Music Video Concept

1. Music Video
Presentation
Bethany Jones

2. Standing In The Dark

3. The Song…
My song ‘Standing in the dark’ by Lawson, is
slow/fast tempo song, I chose it because it
fitted with my narrative of a break up gone
wrong.
Lawson released their first single ‘When she
was mine’ in 2012, their breakthrough single
was ‘Brokenhearted’ released in 2013
featuring B.o.B, from 2013 to 2015 the band
did not release any music due to taking break.
In 2015, they released ‘Roads’ which
eventually climbed it’s way to number 4 in the
charts.
The band were well known during their prime,
however their fan base lost in interest during
the band’s break, and since then they have
become less well known.

4. The Song…
The song ‘Standing in the dark’ is a track about moving on
from a break up, it centers around a boy coming to
understand that he has to move on from the love of his life.
Original Video…
The original video for the song, focuses on the lead of the
band looking through glass to see that the girl he loves has
moved onto someone else. The video primarily focuses
around performance and instrumental, therefore in order to
make my video different and stand out from the original, I
want to focus more on the narrative and what the song
means.
Lawson – Standing in the dark -
https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=PsbPkZPKEuY

5. Genre…
Lawson are considered a pop rock band, this is determined from
the band writing catchy pop lyrics with their conventional guitar
based rock song.
This genre conventionally does well in the charts, as it is
something you can dance to but also you can relate to.
Likewise, the band are regarded for this in particular, this is
shown through their songs such as, ‘Brokenhearted’ and ‘Juliet’,
these songs were covered by multiple YouTube singers and
popular bands/artists at time of release.
Lawson Broken hearted - https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=jekHmNtLcig
Lawson Juliet - https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=1V18P7JkAuA
The Vamps Cover of Broken hearted -
https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=WBcW-5vereQ

6. Videos From the Genre…
As I have been researching the genre, I have noticed that
a lot of bands/artist’s are considered ‘Pop Rock’, that you
wouldn’t really expect to be from that genre.
Personally, I believe the riffs in the song make it rocky,
and the catchy lyrics make it memorable for the audience
or listeners, for example the One Republic song ‘Counting
Stars’ – when the drums and piano kick in, it adds layers
to the song making the audience want to song a long
One Republic:
https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=hT_nvWreIhg

7. Videos From The
Genre…
Furthermore, the genre enables an element of freedom, for example the
artist Ellie Goulding…
Burn - https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=CGyEd0aKWZE
The track ‘Burn’ is in fact considered more a ‘dance’ track, however if you
listen closely to the instrumental of the track, it has similar riffs to ‘Counting
Stars’ by One Republic, therefore you hear it and remember the genre.
Likewise, the video narrative is extremely similar, if you relate the video
above, to the Calvin Harris video for ‘Summer’, they have a very similar
party feel to the video, it makes people want to go out and enjoy
themselves. For example, both the videos, start off in cars, Goulding’s is
does have a slower tempo start compared to Harris’s, but the pair have
used it to employ into the audience that that is what their song should be
used for.
Calvin Harris – Summer https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=ebXbLfLACGM

8. Stills…
As you can see Goulding is using flares, to
add that extremely fun daredevil element to
her video, likewise she is stood in the middle
of a road, contributing to that rebel aspect,
making people want to have a good time.
Likewise, Calvin Harris uses the same
technique, the walking on the road in the
middle of the no where, adds to the
arthuncity of the video, it makes the
audience want to be them.

9. Videos From The
Genre…Asides from understanding the genre of the Band, I
really want to keep my music video true to the genre,
therefore when it came to thinking of a narrative for my
video, I looked at Maroon 5 ‘Won’t go Home Without
you’ -
https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=VlMEGBsw6j8
The video is a cross between narrative and
performance, the video is based around a man trying
to impress his girlfriend, who just isn’t interested in him
anymore.
The video flashes back to one particular night in their
relationship.
The flashbacks is in black and white, whereas the
performance is in colour, this allows the audience to
clearly distinguish between present day and the past,
this is something I would really like to include in my
video as it involves elements of flashback.

