The Pitch - by Josh

This is the first pitch James, Luke and I did to our teacher for our music video for 'Finale' by Madeon. It contains the song choice, the initial idea for our storyline/narrative, the characters and actors playing them, costumes and props, locations and the two possible endings. Below are the pictures from our presentation.












 Click here to view our presentation.

 We found that our teacher liked our ideas and said that if our video was constructed and filmed correctly, it would work as a music video. Everyone else in the room (fellow students) also said that the pitch was strong along with our costume, story and location ideas where good. The one thing that our teacher said that might not work was the song choice, feeling that our idea for a chase video the song (Finale by Madeon) was not quick enough in terms of speed and tempo of the song. Despite the fact that we as a group thought this song would work we decided to look into changing the song; we realised after looking at the song once again that it was possible that many other songs could be matched to our chase video idea and fit well - we wanted our video to instead be a representative of the song chosen so that is fits seamlessly with what is seen on screen. 

 We started to look at other songs and thought it would be a good idea to look at remixes of Finale and came across one that sounded relatively like the original but was notably faster and quicker in tempo. This song was Madeon - Finale (Netsky remix).

 After discussing this with our teacher we all agreed on the new song choice. However, we did encounter a problem with this new song choice. This was that the song was drastically longer than the original, this song being 4:54 minutes long whereas the original was only 3:24. We had already planned out what we were going to do in our video at certain points throughout the song and it would most likely be a lot harder to make our chase scene last this long. We are still discussing whether we should attempt to cut the song length down or make use of the longer song time and make the chase scene longer or even add in some other ideas.

Madeon Artist Research - by Josh

 

 Madeon's real name is Hugo Pierre Leclercq and was born on the 30th of May 1994. He first started composing music at the age of 11 and made a name for himself after he won a competition in 2010 by remixing 'The Island' by the drum and bass band Pendulum. He went on to remix various other artists' songs, most notably his song 'Pop Culture' (video below) which consisted of 39 tracks, some of which are:

• Billie Jean - Michael Jackson
• Raise Your Weapon - Deadmau5
• Aerodynamic - Daft Punk 

 Deadmau5 and Daft Punk have been said to be very inspirational artists to Madeon and it seems fitting that he would use them in the song that got him over 14 million hits on Youtube. A notable point in this video is his use of the 'Novation Launchpad', an incredible piece of technology which he used entirely to create 'Pop Culture'. Comprising of 64 buttons it enables the user to remix an song with endless combinations. 

 His first live performance was in Paris in April 2011, where he was a support act to fellow french artist Yelle. His UK debut was at The Nest in London on August 19th 2011 where he performed alongside the french DJ Jacques Lu Cont. He has done numerous live performances since as well as his songs becoming increasingly popular; his song 'Icarus' featured in the US show 'So you think you can dance?' in May 2012, as well as 'Finale' featuring in EA Sports' extremely popular football game: FIFA 13 and in a Sony PlayStation Vita advert. These are all signs of his rapidly increasingly popularity, the fact that companies are using his songs in popular forms of media demonstrates his rising fame - at the age of only 18, he is set to perform many live concerts (image below) across Belgium, Germany, Holland, France, England and Scotland, me and my partners are attending the London date at the Electric Ballroom.

 Although he is French, it is interesting that he should play so many gigs around England, which is most likely down to his music being largely in English - e.g. the songs 'Finale' and 'The City' are in English. It is also possibly due to his music being quite advanced in the sense that he is ahead of other music producers in France, England being more advanced in music than France; new, English sung artists are continuously coming up with new and advancing genres, e.g. Foster the People with their unique alternative rock/dance music that is unlike any other band.

 Below is his discography. Although he hasn't done many singles and songs entirely of his own content, this can be put down to him being quite young and not having been on the music market scene for that long, only composing 3 songs throughout the whole of 2012. However he has done 11 remixes and mash-ups in total, since this is a lot me convenient for a DJ to do than doing a song used entirely from user-created content; many DJs remix and mash-up other songs as a way to gain popularity and to show how they can creatively turn preexisting songs into their own version of that song. A good example of this is Madeon's remix of Deadmau5's 'Raise Your Weapon' and Pendulum's 'The Island', these are largely how Madeon grew to fame, not forgetting his most popular mash-up on Youtube: 'Pop Culture'.

Copyright Permission Email Reply - by Josh

My partner, James, received an email back from Madeon on 20th October saying that we could use his song for our music video, providing it would be used in an educational context, he also said he hoped James enjoy the London show coming up, which he is planning on going to.

Inital Ideas - done as a group

To help us with the planning of our initial pitch we decided to make a step by step guide for the video we were planning. This would then help us when we come to present our pitch to our media studies teacher and peers, keeping it simple and easy to follow our ideas. Below you can see the initial ideas that we came up with.

