Textual Analysis 1 - A Day to Remember 'I'm made of wax Larry, What are you made of?'

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.