Matthew Dalby‘The Pretender’ Music Video Analysis

Analysing Professional Music Video Texts:

Track Title: ‘The Pretender’

Song Genre: “Post-Grunge, Hard Rock”

Band/Artist Name: Foo Fighters

Single Release Date:

21st August 2007

FEATURES OBSERVATIONS/EXAMPLES OVERALL EFFECT

GENRE CHARACTERISTICS

Grunge is a subgenre to alternative rock and this is shown in the beginning sequence of shots when the band are first shown.

The shot contains the vocalist and rhythm guitarist (Dave Grohl) enter first and start to sing before the drummer (Taylor Hawkins), lead guitarist (Chris Shiflett) and Nate Mendel (bass guitarist) start to perform with him.

RELATIONSHIP BETWEEN THE LYRICS

AND VISUALS

When the band addresses the riot police officer, the chorus starts and he calls him ‘the pretender’ and that the band will ‘never surrender’

This could mean that the police have no power over the band but claim to have it (because pretender roughly means that someone claims entitlement to a position of rank when it is unavailable). Therefore, the band could be implying that the band has more power than the riot police and that they will never surrender.

RELATIONSHIP BETWEEN THE MUSIC

AND VISUALS

As mentioned above, the vocalist enters before the rest of the band and this matches the music because the audience can only hear the vocalist and the rhythm guitar until the other instruments are played.

Many tracking shots are used as well at a quick rate; maybe to match with the aircraft hangar theme because it is like the audience are sweeping past the band and the riot police.

The cutting rate changes as the music tempo quickens/slows. At the beginning of the music video, the first shot is about 8 seconds (and is called a long take) as the lights are switched on and atmosphere is created by the vocalist walking through the aircraft hangar. However, as the video progresses through the opening sequence of shots, the cutting rate and cutting rhythm increases so that the audience feel more intense and the narrative is built.

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Matthew Dalby‘The Pretender’ Music Video Analysis

ARE THERE CLOSE-UPS OF THE ARTIST AND

STAR IMAGE MOTIFS?

There are many close ups of the vocalist and zooming is used in order to emphasis his importance to the narrative. Although, there are a few mid-shots/close-ups of the other band members so that the band is seen collectively.

IS THERE REFERENCE TO THE NOTION OF

LOOKING?

CATEGORY (ILLUSTRATION/ AMPLIFICATION/

DISJUNCTURE)

This music video would most likely go into the amplification category because the narrative shows that the band are standing up to the ‘pretender’ and that the band seem to have beaten the riot police because at the end of the music video, Dave Grohl slams his guitar down on the floor and he falls down to his knees – either showing that he has won finally or that he has actually surrendered by throwing down his guitar – the audience each will have a different conclusion. Before seeing this video in detail and breaking it down however, I firstly would have said that this would have come into the disjuncture category because I thought that it was quite abstract at first.

SCREENSHOT OF MUSIC VIDEO ASPECT EXPLANATION/ANALYSIS

(Big Close-Up from ‘The Pretender’ Music Video).

The ‘letterbox’ format of the music video enhances the fact that the narrative is progressed like a film.

NARRATIVE STYLE/SUBJECTIVE TREATMENT – Like most music

videos, the audience are treated as if the artist is directly

singing/performing to them. This is in order to gain the audience’s

attention and can increase repeatability. Subjective

treatment is used in this music video because there are big close-

ups of the lead vocalist (shown opposite) along with the mid shots of the riot police. This enables the

audience to see the riot policeman’s viewpoint because the narrative makes it clear that the band is not scared of them

(and is enhanced by the zooming in the shots where the vocalist is directly looking at the camera).

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Matthew Dalby‘The Pretender’ Music Video Analysis

(Showing how Shot Angles affect the viewpoint of the audience).

(Shot showing how movement and direct treatment to the audience effects how the character is viewed).

SHOT ANGLES/MOVEMENT – This is the first shot that the audience see the riot police officer’s face

and the low angled shot establishes his authority because

it visualises that he is more important than the band

members. Also to support this, there is a close up shot of the policeman’s face (along with

crabbing movement to the left). Because he is looking at the

camera, the audience is reminded that the policeman is a public

figure and that he should have greater authority than the band.

LIGHTING – As shown in the second screenshot, the policeman has a partially black background at

the top two thirds of the screen and the other is a faded white at

the bottom. The band is fully lit so the audience can see them

perfectly, but the riot policeman is slightly blended into the background. This creates

uncertainty for the audience because they don’t know whether

they can trust him or not – because he is half in the shadows.

This contradicts his authority.

(Shot of the riot police charging at the band members – in slow motion).

MANIPULATION OF TIME – Towards the end of the music video, the riot police begin to

assemble and when they charge at the band, the sequence of shots in which they are running is slowed down so that the drama can be

enhanced and that the audience know that something will happen

in a few seconds. Also, it corresponds to the speed of the music because the music slows

down at that point.

SPECIAL EFFECTS – The red screen behind the band explodes as the

riot police charge at them and the

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Matthew Dalby‘The Pretender’ Music Video Analysis

colour red has connotations to danger and blood and this

contrasts to the black and white mise en scene previously (as the

band members are wearing black and white t-shirts throughout the

video).

I decided to analyse this music video because it shows how the cutting rate/cutting rhythm affects the overall mood of the narrative and how that the simpler can sometimes be better (in terms of mise en scene with black and white and then the colour clash at the end). I encountered it when looking at many music videos for my research (including music videos by Green Day, Muse and other Foo Fighter songs). My interpretation of this text was not really influenced by where I encountered it (YouTube); but it did catch my attention when looking through many music videos because of mise en scene and the narrative with the riot police officers. Some of the conventions are followed in the video such as the bursts of aggressive behaviour when singing (which shows passion for the music that they are playing) and that the black and white theme is used. I think that the audience for the music video could be varied because, as far as I could tell, there was nothing that would be inappropriate for a younger audience and so it would just be pure taste in whether they like that genre of music and Foo Fighters. I think that assumptions could be made that I am skilled in one of the main instruments in the music because of the skill shown by Foo Fighters – even though I do not play an instrument. What I will learn from analysing this text is maybe to narrow down my ideas sometimes because simple colour schemes can work well – like it does in this video.

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