Music Video Analysis - The Flood - Escape the Fate

The first scene of the music video shows a red car pulling up. Looking quite vintage and relatively rich, we expect the people within the car to immediately be relatively powerful in terms of either status or in the current situation. They pull up in the rain, get out and we see the band members disembark. This scene is filmed as an extreme longshot so we can see everything going on. They begin opening a large freight cargo container, at this point no music is playing. This draws the audience in, makes them curious as to what the plan are doing or planning. Inside the freight container we get a longshot of the interior of it as the lights turn on. We see the drum kit at the far end and the microphone at the front, giving away the purpose of the container, for the band to perform. The band members shuffle in, take up their instruments and positions and the song commences seconds after that. As the main riff of the song gets well underway the camera shimmers in and out of focus, empowering the sound of the band and the vocalists screamed lyrics, making them seem like some kind of physically powerful force. Camera angles vary dynamically, showing low angles looking up at the guitarist dive bombing his guitar (a term used amongst guitarists for holding fingers down on the fretboard and rushing down the length of it creating a sustained noise going down in pitch) and the drummer hammering away at the drums. The band take on very animalistic and almost feral appearances, showing their possession by the heavy music they love so much. All these small things work towards drawing the audience into the music as soon as possible, whilst watching this music video, and seeing the energy within each member of the band and their aggressive nature shadowing the music.

During particularly more heavy parts of the song for instance when the lead singer screams or the bassist leans over and screams, the camera again goes out of focus, to empower the vocalists. All the band members are wearing black and from the low angles used, it makes them all look very dark and imposing figures against the lights in the cargo container. The cameras flick from shot to shot, going in and out of focus frequently to almost disorientate the audience, to overwhelm them with things going on. It soon cuts to a shot of the lead singer in the rain and we get a medium close up shot of him singing, head hunched, making him look quite sinister in the rain. This style of quick changing shots, sudden close ups and switching in and out of focus continues to assault the audience in the same way until the breakdown.

The going out of focus for the breakdown starts to take a pattern, rather than doing it at the climax of the vocalists screaming etc, it now takes shape and follows the heavy "headbanging" riff. When the drums, bass and guitar all hit as one during the breakdown, the camera goes out of focus, again serving to make this part of the song seem that much more powerful. At the climax of the breakdown as the lead singer holds a prolonged screamed note, the camera shakes and remains out of focus. This is the most powerful part of the song, in terms of music AND visuals. When the breakdown finishes, we cut to a shot of the drummer hitting a cymbal and standing to grab it (drummers would do this to have a shortened version of a hit cymbal sound, used during a song when a sudden stop is needed), then a swap to a medium close up of the singer from the side holding his mic stand off the ground. At this point only he can be heard for the first line of the chorus, shortly followed by the rest of the band dropping back in after this emphasis of lyrics. With this it returns to the normal methods of the camera focusing and unfocusing with close ups and quick movements. Towards the end of the music video there is a low angled long shot of the whole container which effectively uses the camera to track back while zooming forward to had a distorted effect to the container's walls and the band members.
The video comes to a close with the guitarist having a close up of the final notes strummed and the singer in the rain on a fade out to black.