MONTREAL – For Lisa LeBlanc‘s new video, director Didier Charette wanted to showcase western communities outside of America. Filmed over 10 days in Tokyo, Japan, the city proved to be the perfect fast-paced location to film the video for Gold Diggin’ Hoedown; a ferociously upbeat track from Lisa’s most recent release,Highways, Heartaches and Time Well-Wasted.
While researching, Charette stumbled upon the Little Texas bar in the Meguro ward of Tokyo. The owners give line dancing classes and bring bands from around the world to play at their little basement venue. The Japanese have a long-standing love story with western culture and country music, stretching back to the war when Americans would broadcast their music over the radio (though enthusiasm has waned somewhat with newer generations).
The video was mostly filmed guerilla-style. Charette adds, “It was really interesting to shoot with Sanae because we couldn’t really talk, she didn’t speak English and I don’t speak Japanese. So I had my little book, with basic Japanese stuff I had written down to tell her what I wanted to film. People would give us looks as a Japanese cowgirl was walking with three male foreigners.”
