What do you do to have a big send-off from one HQ to another? Why not get OK Go to take you out in style with a special music video?
Earlier this year, we needed to figure out the best possible way to move my Tiny Desk from NPR’s old headquarters to our new facility just north of the U.S. Capitol. We wanted to go out with a bang and arrive at our new space in style, so our thoughts naturally turned to a catchy pop band we love: OK Go, whose unforgettable videos have been viewed tens of millions of times on YouTube.
Bandleader Damian Kulash used to be an engineer at an NPR member station in Chicago, so we figured he’d be up for helping us execute a simple idea: Have OK Go start performing a Tiny Desk Concert at our old location, continue playing the same song while the furniture and shelving is loaded onto a truck, and finish the performance at our new home.
The video includes cameos by Ari Shapiro, Audie Cornish, David Greene, Guy Raz, Scott Simon, Alix Spiegel, Susan Stamberg and more.
As a really amazing bit of trivia the entire NPR move took roughly a week, starting with NPR’s Weekend Edition Saturday as the first to move and be broadcast from the new studios.
On Friday, April 19, while covering the manhunt for Boston bombing suspect, Dzhokhar Tsarnaev, Morning Edition hosts Steve Inskeep and David Greene finalized the network’s move — while they were on the air. The show started broadcasting that morning in the old studios and continued broadcasting an extended edition surrounding the manhunt. The pair wrapped up the broadcast that day at the new studios.