An In-Depth Essay Discussing 'Stressed Out' Music Video
‘Stressed Out’ is a single from American indie-pop duo Twenty One Pilots’ 2015 record, Blurryface. Mark C. Eshleman of Reel Bear Media directed the video. It features the band revisiting their childhood, while the pressures of adulthood bear down on their reminiscences. The single marks a point in their career where their popularity is increasing, but acts as a showcase for their authenticity as normal people with relatable home lives.
The video takes the form of an ‘enhanced performance’ under Gow’s terms, and a mix of a narrative video and staged performance beneath Railton and Watson’s four generic categories (2011). The video compliments and extends the lyrical content of the song, yet creates a staged performance with lip-synching, routines, and sets. Though it doesn’t show a completed story, but “will hint at a character’s personality, mood, [and] goals…but will never fully disclose them” (Vernallis, 2004: 37), helping to interpret an overall theme.
The video opens with an establishing shot of frontman Tyler Joseph riding an oversized big wheel, which begins to tell the story before the introduction of the lyrics. The mise en scéne of the widescreen frame (Figure 1) shows a stereotypical American suburban neighbourhood on a dreary day, Joseph’s hip hop-esque outfit, and an adult on a popular children’s toy in the middle of the screen. “Objects…can carry an excess of meaning…taking on a heightened role” (Vernallis, 2004: 99), the big wheel a main source of information regarding the video’s concept.
Figure 1
Once the lyrics begin, the music dominates and a connection can be drawn between the words and the images. Vernallis states, “Even when the three media of lyrics, music and image seem to combine seamlessly into a new whole, some aspects of music, image and lyrics may move to the background (Vernallis, 2004: 14). In this case, the image falls to the background because it stays static throughout the verse. A theme starts to develop between childhood and adulthood with the line, “I was told when I got older…” (0:27). Joseph alternates his gaze between looking at the camera and looking away, his face solemn, almost sad. The extra long shots are intermittent with mid shots using roll movement, thus allowing the viewer to focus on the words from Joseph’s mouth, while the longer shots establish location.
After Joseph walks up to the house (0:42) and meets a new character, band mate Josh Dun, the music is cut off while the two exchange a secret handshake (Figure 2). This is the first and last time that the video uses ambient sound instead of the track. The disruption draws the viewer’s focus to the action yet disjoints the story, cutting off the flow of the scenes. The choice to have visuals dominate the scene is a polysemy sign, and could have a number of reasons – either to emphasize the normality of the neighbourhood with dogs barking and birds chirping, to establish the friendship of the two characters, or to act as an ear catching introduction for the chorus straight after. No matter the cause, the action once again asserts the childlike behaviour.
Figure 2
A performance scene takes place in the living room of Dun’s house during the chorus, bringing focus once again to the music (0:56). The drum kit features ‘Twenty One Pilots’ sloppily written with a question mark at the end (Figure 3), suggesting a time when the band was younger and didn’t know what to call themselves. The duo is still and expressionless, soft light from the windows illuminating their faces, until the drums kick in and they come alive. At this point a third character is introduced – a boy who sits disconnected in the background (Figure 4), foregrounding the band. His sole purpose seems ingrained in bobbing his head along to the song in his headphones, but it can be interpreted that he is the incarnation of the child who has grown up. Though he has no role, he can be viewed as the main character, losing his stresses in the daydreamed past.
Figure 3
Figure 4
At the end of the chorus, the characters are back outside. A shot/reverse shot is used to show Joseph and Dun sitting on a curb drinking an unlabelled but recognizable Capri Sun (1:19). The first typography of the video is used in this scene as a caption of dialogue that’s not spoken out loud (Figure 5). The typeface used is the band’s logo font, a lightweight serif with slashes through the ‘Ø’s, a connection to Blurryface as a whole. Here the image dominates, drawing the viewer’s eye to the caption and forcing focus to the storyline.