10. Video’s From The
Genre…
I have also looked at Pink’s ‘Just give me a reason’ – the video
is a bit of an anthem for people who don’t want to lose someone
they are still in love with.
I really like how the video uses a simple set, for example for
90% of the video, certain around the a bed and a TV, I really like
how they have set the scene.
For example, the bedding is all screwed up and there is rubbish
on the bed, I really like this idea for my video, as the boy is
completely heart broken, and adding this setting will contributing
to the feel of how his life has fallen apart.
The video gave me a lot of inspiration for how to set my video
and get the effective feel that I want for the video.
Pink’s – Just give me a reason -
https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=OpQFFLBMEPI

11. Videos From The Genre…
Also, Tom Odell’s ‘Another love’ – influenced me when it
came to creating a true narrative. I want to keep the
narrative extremely true and real to the story and the lyrics
of the song, but I also want to keep the video alive and
interesting.
Therefore, I looked at a lot of break up anthem songs, to
get a good feel of what people like to look for in a break
up narrative, therefore Tom Odell’s, ‘Another Love’, was a
great video to take influence from, he stays directly
looking into the camera the whole time, while a girl tries to
get his attention, as he sings, she lip syncs certain lyrics to
match his, as the music video progress and the
relationship goes further down hill.

12. Videos from the genre…
The colour of the video changes to a fiery
red and bits of the set faded in and out, I
would like to include this in my video, when
the girl is shown with another boy.
I thought it would be an effective idea to
have her staring into the camera while the
new boyfriend does nothing and goes out all
the time.
I feel this would give the narrative more of
an edge and make it more artistic, because
a narrative can be hard to keep interesting.
But, with including that aspect to the video.
I feel it will bring it to life and give the
audience more of a feel to what the couple
is going through, furthermore it will make the
difference between flashback and present
day more clear.

13. Videos From The Genre…
Moreover, rather than just looking at the music and how to film the video, I
wanted to look at narrative videos in order to get my narrative right.
Therefore, in order to achieve this I looked at, short films, such as this one –
Free People – ‘ROSHAMBO’ - https://vimeo.com/58375780
The film follows a couple who are falling in love, this gave me insipration for
the begginning of the video, as the couple are in love before it all goes
wrong, the couple use ‘Rock , Paper, Scissors’ in order to decide whether or
not they should leave or if they should stay together.
It gave me a good sense of what it is like to be in love in the modern age, it’s
all about choices, it also gave me inspiration to include a scene before the
music in order to set the tone of the video for the audience and give them
more of a sense of the storyline.

14. Videos From The
Genre…Furthermore, the short film expresses both the girls and the boys view of the
video, much like my video, I feel like the short film effective describes what it
is like to through a break up for both the girls and the boys.
The short film, made it me think about the realistic aspect of the video,
taking inspiration from Tom Odell’s video, with the fading in and out of the
objects, I want her facing directly forward into the camera, but then I would
like her to get a phone call from him, in order to make it more realistic, that
they are both struggling to move on.
Likewise, instead of flashing back to the sad times in their relationship, half
way through he video, I will flash in back to the happy times in their
relationship, I will flash the video back to how they both saw the day they
broke up. Therefore, it further highlights the fact it is from two different sides.
Free People – Roshambo: Rock (Girls view) - https://vimeo.com/65227571
Free people – Roshambo : Paper Scissors (Boys view) -
https://vimeo.com/71546824

15. Target Audience…
The band ‘Lawson’ are considered a mainstream band, therefore they will
have a fairly conventional following for their music, they were popular at a
time when audiences were crying out for pop rock music, for example their
first single ‘when she mine’ – released in 2012 – went to number 2 in the
charts.
The band have 320k following on twitter, and over 200k subscribers on You
tube, however the band have over 34 million views on You Tube, showing
that their social media following does not reflect how popular the band are
in terms of views or charts.
Furthermore, I want my video to relate to as many ages groups as possible
as I feel the band do, their music is not explicit, also their style varies, their
song ‘taking over me’ is a dance track, whereas ‘when she was mine’ is a
love song, this relates back to the genre of the music, pop rock gives you
the freedom to explore different ideas and concepts. Therefore, because
most people can relate to a break up at some point in their lives I feel my
video will relate to many people.

16. Target Audience…
Therefore I plan on targeting a wide range of audience, I feel like
anyone who has been through any kind of break up I feel like it
could relate to them.
As I will have teenagers as my main actors, I feel the video will
relate to teenagers a lot more than an adult would, because they
would have a concept of the emotions of a teenager.
I will target them by focusing on the emotion of the song, as break
up songs is normally something people can relate to, I plan on
adding in certain artistic qualities, in order to keep the audience
interested in a more narrative based music video.
Furthermore, because I am focusing on the emotions of the actors,
I feel like this would build trust between them and he audience
therefore building a relationship between them.

