With a combination of video and video freeze frames, the video for “Ain’t It Fun” will show Hayley, Taylor and Jeremy having adventures while on a remote getaway. The band will play irreverent games and invent bizarre challenges, getting more and more creative as the video progresses. The rhythm and pacing will be reflective of the song, energy and subject matter in the stills and video clips, repeating, looping and re-arranging, telling and re-telling stories, revealing new things with different angles and approaches. The video will be simple, fun, playful, mysterious and surprising, showing the band having a great time with the backdrop of waterfalls, barns, trees and windy dirt roads.
Time and space are blurred as we travel in and out of these surprising vignettes. The stories will be told through a combination of gif-like flip-book style images, and slow motion video.
We open to a quick series of visually arresting images that give the audience a glimpse of some of the highlights from the scenes to come.
A floating balloon pops.
A bright light reveals a screaming girl.
A guy with a staring problem, fixes his eyes on Lolo at the supermarket, and Lolo slaps him on the face.
Two French Mastiffs rip apart a raw steak on the ground.
Sugar pours onto a tiled floor.
A little boy makes a chocolate hand-print on a woman’s dress.
Lolo lies down onto a giant cake that’s shaped like a bed.
A man with long dreads flips his hair.
All of these random images are expanded on later in the video.
The next thing we see is a slow motion, close up shot of Lolo. It’s dark out, and her face is lit by a flickering, golden, fire, off frame. She looks like she’s daydreaming as the flattering fire-light shines a variety of warm colors and shadows onto her pensive expression (4-24 seconds in the track).
Now that we’ve set the tone of the video’s unpredictable nature, we begin to explore the . There are no limits to where we can take this approach as we give hints with shocking images, and then later fully explore the scene.
Many stories will lead to another story staring the same character in another location. We scroll through events, showing different odd occurrences, then re-visit the same short story, revealing more details. Set inside and out of the party, we get to know a cast of characters and watch Lolo effortlessly having fun. There will be no real narrative structure as we are exposed to all these intriguing images. The video will be more about the thrills and surprises. It will be a great surreal portrait of a simple summer BBQ.
Some of the highlights are pictured and listed below.
(*NOTE: Although some of the visual references below have a real retro style, the video will look very current, matching the kinetic, almost gif-like treatment of the footage. No instagram-esque color filters will be used, and it will contain no appropriated imagery- all original footage.)
The pace of the flip-book style will match the keyboard and drums in the track.
A woman will put mustard on a hot dog, and right as she’s about to take a bite, she screams, drops the hot dog on the ground and runs. These are stills from an educational video from the 70’s:
Another woman will be watching the reflection of her mouth on a doorknob.
A man in an apron turns different fruits and vegetables into Phallices.
Several people at the barbeque will be taking selfies.
A party guest is wearing a shark bite bathing suit that inspires a man to hold up two fish over his eyes.
Another guest s getting her hair braided into a dollar sign.
An elderly man, seemingly completely unaware of the party, stares into nowhere while eating a ricecake.
Someone with a sunburn will be intensely staring at the difference in skin tone on his/her arm that will turn into a full screen image that goes from peach to red.
Someone starts choking.
Some other visual inspiration:
A new experience will feel like a memory as these stories/images repeat and re-occur. One video or series of images may have a final frame that juxtaposes the first frame so that when played in a loop, it becomes even more visually arresting. We will see the same story go from stills to video, so that more details are shown the second time, giving it new meaning.
We end how we started; slowing down the pace, face to face with the hostess, as the flames lighting Lolo’s face die down, and the party ends. Fade to black.
Thank you!
XO
Sophia