Music video analysis on Pompei by Bastille

2. Music
 The start of the song starts off with quite a slow and calming rhythm, and
then gets quicker and more into the rhythm, during the middle of the song,
this is where the beat is at its fastest the audience will be to be waiting for
the ‘drop’ where it then calms back down with the single main beat of the
drum.

3. Genre/mise en scene
 The clothing of the main character is all black making him look mysterious
and makes the audience feel as though something bad may happen or he
may be bad. Whereas the other people who have the black eyes seem to be
wearing ordinary clothing or work clothes such as the maids, making it seem
weirder as its just ordinary people who have the black eyes, The genre of
this music is rock/indie rock which the stereo type for rock is that’s its dark
colours, and people going crazy on a stage with a Mohawk, however I think
that this song and video goes against this a bit because it has a story to the
video and isn’t set in a stage location, but merges with the stereotype with
the dark colours.

4. What it’s about?
 The music video focuses on a man (played by lead singer Daniel Smith) who
is running away from the eruption of Mount Vesuvius in Pompeii ("Great
clouds roll over the hills, bringing darkness from above") once he sees
people with black eyes he realises the ash from the volcano has caught up
with him.

5. Camera/editing
The start of the video shows us a establishing shot of the lead singer standing
on top of a wall where he looks tiny compared to the building he’s on showing
his vulnerability, it then goes into a close up of his face showing the recognition
of the band, many establishing shots are used to show the location of the scene
which is quite dark and empty. In the middle of the video a hand held camera is
used to ‘chase’ the character through different locations showing he is in
danger. The last shot a close up of the characters face replicating the one at the
start but he has the same black eyes everyone else during the video had. As the
location changed quite a lot it meant it had to have rapid editing to fit in with
the pace of the song

6. Lyrics
 I was left to my own devices
Many days fell away with nothing to show
And the walls kept tumbling down
In the city that we love
Great clouds roll over the hills
Bringing darkness from above
But if you close your eyes,
Does it almost feel like
Nothing changed at all?
And if you close your eyes,
Does it almost feel like
You've been here before?
How am I gonna be an optimist about this?
How am I gonna be an optimist about this?
We were caught up and lost in all of our vices
In your pose as the dust settles around us
And the walls kept tumbling down
In the city that we love
Great clouds roll over the hills
Bringing darkness from above
But if you close your eyes,
Does it almost feel like
Nothing changed at all?
And if you close your eyes,
Does it almost feel like
You've been here before?
How am I gonna be an optimist about
this?
How am I gonna be an optimist about
this?
Oh where do we begin?
The rubble or our sins?
Oh where do we begin?
The rubble or our sins?
And the walls kept tumbling down
In the city that we love
Great clouds roll over the hills
Bringing darkness from above
But if you close your eyes,
Does it almost feel like
Nothing changed at all?
And if you close your eyes,
Does it almost feel like
You've been here before?
How am I gonna be an optimist about
this?
How am I gonna be an optimist about
this?
The main interpretation from this
song is mostly about the volcano
which wiped out Pompeii, also the
fact that our worlds falling apart due
to our own faults and in peoples life
there is always problems and
difficulties yet when we ‘close our
eyes’ we realise that and stop
thinking about the problem
ourselves we see how we haven’t
really changed our attitudes to make
things better, and keep making the
same mistake again and again
‘we’ve been here before’