Written by: A Day to Remember
Director: Dan Dobi
Genre: Pop-punk / Post-hardore rock
Structure: performance/ Narrative
The video has an evenly matched amount of narrative and
performance feature. The shots are fairly straight forward and the video has a
lot of unconventional qualities.
The
band’s focus is mainly away from the audience as they are not directing them
and are playing the game of kickball. This creates a sense of realism as it
shows their focus on the game. It also makes the audience feel like they are
there playing with them. This helps to involve the audience in the video to
make them emote with the band. It also gives the video a perspective as the
audience feel as if they are viewing the band play the game from by the side of
them which
An
unconventional feature of the video is that the band are playing a sports game
which is not stereotypical of rock bands however lots of pop punk bands have
sports references in their videos. For example, Good Charlotte played a Madden
video game in the anthem video.
A conventional feature of the
video is the fade in at the start as the image comes from blurred to clear.
This is conventional of pop-punk music videos and was adopted by other sub
genres of rock after. The fade in could symbolise the bands transition from
faceless musicians to professional musicians as they became famous.
The
video uses intertextuality by referencing the band Blink 182, the band that
inspired A Day to Remember to form at the beginning of the video when the band
are walking into the arena. This is done by using the number on the back of one
of the band members t-shirt. Another band member has the number 69 on the back
of his t-shirt which shows the immaturity of the band and the genre. Another
case of intertextuallity is the unexplained naked tattooed man at 2:40 also
appeared in Bring Me the Horizon’s Chelsea Smile video. The video is self-reflexive
as at the beginning of the video a fan is holding up a sign that says “I love
ADTR”
The
video has a lot of fast editing which matches the beat of the song. Most of the
shots stay on screen for under two seconds which is long enough for the
audience to register what is happening in the shot but not long enough for the
audience to emotionally connect with each shot.
After a
band member is shown kicking the ball, the video cuts to a mid-close up of the
member playing their instrument for a short amount of time.
There
are a lot of Rockstar energy drink logos throughout the video, this is because
the band was sponsored by Rockstar energy drink at the time and also because
the video was shot during the bands break at Warped Tour. The name Rockstar
also shows the bands breakthrough into becoming rock stars themselves. The use
of energy drink endorsement throughout the video also reflects the audience of
the video as it is aimed at teenagers who are also the target audience for
energy drinks.
The use
of shot-reverse shots during the argument between the singer and the umpire
shows the argument to be a back and forth conversation and not only one person.
The camera spins around the argument to show the reaction of the audience as
when a fight occurs, a circle of people will usually form around them.
The way the band walk into the
game was very similar to the iconic Reservoir Dogs walking scene which shows
that the band are serious and are determined to both win the game of kickball
and break into show business.
The band’s clothes follow
conventions of the pop pun and post hard core genre as they are all wearing
full black outfits. The band members all have tattoos and stretched ear lobes. This
helps the band to relate to their audience as they will be teens or early
twenties and will probably fit into the same demographic as the band with the
same interests and style. A close up of three of the band members shoes were
shown and the style of shoes shown were Nike Air’s, Converse Chuck Taylors and
Vans which are popular shoes with the audience of the band and the video.
The cheerleaders are partly
conventional of the genre but not completely as most pop punk bands have party
scenes in their videos with females dressed provocatively and the cheerleaders
are the bands spin on this. However, cheerleaders are stereotypically egotistic
and shallow and more attracted to athletic males than musical ones. This shows
Levi Strauss’s binary opposites theory as conventional pop punk artists are
very un-athletic and usually eat a lot of fast food which is shown at the
beginning of the video when two members of the audience are sharing a hot dog. The
fact that cheerleaders are usually not attracted to musicians does however reflects
the stereotypical cheerleader as the band are successful and therefor have
money which could be why the cheer leaders are attracted to them. Also in terms
of Laura Mulvey’s ‘Male Gaze’ theory, the cheerleaders are shown in short
skirts and vests and are shown stretching with low angle camera shots which
could be to cause voyeurism from the audience.
Before the game of kickball
starts, the band seem very confident and have aggressive faces to intimidate
their opponents but when the children walk out, their faces drop and look
scared. This could represent breaking into the music industry because lots of
people think that it looks easy to do on the surface but once they attempt it,
they realise just how difficult it is.
As
a British person, I don’t know what the rules of kickball are and so at 1:52
when the scoreboard is shown, it doesn’t really mean anything to me however it
is visible that the teams are drawing which adds a bit of suspense to the game
and video which is eleviated when the singer, Jerremy Mcckinnon kicks the winning kick.
