1. Treatment sheet
Song Choice – Radioactive – Kings of Leon
Concept
At the moment
this Pop/Rock
song has a
music video
with a very
abstract music
video, which
rarely follows
the narrative of
the song. The
video consists
of the band
spending time
with children
in Africa, as if they were on some form of charity raising event. Because of this
unrelated video I hope to create a video that is more in keeping with the song’s
theme, whichis the band’s southern roots/origins. The music video was named
by NME as the second worst music video ever. Throughout the video there is an
exclusively black cast (excluding the artists), which was received badly and was
referred to as “…muddled mise-en-scene of questionable racial subtext”. As this
song is based around southern American life I hope to make a good example of
juxtaposition when my filming will take place in northern England. A key word
throughout the entire song is ‘water’, a necessity of which there is an abundance
of in the filming location. The sepia affect that is used throughout the video
provides a tone that I hope to be able replicate in my production. In my music
video I will attempt to show some of the religious elements that are present in
the lyrics while at the same time showing the character as a rock musician
(which the song is), these 2 themes, religion and rock contrast and because of
this I hope to use this as an example of juxtaposition both between the lyrics and
the video, and between different scenes within the video.
Performance & Narrative
Following their breakthrough album “Only by the Night”, the album that this
song features on, “Come Around Sundown”, was vitally important to cement
Kings of Leon’s place in the modern day music scene, however it was deemed as
underwhelming. Because of this I plan to refer to the music videos for both
“Notion” and “Use Somebody” in a homage to the band’s past success, I will do
this in a way that I will be able to look over my music video and show the
similarities between it and the officially released music videos that the band has
taken part in.This is the first song that Kings of Leon have released which gives
any inkling into their religious upbringing, this may be a reason due to the

2. public’s poor opinion of the video, as can be seen in a range of mediums if
religion is mentioned in a positive way then it is often received badly. Because of
this I will attempt to keep religion as a less noticeable theme.
The lighting that I plan to use in the video will vary greatly as I plan to use
daylight, spotlighting and darkness (night). These different levels and styles of
lighting will hopefully show the different themes of the video.
I plan to use a variety of camera angles ranging from establishing shots to much
more personal extreme close up shots, the reason for this is to both show the
location of filming and to show the level of emotion/intensity of the performer. I
hope to put some of the camera time on the instruments used. These instruments
will likely be exclusively guitars (coming together with the rock theme and the
fact that the majority of the band that perform this song play guitar). In my
video the solo performer/character will rarely acknowledge the camera, only
doing so during musical performances. The majority of the video will be a range
of shots of this character and the instruments in a range of settings dealing with
emotions.
An event will have taken place prior to
the video starting that the character
eludes to at certain points in the music
video but the event in question will not
be shown in itsentirety. The
performance sections of the video will
feature the character playing the guitar
segments of the audio, the aim of this is
to have the video sync perfectly to the
track and give the impression that the
character is performing at the time.I
hope that this scene will show the audience a connection between the character
performing and the lead vocalist/guitarist of Kings of Leon.
In the remaining sections of the video I plan to have the character in a range of
settings, both on foot and driving, this will expose the character to different
scenes (which will allow for different sound effects) and therefore different
lighting conditions. Due to limitations such as insurance requirements to drive
the car there will be limited
choice of vehicles, I feel that an
interior shot of the character in
the car will create an intimacy
between the audience and the
character and would be worth
having a shot of a vehicle that
does not fit with the rest of the
video. The sections in which a
car is featured and being driven
will give a good example of the
juxtaposition between the

3. complete control of a potentially dangerous vehicle and the character’s
ignorance to the world around them in the majority of the video.
When learning how to play the song on guitar I used the site
http://tabs.ultimate-guitar.com/ along with the tutorial for the majority of the
song made by Kings of Leon on YouTube. Both these two methods, the former of
which is highly accredited, have been able to aid me in the key aspects of the
guitar performance. The tutorial/interview with the guitarists of the band
allowed me to learn the ways that the hands should be positioned whilst playing
this song, in order to play it fluently while in front of the camera this is vital to
seem comfortable and able to play the song right in every shot.