The DJ Takeover sponsored by Level Up is a program for listeners to discover their favorite artist's favorite artists, working to foster connection to the music and makers inside and outside our city. For the entire hour, we go down the rabbit hole of stories from their past, experiences of the present and goals for the future.
“You get a different side of musicians when they approach film as an artform.”
Speaking that truth was Abbie Esterline, Sound Vision programmer for this year’s Milwaukee Film Festival and part of my guest roster for this DJ Takeover. I sat down with her, along with Cole Quamme and Liam O’Brien of Wisconsin project oak you, to take a closer look at the important intersection of music and film.
The Sound Vision program runs throughout the length of this year’s festival, April 16-30, with films playing at both the Downer and Oriental Theaters. Esterline explained that many of the selections are documentaries about musicians and their lives, yet no two are alike. Something that does bind them is how they use music as not only the subject, but an emotional medium to represent a time, place or moment in the history we share with many of these artists.
A prime example came after Esterline heard “Broken English” by Marianne Faithfull during the Takeover and shared that a documentary of the same name is set to show at the fest April 22-26. The film’s nonfiction approach happens within a fictitious research facility called “The Ministry of Not Forgetting,” where Tilda Swinton and George MacKay show archival footage to Marianne Faithfull, who relives these parts of her life while sitting outside of it.
Quamme and O’Brien have a film of their own in the festival, something they may not have imagined more than 10 years ago when they started making music in and around Milwaukee. Their current focus is oak you, a folktronica project that will debut “pangea pt. 3 (hibernation)” during the return of the Milwaukee Music Video Show at 6:30 p.m. April 28 at the Oriental Theatre.
The film is the latest edition in oak you’s five-part EP series, pangea. Each one has been accompanied by a durational short film inspired by Norwegian Slow TV. This broadcast style offers a meditative experience by covering an ordinary event in its complete length — for example, a seven-hour train journey in full.
Quamme and O’Brien live on a farm, which allows for their surroundings to set the scene on idyllic tracks like “Misty Meadow Magic Land.” The duo are in a habit of creating videos to go along with their EPs, but they explain that adding the visual component has taught them more about their own music.
“We spent a lot of time conceptually thinking about what was being represented by this music, what’s the feeling,” O’Brien said. After capturing that feeling through footage of their farm, they enlisted an edit from Liyan Zhao to direct the narrative. “We got to discover the Misty Meadow Magic Land of the farm,” Quamme concluded.
Joining oak you in the Milwaukee Music Video Show are other familiar members of the city’s scene, like Caley Conway, Fuzzysurf, Hughes Family Band, Mol Sullivan, Sex Scenes and Seances. While their genres may differ, they’ve all embraced the marriage of music and film as a creative exercise to expand past their medium of comfort and gain a greater understanding of what they’re putting out into the world.
For the consumer, the two work in tandem to trigger our deepest sensory experiences, helping us make an even stronger connection to the artist and their message. To feel that connection, check out Sound Vision and the Milwaukee Music Video Show at the 2026 Milwaukee Film Festival, running now through April 30.
DJ Takeover: Sound Vision playlist
- "Misty Meadow Magic Land" by oak you*
- "En Yay Sah" by Janka Nabay & the Bubu Gang*
- "Broken English" by Marianne Faithfull#
- "Disparate Youth" by Santigold #
- "FIRST BODY" by TNGHT*
- "Purple Hat" by Sofi tukker*
- "Maggie's Farm" by Bob Dylan#
- "Waiting Room" by Fugazi#
- "Singing Never" by Caley Conway*
- "Drive in Reverse" by Pat McCurdy#
* Picked by oak you
# Picked by Abbie Esterline
