MTV Films Seattle Musicians

A popular online series launches a new season set in Seattle’s music scene

If you’ve spent any time in the Seattle music scene, you’re aware of a Six Degrees of Separation effect, wherein every band is somehow connected to the next. All that overlap leads to a strong sense of community among musicians (and, yes, some drama), which is exactly what award-winning Seattle filmmaker Lynn Shelton captures in the second season of $5 Cover, MTV’s popular online series about live music scenes in American cities. (The first season, launched last April, showcased upstart musicians in Memphis.) The 12 episodes, each seven to eight minutes long (scheduled to launch all at once, sometime this month), are filmed in cinema verité style and feature an array of local bands—including The Moondoggies, The Maldives and The Lights—who, in addition to playing their own music, improvise scenes from Shelton’s structured story outline. Also exciting are the two companion documentary series, released simultaneously: $5 Cover Amplified, in which esteemed local filmmaker John Jeffcoat profiles the featured bands; and B Sides, for which Seattle producer Sue Corcoran concocted juicy clips of more Seattle musicians getting their groove on.