How Chris Wade is rewiring the UK music-video scene

Featured

As the lights strobe through the bars of the cells, TV screens depicting frenzied mouths bite the air in a hugely vivid scene that’s not easily forgotten. And that’s the point.

The music video for Cannibal, a track created by international genre-smashing outfit Pendulum and the South East’s electro rockers Wargasm was filmed at former fort and one-time prison the Dover Citadel.

It’s a familiar scene for Chris Wade, the visionary behind Dogbrain Videos (@dogbrain_videos) - a production house that’s quietly (and sometimes not so quietly) carving a niche in how British rock and electronic music look and feel on screen.

Over the past decade, Dogbrain has become known for its “bonkers energy”, forging a visual language that’s equal parts Kerrang!-era nostalgia and cutting-edge LED wizardry.

“I always want to do videos that nobody else can really replicate very easily,” says Chris. “So, you know, anyone can pick a studio and go there and do a music video, but I feel, like, to stand out now you need to do something a little bit extra.”

“ ...anything heavy and fast-paced and really high energy, that electrifying sound, whatever genre that might be.”

— Chris Wade, Dogbrain Videos

Chris’s route into music-video direction was far from conventional. While studying film and TV production at university, he quickly realised he wasn’t destined for a life as a BBC runner. Instead, he turned his lens on his friends’ bands in Canterbury - particularly Broken Hands, an act who would go on to sign with So Records.

“I owe a lot to Broken Hands,” he reflects. “Wherever they were, I was with a camera. It gave me the chance to make cool stuff with my mates - and that’s what really started it all.”

That DIY, friendship-driven approach laid the foundations for Dogbrain. When Chris later moved to Brighton, living among a tight-knit community of musicians, he realised he needed a banner for his growing catalogue of videos. The name? A happy accident.

“My mum wanted me to update her iPad,” Chris laughs. “I asked for her password and she said ‘dogbrain1’. I was, like, that’s it. That’s the name.”

Dogbrain’s iconic mascot, a humanoid figure with a dog’s head, wasn’t born from a marketing meeting. It was born from chaos.

“I bought this dog mask for a headshot session,” Chris says. “The shoot got cancelled, so I just used it at Halloween to chase my kids around the house in a northern accent. Then I made a funny video with it and people really resonated with it. It wasn’t intentional - it just happened.”

That spontaneous absurdity is at the core of the Dogbrain identity. “Comedy has always been part of what I do,” Chris adds. “Even in the early days, my videos were tongue-in-cheek and weird. Now, they’re more polished - all flashy LEDs and high production value - but I still love bringing that humour in.”

From working with Wargasm, Gang, Punkband and babii to Boston Manor and South Arcade, Chris has built a reputation on integrating LED technology in ways that feel immersive, futuristic and tangible.

“I've been working with a lot of heavy/EDM electronic bands,” he says. “It’s anything heavy and fast-paced and really high energy, that electrifying sound, whatever genre that might be.”

Dogbrain also has a key partnership with Kent-based Video Illusions.

“They can build anything out of these high-powered screens,” says Chris. “We just opened a little studio in Manston with a permanent LED wall - a creative space where bands come in and we can control everything.”

The technique evolved after a shoot for Boston Manor on their track Everything is Ordinary a few years ago.

“They wanted a video that looked like it was shot in a Samsung cube,” Chris recalls. “I called up Video Illusions, they built it, and when I saw it, I thought ‘holy sh*t, this is proper stuff’.”

Since then, that LED aesthetic has become Dogbrain’s signature - part live-show spectacle, part cinematic fever dream.

From the 2015 Who sent you? video for Broken Hands to the early-2000s-inspired Danger video for South Arcade, Dogbrain’s journey from being paid with a crate of beer to pitching videos to global acts has been a decade-long climb.

“I came up with Dogbrain Videos in 2015 in my bedroom in Brighton,” Chris says. “It wasn’t until 2019 that it became a real business. People were giving me budgets. Suddenly, I was working with artists I’d grown up listening to.”

Arguably the highest-profile collaboration is with the darlings of the electro rock scene Wargasm (who have themselves worked with the likes of Slipknot’s Corey Taylor and Limp Bizkit’s Fred Durst).

“It’s funny because I knew Sam from Wargasm from his old band Dead!. I did my video for them years ago - it was the first one that made it onto Kerrang! TV! It was like ‘Look, Mum, I’ve made it!’. Years later, he got in touch about Wargasm and it was like no time had passed.”

That reconnection led to a string of collaborations, culminating in the Pendulum project. “I was filming their live show at Dreamland in Margate,” Chris says. “A few days later, I just messaged Rob from Pendulum on Instagram. I’d had a few beers and thought ‘Why not?’. He replied straight away. Next thing I know, we’re shooting Cannibal in Dover’s Citadel prison - a location Marvel and Sony have used. It was insane.”

“I sent them an eight-page treatment and a 10-minute voice-over video explaining my vision,” Chris says. “Rob just said ‘As long as it looks cool, I don’t give a f***’. That trust was huge - but it also meant if it flopped, it was on me.”

At current count, the video for Cannibal, which launched in July this year, has surpassed half a million views.

After 10 years, Chris knows what works for him. “The best videos I’ve done are when I’ve had creative control,” he says. “Equally, with Wargasm, they’ve always been really collaborative. I work so well with them - they’ll come to me with an idea and I’ll refine it, and then we’ll work together on it.”

He’s equally comfortable walking away from projects that don’t fit his style. “I just turned down a video because it didn’t suit what I do. It all happens organically. I’ve learned that the more you try to force it, the less it happens.”

Beyond music videos, Chris’s creative curiosity has previously spilt into film. His award-winning short Wuurm - a black comedy about a man and his talking tapeworm - channels his lifelong love of B-movies and early sci-fi. “Evil Dead, that kind of stuff,” he says. “That influence definitely bleeds into the music videos - the weirdness, the texture, the sense of fun.”

And while his client list grows, his teenage inspirations remain close to heart.

“In Year 10, we had to make a music video for school. I did one for a Bullet for My Valentine song with my mates in the garden,” he smiles. “Got top marks, a distinction - and I realised I could actually do this. I owe so much to that moment.”

If he ever got the call to work with Bullet for My Valentine or Funeral for a Friend, he admits, “I could die happy”.

Despite the chaos, strobes and surreal humour, Chris remains grounded in Kent, raising a family and balancing creative passion with practicality. “I tried to do it full-time when I was younger,” he says. “But I was living that starving-artist lifestyle. These days, I do corporate work, too - it pays the bills and gives me the freedom to only take on music videos I really care about.”

That balance between art and real life, chaos and control, seems to define Dogbrain’s appeal.

“It’s a really nice thing to be part of,” Chris reflects. “I feel connected to the movement that’s going on in heavy music right now. I never take it for granted.”

INFO: www.dogbrainvideos.com