No Rest Dry The River

During today's lesson we engaged in a narrative task using this song 'Dry the River'. In this task we closed our eyes without watching the video and listened carefully to the song and came up with a narrative for the video ourselves.
 The narrative I came up with involved a lake in the Scottish Highlands, where a boat race would take place between two teams of people. But in the middle the band would be playing on a barge in the tranquil location.

The Task We Were Set:

Listen to the track with your eyes closed. First the music:

What are the emotions it stirs?
What do you visualise?
What images are conjured up in your mind when you hear the song?
Intertextuality, voyeurism, performance, narrative, abstract? A combination?
How do you picture the music video?
What did others say about their ideas for a music video? Which did you like the best? 

What I came up with ......
After listening to this piece of music I envisaged a water based video based in the lake district, involving two boats competing in a race. As the tempo of the song quickens and the guitars and drums kick in this would be the beginning of the race. The band would then be playing on a separate barge in the middle of the lake somewhere, the boats would then row past. This would give the video a clever mix of narrative and performance in an interesting setting, For video effects i may be inclined to use a black and white filter on top of the imaging.


Then the lyrics:

"No Rest"

I used to be a king alone
Like Solomon or Rehoboam
And in the eaves, the Corvidae
Did jealous keep my picture frames
And everything did oxidate in place.

But then you came, a single cell
With astrolabe and carousel
And algebra and symmetry
And none of this was lost on me
And I could see how still I’d been before

If I don’t eat, I don’t sleep at all
Like limbs in procession,
Like so many birds
Stampeding like oxen,
Our hearts are a herd

I loved you in the best
I loved you in the best way possible
I loved you in the best

Did you see the light in my heart?
Did you see the sweat on my brow?
Did you see the fear in my heart?
Did you see me bleeding out?

I loved you in the best
I loved you in the best way possible
I loved you in the best way possible
I loved you in the best way possible
I loved you in the best…