Sophie's Video Analysis

Music Video Analysis

I have chosen to analyse Vlad the Impaler by Kasabian. I chose this video because I have decided to research Indie and Alternative rock, as rock itself is a large genre with lots of sub-genres and styles. I also thought that this video tied in well with my previous research as it is from the album being advertised in my advert analysis.

The song begins with a distorted, echoing guitar riff as a colourful, old fashioned movie screen shows titles ('Sergio Pizzorno presents', 'A Ricardo Elfio Film', 'Roman Tarisov in') as if a movie is about to begin. The guitar then disappears and a low bass riff begins as the scene switches to Noel Fielding dressed in a cloak, carrying a large stake. He is walking along a long dirt track. The main title of the video shows up in white but uses a sort of pouring, dripping effect and is drenched in red (probably to represent that blood that is later spilled in the video).

The editing used in the video sometimes matches the beat of the music, incorporating Andrew Goodwin's theory of thought beats, somewhat. A good example of this is a shot between 0:46 to 0:49 as the beat of the song matches Noel's feet touching the ground as he walks. The editing is also sometimes quite disjointed, moving to it's own pace. Thecamera movement used in one scene (1:11 to 1:20) uses a point of view shot, showing everyone running away from 'Vlad' which draws the audience further into the video as it gives the illusion that they are running with the people.

Mise en Scene is very important in this video as Noel's costume links with the title of the song, telling the audience who he is. He is wearing a long, black cape and is ghostly white with a thick black moustache and dark eye makeup. The song's title is 'Vlad the Impaler' so it is suggested straight away through the use of costume and makeup that that is who Noel is portraying. The colours used in the video are very dark which gives the video a very negative, creepy feel. There is also a large use of the colour red throughout the video, used to represent the murders committed and the blood that goes along with them. A lot of fake blood has been used in some scenes which adds to the horror movie feel that is displayed in the video. The setting used in the video is also very bleak as it is a wide open space covered in open feels, giving the scene a sense of inhuman emptiness. Another setting used is a dark forest which also ties in with the horror movie feel of the video, as forests are a common setting for a lot of horror films. The costumes of the victims are very normal and simple which allows the audience to relate to them and also makes Noel stand out in comparison, making him look strange and dangerous.

The narrative of the video is fairly easy to follow; we follow 'Vlad' around a large countryside as he hunts victims and chases them, eventually staking them to death. This takes up the majority of the video until the end where we see 'Vlad' being warded off by nuns with flaming stakes. The video itself is presented like an old horror film, using movie-style titles and film grain effect.

Kasabian are not actually present within the video (although the singer - Sergio Pizzorno- is mentioned within the titles). This means that there is no star image presented to the audience as the band are not introduced in the video and therefore, the audience does not know what they look like from this video alone (although this song was released on their third album, so anyone with prior knowledge of Kasabian will most likely already be aware of what they look like).

This was done by Sophie Arnison.