Here’s the video premiere of ‘Orange Blossom Child’ – a love letter to her childhood from Florida’s Van Plating. The shuffling rhythms and stirring guitar hook you in. Van Plating’s catchy vocal performance, reinforced by melodic backing engages throughout.
Van Plating says of the video: “Originally when I’d decided I wanted to do a music video for ‘Orange Blossom Child’, I was thinking more literal with the concept — searching for a Jeep Cherokee like the one I grew up driving and a teenager in a old house etc…but I couldn’t find a car local enough to be able to use it for a day of filming. A fan of mine dmd me on twitter offering the use of his vintage Corvette Stingray — if I was open to the whip not being a Jeep. (The generosity of my fans is a trademark of who they are as people. They are the best humans I know.) When I picked up my jar off the floor at his wildly generous offer I quickly pivoted the aesthetic vision to a look back on those times I’m singing about, and chose the beautiful Colt Creek State Park as our setting for a dreamy highway drive remembering being the kid who never quite fit in — but here she is all grown up and she’s made her way in the world just fine. The Florida wilds have been disappearing for over 40 years and this park is one of the last vestiges of the Florida frontier here in Polk County where I currently live. I hope you enjoy the beauty of it. I hope it carries you away. Filmed by my good friend and fellow artist Will Payne Harrison.”
‘Orange Blossom Child’ is the title track from Van Plating’s third album, which was released in the autumn of 2023. For this album, she set out to capture the sound and feel of Florida’s music and the result is what she calls ‘Orange Blossom Country’. Nine years after she finished making music with her band Pemberley, Van Plating returned with a self-titled album in 2019. Her writing has continued to mature and the latest record finds her combining her styles and influences more confidently. Thematically, ‘Orange Blossom Child’ takes us back in time, celebrating her childhood in Florida. She says: “I want it to be really clear that I made this thing, this was my specific vision and my objective. I am the Orange Blossom Child after all, and along the way, I invited people to join me in the process. The result is a creation that is so much larger, more colourful, and more lush than anything I could have created alone. No one is an island. This time, I didn’t create like one.” Indeed, she invited 33 performers to contribute to the process. Enjoy.
