MUSIC VIDEO DECONSTRUCTION

Passion Pit – Take a Walk

‘Take a Walk’ by Passion Pit

Take a Walk is a song by Passion Pit who are an American alternative rock band. It is from their second studio album which was released in 2012

The music video was directed by David Wilson

The following slide is the music video that I have deconstructed

‘Take a Walk’ by Passion Pit

The music video begins with a plain black and white title screen. There are noises of birds and wind blowing which give the impression of an outdoor setting.

The opening is a high angle long shot of a man lying on a pavement as music starts to fade in and camera zooms slowly creating a relationship between the music and the visuals. A dog runs into the shot interrupting the peace of both the shot and the music.

‘Take a Walk’ by Passion Pit

The man seems disorientated as he gets up and throws a ball for the dog which leads to a continuous point of view shot giving the audience the perspective of the ball. The camera moves up and down to give the effect of bouncing which was done using advanced Helicam technology.

On beat editing as the ball begins to bounce to the beat of the song which again shows a relationship between the music and the visuals.

The camera then moves up to show a high angle shot of the neighbourhood

‘Take a Walk’ by Passion Pit

The camera tilts up to a shot of the sky as the lyrics say “sky”. This creates a relationship between the lyrics and the visuals, and also the music and the visuals as it is edited on beat

The ball continues to bounce through the street and then again travels into the sky and a high angle extreme long shot of the houses below is used

When the ball lands again we can see a shot of a couple sitting by a tree. This relates to the lyrics as he is talking about his relationship with his wife

‘Take a Walk’ by Passion Pit

On beat editing is used as the chorus begins and the ball is hit by a baseball bat sending it in a different direction

The camera shows the ball travelling through several different locations such as the park, the sky, a river, a farm and then a city. The different locations connote his financial journey through life and how this effects his family and other aspects of his life. This portrays the irony of the ‘American Dream’

‘Take a Walk’ by Passion Pit

The camera bounces back up into the sky which now seems a lot darker and dull, possibly to connote his struggle through life worsening. The camera also spins round, possibly to portray confusion and disorientation

The ball lands in another street which appears to be a lower class area with litter on the road and run down buildings. This suggests how much worse his life has got and the lyrics “I'm just too much a coward to admit when I'm in need” show that his pride in himself is too high to ask for help

‘Take a Walk’ by Passion Pit

The camera cranes up to show contents of a house or living room on the roof of a building. There is another crane shot of a city office building and flowers fall to the floor and smash connoting that he has lost everything good in his life

At the end we see the ball go ahead of the camera to continue its journey and the camera tilts up to show a balloon floating into the sky while the music fades. This calm and peaceful visual fits with the fading music and shows that the journey of the song has come to an end

‘Take a Walk’ by Passion Pit

This music video is completely narrative based with no elements of performance including lip syncing. This is unusual for music videos of the indie genre as artists often like to show off their talent. Passion Pit may have chosen not to use performance elements as they thought the message of the song was more important and they wanted to illustrate this.