Q&A: Father Koi's “locket” is a Journey Through Memories and Time
INDIE AND HYPERPOP MUSICIAN — Father Koi, also known as Kara Lu, released a new song accompanied with a music video, “locket,” last week. “locket” was born from the artist’s 2022–2023 relationship, which Father Koi called “pretty undefined.” Initially, she thought that the relationship wouldn’t impact her, but over time it caused her to wrestle with feelings of “attachment and desire.” “locket” is the first single off an upcoming EP, set to drop either late 2024 or early 2025.
Father Koi began making music under this project during her freshman year in college in 2019. Starting with indie-pop music, she slowly transitioned into the hyperpop space, which was brought on by an electronic class she took. This allowed her to fuse the original indie pop and alternative music she was making with hyperpop, which can be seen in Father Koi’s last album, everything is a dream, but it is your dream.
The “locket” music video was directed and co-produced by Lianne Rose, who has had a filmmaking and music background for as long as she can remember. Six years ago, she figured she could make a living doing what she loves.
“As a director, my vision in all my works is to explore the layers and perspectives of dealing with the harsh realities and divine timings of life,” Rose shared. “My initiative is to layer my films with all emotions from happy to sad, from horrific to romantic — to not generalize them, because life is just all that in one.”
When Rose watches films, she explains that she wants to feel connected to them in every way. She hopes that people who watch her films can connect with all those emotions as well. “Locket” was the first music video she has made in a while, as she was obtaining a BFA and working on narrative films.
Read below as Rose and Lu share what inspired “locket,” how the music video came together, and what’s behind the intricate details in the visual.
LUNA: Can you tell me about the inspiration behind “locket”?
LU: Honestly, this song wasn’t even supposed to get a music video. My co-producer Ken suggested it when we were in the midst of working on it. I first started writing this song a year ago, so I had dug it back up and didn’t feel the need to do a video for it, but then as we got back into writing the song, I realized a video could be really cool to bring home the story and sort of commemorate it.
When I took the concept to Lianne, it was very rough. I knew I wanted to tell the story of a past relationship through specific scenes and settings, but little was fleshed out beyond that. It was more about the aesthetics for me in the beginning, since I felt like the storyline was pretty standard. I think Lianne really helped bring the story to life through the time machine part of the video.
ROSE: I always liked the idea of “letting go” — it's something everyone can relate and connect to in one way or another. When I first met Kara in person, we had a bit of a heart to heart about her past relationship and I very well related to her bittersweet past connection with my own past.
I once had a silent student film titled Let Go that expressed the feelings of seeing one of my family members pass away — it coincided with a broken time machine, and traveling back to those memories yet getting hurt, feeling shocked. The film was never fully finished. I thought that this was the perfect opportunity to bring the idea back to life.
LUNA: I love the reel-to-reel in “locket” — can you tell me why you choose to use it in the video? Are you being electrocuted by it? Also, is the song recorded using analog?
LU: Yes, I am being “electrocuted” by the machine in the video — every time I touch it (and it harms me) it takes me back to a distinct memory. The song wasn’t recorded with analog, though.
ROSE: We wanted to build our own time machine. From the DeLorean in Back to the Future (1985) to the elevator in SpongeBob SquarePants, episode “SB-129,” films [and television] have visually expressed time machines in various manners.
I found this analog tape recorder at my job and took it home. I thought its vintage, metallic look that was fit with film reels would be the perfect fit for our interpretation of a time machine. Her old flashblacks almost coincide with the old rolls of tape on the machine. The fact that it was an audio recorder felt fitting for a music video.
The prop designer, my talented friend Max Mills Rohr, helped me design the full machine that included a distro box, various wires, a custom clock, fans, even a little ominous box that says “Father Koi.” The day of shoot, our production designer, Erin Robles, and our set dresser, Sasha Thompson-Wells, pieced it together and used dirt and oil to weather it up.
LUNA: I like the contrast of colors — you go from a gray room to more lively settings (including the rainbow shot). Is this supposed to invoke the ups and downs in a relationship?
LU: I think this part of the video is more up for interpretation (which I love doing in my videos — some parts are more vague, so the [viewer] can take what they want from it), but yes. I think I thought about it like, the time machine is in “my mind” and the memories are clear and vivid in color because of how I chose to remember them.
ROSE: The rainbow shot is my interpretation of a wormhole. We even called it the wormhole scene. Its look was heavily inspired by one of my favorite director’s, Tim Burton’s, Coraline (2009), when Coraline crawls through her closet to a new world. In the “locket” music video, the rainbow shots for me do add visual contrast, separating Kara in the time machine abyss and the real life memories she has, but really it's the thread that connects the whole story.
LUNA: I feel like the video represents a lot of New York (subway scenes, NYC party life). Can you talk about it more? Why choose these places to film, etc.?
LU: So this song is about a relationship I was in around a year ago, and it was my most serious relationship at that point. Even though the person who it’s about and I don’t talk anymore, she introduced me to a lot of new things and people, and that felt incredibly magical. I sort of wanted to pay homage to that. I also specifically wanted shots of the subway — things like smoking between the train cars — because that was a moment I remember about our time together.
I also really like this quote by Lorde: “All my life I’ve been obsessed with adolescence, drunk on it. Even when I was little, I knew that teenagers sparkled. I knew they knew something children didn’t know, and adults ended up forgetting.” In the back of my mind I knew I wanted to capture that. The magic of it all. I’m an optimist, and a romantic, and that combination can be pretty impactful for a musician.
ROSE: We live in the most beautiful and magical city in the US, why not shoot it!
LU: So true. I stand by that.
LUNA: I really like the freeze shots at the party. Is there any inspiration behind that? Any feeling you wanted to invoke?
LU: Lianne, you can tell me if I’m wrong, but I do remember one part of using those shots was the concept of everything fading away and only the situation at hand remaining. One of the lyrics goes, “Nothing else matters when I have it all / Is this feeling hate, or just being in love?”
ROSE: Love leaving things up for interpretation, but for me these freeze shots at the end pushed our time machine idea even further. What's it like to travel in time? What if things messed up? Would the world stand still around me?
Memories play like pictures in one's head… but stills are no fun in a motion picture. I wanted to capture this sort of “theory” in a fun way by having everyone participate in a mannequin challenge. Have viewers step in Kara’s shoes and relive a memory of their own.
Watch “locket” now to explore the world of past relationships.
