Kasabian - Vlad The Impaler Textual Analysis

As the video opens you see a continuous film burn effect as titles appear on scree. These titles are similar to that on the start of a film, and feature the bend member’s names as if they were producers or directors. The font used to show their names is basic white, and shows up well from the orange and red background, but it looks aged and like it was from the 70s.

As the beat drops you see the well-known comedy actor Noel Fielding in costume as Vlad The Impaler. This is unusual as what seems like a very low budget production wouldn’t usually feature such well-known actors, let alone in a music video.  Titles appear onscreen displaying the title of the song and the name of the main character within the video, which turn from white to red as if blood had stained the text, continuing the horror theme and marking the start of the video.

The style of the video is reminiscent of a cheesy 70s horror film. This is expressed through the choice of camera technology used to film the video, various types of shots used and the mise-en-scene.  For example the costume and props are all from the 60s/70s era and many of the camera angles used to show the various killings are seen throughout films from the previous decades.

The rest of the video consists of Vlad killing various teenagers alone in the wilderness, and a good use of cheap effects and fake blood. It’s obvious that a band like Kasabian could afford a big high budget video with special effects spilling from the sides, but they have specifically made a cheap version of a 70s horror film, and the makers of the video were definitely not going for realistic scare tactics. Instead, thanks to the use of Noel Fielding, the video I feel is a great comedy success.

The cheesy murders and stereo-typical victims give the video a sense of humour without having to make any jokes, and what heightens the comedy further is the excellent acting from Noel Fielding as a psychotic murderer, as he doesn’t scare the audience yet encourage them to laugh at the fake blood and increasing corpses.

For a band of this stature id would seem entropic to make music video as low budget as this with such well-known TV personalities. Yet Kasabian have decided to take that route and I feel that it has paid off and makes the video stand out rom the rest, and sticks in the viewers mind, which as an artist is the ultimate goal as ultimately it results in record sales.