Technology has made it easier and more affordable for the average person to produce and distribute his or her own content, empowering artists and eliminating old gatekeepers. This in turn has created countless opportunities for success but left artists to their own devices in achieving it. To some, this new era means the death of the art of recording and filmmaking. We disagree. To us it means that the power structure has changed; the control is in the hands of content creators. With The Sea In Between, Mason Jar Music would like to offer our own vision for a possible future of distributed media: a full audio-visual album. In essence, an LP of sights and sounds. This film represents a labor of love for us. Together with the intrepid Josh Garrels, his wife and toddlers in tow, we filmed and recorded a dozen live performances in less than a week and have woven them together with documentary vignettes exploring Josh’s hand-built career, the process of collaborating on Mayne Island, and the challenges and rewards of being an artist in the 21st century. We hope it gives the audience an opportunity to be a part of the process, and will encourage casual consumers to become active participants in the development of artists they believe in as they build careers in the face of this shifting landscape.
