1. blessthefall – You Wear A Crown But You’re No King
Blessthefall’s video for You Wear A Crown But You’re No King takes place in a
forest, in which it shows the band giving an energetic performance of their song.
The video is intersected by shots of Clean Vocalist Beau Bokan on his own,
chopping logs in half, which is then followed by him pouring gasoline onto them.
He then proceeds to set the pieces of wood on fire as he watches them burn.
After this he sets fire to his clothing, which leads him to run through the forest
and collapse on the floor. The final shot is of Beau’s chest and face which has had
fake blood applied to, which may be a reference to the cover art for their latest
album, Hollow Bodies.
The video for YWACBYNK has no relationship to the majority of the lyrics, except
for one. The lyric, which goes along with the video, is the lyric “Watching the
ashes fall”. This lyric goes with the video, as there is a lot of pyrotechnics being
used within this video. Apart from this there is no relationship between lyrics
and video to create a narrative. The mise-en-scene of the video consists of poor
lighting, most likely due to the band performing at a night within a forest. This
gives the effect of a dark setting to go with the lyrics, which may form a slight
narrative as the lyrics reference how they will be “watching your empire fall”
which is soon followed by Beau singing the lines “Am I gonna be the last one
standing? How’s it gonna feel when I’m on top, I guess I’ll watch you walk away,
And let your empire crumble. The use of the lighting along with the lyrics does
suggest a dark side of the narrative. The costume of the band is their typical
stage wear, which consists of T-shirts (a vest in Beau’s case), jeans and sports
shoes. The facial expressions of the singers Beau and Jared go along with the way
the lyrics were sung when the song was recorded. For example, Jared is the
unclean vocalist and mainly focuses on doing the screams for the band shows a
strained facial expression, as if he is screaming or shouting. The use of this facial
expression goes with the way the song was recorded as if he sang with a face
without any expression it wouldn’t go with how it was recorded, giving the song
a poor narrative. There is no extra sound used within the video, giving the video
no narrative at all. This just shows the band performing the song in a rural
setting with the odd intersection of Beau cutting up the wood he later sets on
fire. The camera shots used within the video range from those of an extreme

2. wide shot to medium shots of the band members. The first time we see the band
is when Jared screams, “Watching your empire fall!” At this point the whole band
start head banging and moshing, for lack of better terms. The breakdown, along
with the bands energetic performance, is put alongside bursts of fire, which
erupts from around the band, most likely edited in that way. This use of
pyrotechnics and mise-en-scene may be used by the band and the director of the
music video to reflect on the bands live performances, which are known to be
highly energetic and involve a lot of moshing, circle pits and wall of deaths. The
colours used within the video are mainly dark and bleak, except for the colour
and illuminations of the bursts of fire occasionally lighting up the darkness.
All in all the video holds barely any narrative to the lyrics or the album. The only
narrative references that the video holds is the fire and the reference to watching
ashes fall and Beau’s burnt, bloodied face which is a reference to the album art
(as seen above).
^blessthefall with currents memebrs, 2013^