommentaryShuravia Stereoboard.com

  311215 is about fear of death. The death of my parents and to a certain extent my own. That everything must come to an end. I chose to end my record with this song in part because it deals with endings. The last sound you hear is the sound of the front door of my flat closing after my twin brother and I. For me this sound symbolises the end of the record and the inevitable separation that occurs when your parents die and you become an orphan. I wanted to use excerpts from family recordings to make a video because so much of the fabric of my record is made up not only of samples from these videos but also my experience of childhood. The lyrical content of 311215 is quite dark. I wanted to pair this with beautiful moments from my childhood as a contrast. There is something antagonistic about it.

  I edited the video with Karbon, who made the video for The Space Tapes in order to treat the footage in a way that would reflect how our memory often distorts and warps as time goes on. That we remember things differently. That often we forget what it was that was good and focus on the less positive experiences in life. I wanted to use a television to symbolise the fact that every single person experiences life from one very precise viewpoint. We watch a film and when we die that film is over. Film is also incredibly important to me. It was a huge part of my childhood (my Dad is a director and my Mum an Actor) and had it not been for music it is quite likely I would have become an editor. Making 311215 was hugely important experience and feels like the end of one record and the start of another journey. Who knows where that will lead.