17. Concept…
My concept is narrative and performance based, it is based around a
teenage relationship as they cope with the highs and lows of a
relationship in the modern age, putting a literal meaning to the lyrics of my
chosen song ‘Standing in the dark’.
The video is a continuous cross between present day and past.
The video opens with a piano based backing track while we explore the
couples ‘Happy’ stage relationship, taking inspiration from the short films,
the couple will always use ‘Rock, paper, scissors’, to decide where they
will go next in their adventure.
The instrumental will then kick into the video, and the audience will see
the boy led in his bed, the setting of the bed will be messy, with screwed
up bed sheets and empty packets around him.
There will be continuous cuts between the performer on the bed and the
‘Happy’ stage of the relationship.

18. Concept the happy and the
sad…As with any music video, you have to rely on the introduction to set
the tone of the video.
As my video is strongly narrative based I will rely on the start of the
video to set the narrative so my audience understand the concept
of the video.
In order to make the narrative as realistic as possible, I want to
include a short little silence piece during the beginning of the video,
for this I will use the a piano backing track.
The juxtaposition of the sad backing track and the ‘Happy’ stage in
the relationship, will foreshadow to the audience the downfall of
their relationship.

20. Concept…
As with any story there is always 2 sides.
Therefore my video will focus on both sides of the story, for the
first verse and chorus you will get the boy’s version of events
and how he truthfully feels once the couple spilt.
Likewise, the second verse and possibly third verse will belong
to the girl version of events.
I am doing this because no one views a break up in the same
way, and they will both see what happened when they broke up
and their lives now differently.
The theme of ‘2 sides’ will always be promented throughout the
video.

21. Lyrics…
Sitting here wide awake
Thinking about when I last saw you
I know you’re not far away
I close my eyes and I still see you
Lying here next to me
Wearing nothing but a smile
Gotta leave right away
Counting cracks along the pavement
To see you face to face
Thinking about the conversation
I know I’m not one to change
I’ve never wanted nothing more
But as I walk up to your door
I'm standing in the dark
She’s dancing on the table
I’m looking through the glass
She’s someone else’s angel
It may sound stupid that I'm wanting you back
But I'm wanting you back, girl
And now I’m standing in the dark, dark, oh
Dark, dark
All I want to do is hide
But I can’t stop myself from staring
Wishing his hands were mine
I can’t stop myself from caring
And as he turns down the lights
I’m feeling paralysed
And as he looks into her eyes
Yeah, alright
I'm standing in the dark
She’s dancing on the table
I’m looking through the glass
She’s someone else’s angel
It may sound stupid that I'm wanting you
back
But I'm wanting you back, girl
And now I’m standing in the dark, dark, oh
Dark, dark, oh
Dark, dark, oh
Dark, dark, ohh, oohh
I’m standing in the dark
I’m standing in the dark
I'm standing in the dark
She’s dancing on the table
I’m looking through the glass
She’s someone else’s angel
It may sound stupid that I'm wanting you back
But I'm wanting you back, girl
And now I’m standing in the dark, dark, oh
Dark, dark, oh
Dark, dark
She’s someone else’s angel
She’s someone else’s angel
As you can gather from the lyrics they relate highly to the emotions of losing someone,
therefore, I plan to zoom in on the literal meaning of the lyrics when filming my video, for
example, when the song states, “I close my eyes and I still see you” – my main
performer will open his eyes to see her lying there next to him, he will close his eyes
tightly and open them again to not see her there.
Blue – Boy Yellow – Both
Red – Girl

22. Conventions…
The conventions I plan to include are…
Close up
Lyrics and visuals
Systems of looking I.e. A performer looks at a phone
Iconography

23. Close up…
I plan to use a lot of shots throughout my music video, however
the close up will be used through moments of emotion or
intensity…
When the instrumental of ‘Standing in the dark’ comes in, I plan
on using a close up of the boy’s eyes…
The camera will gradually cut outwards, revealing the whole
space, while he stays looking directing into the camera,
effectively setting the video and conveying the emotion.

24. Lyrics and Visuals….
This is perhaps one of the most creative elements…
Throughout some scenes in the music video, there will be lyrics present
For example, there is a scene in the bathroom where the boy goes to try
and calm himself down after he fails to fall asleep, lyrics will be written in
the steam of the mirror…
This will have lyrics on that link to that scene, for example ‘’She’s someone
else’s angel’’ this shows that he literally cannot escape it anyway he turns.

25. Iconography…
This will hopefully be portrayed through what the main performer
wears…
For example, most artist of this genre normally wear, quite rocky/indie
clothes.
This fashion is popular within the genre, as shown by the bands and
artists I have researched, such as one republic and tom Odell, therefore I
feel styling my main performer like this will create an iconography.

26. Systems of looking…
Both my main performers will at some point look at a phone, as
in the story line they try and contact one another…
Therefore when this happens I want to do a close up of the
phone in order to allow the audience to see what they looking
at…