0:00 – 0:22

• Guy browsing shop – acting slyly like a thief.
• Being watched through CCTV system by two anonymous characters wearing masks.
• 0:22 – guy takes object and runs – we see anonymous characters leaving their seats.

0:22 – 1:04

• The guy is seen running thinking he has got away with stealing the object – does not know he is being followed.
• See brief shots of the anonymous characters running after the guy.
• He enters an underground car park and starts hiding – thinks he has got away with the theft.

1:04 – 1:58

• Anonymous characters seen either side of pillar in background and guy looks worried.
• Slow motion of him looking round the pillar realising that the anonymous characters are getting closer to him.
• Anonymous characters remove gun from jacket ‘brace yourself’ – undo suits.
• Zoom into gun – gun shot – screen flashes white – cut to guy running.

1:58 – 2:43

• Chase scene takes up the majority of this section of the video.
• Use of quick cuts, different camera angles, shots of feet etc.

2:43 – 3:24

• Guy runs to underground pass/walkway – does not know where anonymous characters are.
• They appear in front of him at the end of the walkway.
• Goes to turn and run the other way but sees loads more people in suits and anonymous masks.
• All close in on him and lean over/around him in a circle.
• Camera pans around in circle on their faces from his POV.
• Shot fades out to black to finish the video.

Copyright Permission Email - by Josh

 Since we needed the permission of the song owner to use the song we wanted, my partner, James, sent an email to Madeon's manager and Madeon himself requesting permission of the song: Finale. Below is a copy of the email.

Analysis - Madeon [chosen artist] - by Josh

 The last video analysis I have done is the music video 'The City' by Madeon, the chosen artist for my music video. I deemed it appropriate to analyse in detail a video done by the artist whose song I am doing to get a real sense of what his style and image is. Therefore, when I film my music video along with my partners, we will have some ideas of what to do when it comes to planning the video. Below is the music video for The City.

 


 Upon first viewing, I instantly liked this video. The song alone creates a sense of having a good time and the video helps to emphasise this. There is a constant presence of the major key throughout this song, as well as other voices that join in with the main singer in places for added effect.

Music

 In terms of the music relating to the video, I believe there to be a significant link between the style of the music and the style of the video. A lot of Electro House music videos generally have lots of people in them having a good time which is what this genre of music is mostly used for. Seeing people having fun whilst listening to this song will influence the way the audience views this song. I listened to the song without watching the video and although it sounded great and did indeed portray the sense of fun and partying. This only furthered my belief when I listened to the song again whilst watching the video. The actual video is a paint war where one side is trying to rescue a hostage from the other team. It has a sense of seriousness about it but the idea of paint being used instead of lethal weapons destroys this image. The vibrant colours in the clothing, paint and the bright urban landscape emphasises that this is not a deadly, fatal environment but more of a competitive one, similar to that of paintball; the serious attitude is there but without the deadly consequences, which captures the exciting nature of the game and the song combined.

 As with many music videos, the editing is driven by the song since a lot of cuts and transitions are made to directly correspond with the song; since there is a distinctive beat to the song it is clearly evident throughout the video. This is most prominent from the video below:

 As the song reaches its climax (0.58) the beat is clear and the video reflects this with quick cuts with the camera bouncing around to emphasise the people running, thus creating the sense of an action video. There are many cuts that last only a fraction of a second until 1.11 where the song slows down, the singing stops and what is seen in the video also slows down, making use of slow-motion to emphasise this (where the man raises the bazooka to the building). At 1.14 the singing comes back and relatively quick cuts (albeit not as fast as before) are seen. This proceeds with the people on the floor below being attacked by paint from those upstairs, with many closeups of the people and the paintballs shown to accentuate the battle between the two groups, such as the serious expressions shown by the people above and the fear by the people below.

 An extremely important point in the relationship between the video and the music is at 1.42 where the music dies down for a few seconds and is brought back to life by the line "so here we go" which can be seen as the signal for the beat at 1.44 which directly links in with the shot of the bazooka, striking the building and bursting into a colourful cloud of orange dust. This launches the video into the same fast sequence to match the chorus with short quick cuts. More people appear as the battle ensues into a raging conflict with many paints being thrown. This continues until 1.58 when the song slows down with few significant beats, apart from those that accompany the cuts from each closeup. This brief sequence could be to portray the emotions shown by the participants and the progress of the battle at that time; the sternness of their expression is matched by their faces covered with paint, indicating that the battle has been going on for some time and are in the main stage of it, perhaps inclining that the song is also in the main part.

Lyrics

  Although there are no evident direct links between the visuals and the lyrics at first glances, when looked at in more depth you can see that there are some subtle meanings behind the lyrics and even the title. "I can feel the city crumbling around me" does relate to the video, the setting being an urban city with unused buildings, "crumbling around me" did possibly have an influence on the location since the whole video is filmed within and around unused and derelict buildings (image left)."But I can see a bright light calling through the dark night" could also be a reference to the brightly coloured paints that being thrown throughout the video, considering the paints to light up and colour the desolate landscape. This is also reflected and directly influenced in the title for the song (image below), with the background being a blank canvas which is brought to life by the vibrantly coloured title with bright and contrasting colours that stand out against the background, which can be seen as having a direct correlation with the video; the paints lighting up the city, actually sharing the same colours and, if you look closely, you can see that the title has the texture of the dry paints used in the video.

 "There is a place in the distance, A place that I’ve been dreaming of, No more time and space don’t exist there, We can dance like there’s no tomorrow, There is a place, no time in space". The opening lyrics here could be descriptive of the derelict buildings, and how this place exists in the singer's dreams, which he is going to make come to life as seen in the video. "We can dance like there's no tomorrow" I believe relates to the nature of the paint war; the dance is their fight and they will fight like they know they won't live to see another day, they will give it their all. "There is a place, no time in space" can be seen as the deserted area in which the buildings are situated, the fantastical place has no time and space and could merely be a creation of the singer's mind, a place to retreat into, or even his idea of a heaven in which exists his ideal world with no physics that can represent the real world.

 "I can feel the heartbeat underneath the concrete, Just like a kick drum plays, Running in a straight line guided by the street lights, Pushing the dark away". The "heartbeat underneath the concrete" line could represent the life of the people in the video that bring the city to life, just as they are the people "running in a straight line guided by the street lights, pushing the dark away"; they are one with the city and they need each other to survive.

There is a place in the distance
A place that I’ve been dreaming of
No more time and space don’t exist there
We can dance like there’s no tomorrow
There is a place, no time in space

I’ve got tomorrow to
I’ve got to go all the way
I’ve got tomorrow to
I’ve got to go all the way
I’ve got tomorrow to
I’ve got to go all the way
I’ve got tomorrow to

I can feel the city crumbling around me
I can’t seem to find my way
But I can see a bright light calling through dark night
Hoping I’ll find my way

Yeah I had what I wanted
It went away so fast fast
Yeah I got to let go
We can dance like there’s no tomorrow
So here we go

I’ve got tomorrow to
I’ve got to go all the way
I’ve got tomorrow to
I’ve got to go all the way
I’ve got tomorrow to
I’ve got to go all the way
I’ve got tomorrow to

I can feel the heartbeat underneath the concrete
Just like a kick drum plays
Running in a straight line guided by the street lights
Pushing the dark away

Yeah I had what I wanted
It went away so fast fast
Yeah I got to let go
We can dance like there’s no tomorrow

There is a place in the distance
A place that I’ve been dreaming of
No oh time and space don’t exist there
We can dance like there’s no tomorrow
There is a place, no time in space

There is a place in the distance
A place that I’ve been dreaming of
No more time and space
We can dance like there’s no tomorrow
Oh oh oh!

I’ve got tomorrow to
I’ve got to go all the way
I’ve got tomorrow to
I’ve got to go all the way
I’ve got tomorrow to
I’ve got to go all the way
I’ve got tomorrow to

Tomorrow
Tomorrow
We can dance

Concept

 A very important concept I picked up when watching this video was that this video relates heavily relates to the Hindu festival: Holi, the festival of colours (video below).

Holi is the celebration of colours and a new season, and as you can see from the video, the participants are having lots of fun, directly relating to The City. It is celebrated by throwing paints and perfumes at each other as a way of representing the new colours of the new season. This can be seen as a way of representing Madeon's colourful and creative personality.

Song Choice - by Josh

 For our video me and my partners, James and Luke decided that we wanted to do a song by a relatively unknown artist, so their image wouldn't play in with how we were going to shoot the video. We also decided to base our video largely on narrative instead of performance as we found narrative type of videos much more interesting than simple performance ones. This also ties in with popular culture as artists are constantly going for more and more narrative type videos, seeing narrative music videos as a way for them to express their image, style and creativity.

 The song we have decided to choose is 'Finale' by the fantastic new 18 year old French Electro House/Pop artist: Madeon.


 We are thinking of basing our location for shooting in London so we can have a good looking, urban landscape. You can actually see from his name logo that it is the Sydney cityscape, which was one of our main influences when deciding on our location.

Lyrics

(Aahoo hoo hoo)
Brace yourself
Brace yourself
(Whoo hoo hoo)

Your last chance,
last summer,
your last dance,
to beat to your own drummer.
Go out fighting.
Go out young.
A flash of lighting.
Clips the Sun.
(2x)

Brace yourself, brace yourself.
Brace yourself, brace yourself.

(Brace yourself for the grand finale!)


Your last chance, 

last summer,

your last dance,

to beat to your own drummer.
Go out fighting.
Go out young.
A flash of lighting.
Clips the Sun.

Brace yourself,
brace yourself