Figure 5
When the second verse begins (1:30), the actions of the first verse and chorus repeat. Vernallis states, “An image’s apt reappearance against the musical line…creates patternings” (Vernallis, 2004: 188). Joseph is once again shown riding down the road on the big wheel, yet this time accompanied by Dun on a second big wheel, pulling his drum kit behind in a wagon. The two are seen going into a second house to perform again, this time in a childhood bedroom. The frame is full of symbols that connote a young boy’s room, such as trophies and sports memorabilia (Figure 6). The detached character is back, still bobbing his head.
Figure 6
When the bridge begins (2:27), the setting of the video changes completely. Joseph and Dun find themselves in a stark white walled room, dressed identically, and lying in two beds that mirror one another while a group of people stand behind, all dressed in black. The framed shot is very symmetrical (Figure 7), and seemingly out of time and space of the originally witnessed progression. The only ‘special effect’ used in the video is when the beds turn instantly into a drum kit and microphone, Browne explaining, “A jump cut…can be used to pop people or objects in or out of a scene” (Browne, 1998: 172). Joseph and Dun perform in front of the people, before they are grouped and each introduced as the band’s family members.
Figure 7
Showing the duo lying in bed can signify that they were dreaming about the previous scenes of the video. When the family comes alive and says, “wake up you need to make money”, they wake from the dream and the beds pop into instruments – their way of making money. This scene could also be titled, ‘death of the childhood’, and viewed as a funeral. The two are lying down with their eyes closed while the black-clad family looks down on them. The shot changes the dynamic of the video, connoting the social push to grow up and be stifled by uniformity. Right now, the duo is the colour, the diverse rebels among the black and white.
The end of the video flashes back to the bedroom for a final chorus performance (3:01), a patterned element, before cutting to the street again. Now that the duo has been pushed to acknowledge their adult side, the final scenes interchange showing two different forms of Joseph – one dancing in the street with Dun and another singing from the depths of a dark room, eyes shrouded with red contacts (Figure 8). A spotlight gives luminosity to the face of red-eyed Joseph while the rest of him slides back into darkness. “Characters are designed two-dimensionally in order to be fleshed out by music” (Vernallis, 2004: 61), thus it can be interpreted that ‘child’ Joseph is on the street while red-eyed Joseph sings “wake up you need to make money” and represents the evil and fear of adulthood. This deep voiced alter ego of Joseph is also known as Blurryface.
Figure 8
The main concept of the video is very much one of Peter Pan Syndrome, “In other words, an adult male, chronologically and physically, who still wants to live the carefree life he had as an adolescent” (Houghton, 2014). The video reminisces about childhood, the duo re-enacting childhood activities, until the family yells “Wake up you need to make money”, as if the previous scenes were a dream. Houghton states, “Becoming an adult is a frightening prospect…With responsibility comes some sort of personal sacrifice; we do have to have a job, we do have to make car and credit card payments” (Houghton, 2014). This concept shows the vulnerability and relatable qualities the band possesses. The video gives Twenty One Pilots “an opportunity to present a new snapshot of themselves…a new fantasy role to play”(Austerlitz, 2007: 8).
As Goodwin discusses in Dancing in the Distraction Factory (1992), the video uses two of the three ways to outline the relationship of song and video. The video illustrates the song, a narrative about Peter Pan Syndrome relating to the lyrics, yet more so amplifies the track, adding new meanings to the basic lyrics. Re-enacting childhood and introducing the family adds a new layer to the interpretation of the song. Vernallis states, “Videos mimic the concerns of pop music, which tend to be a consideration of a topic rather than an enactment of it” (Vernallis, 2004: 3), therefore the lyrical theme is illustrated rather than the exact words as they are spoken.
Goodwin states, “At first sight, repetition clearly undermines the principles of the classic realist text. It defies progression and – therefore – resolution” (Goodwin, 1993: 80). Being that the video portrays the Peter Pan concept, it doesn’t follow a set narrative, instead repeating elements based on musical queues until the bridge acts as a turning point, the reason why some scenes feel like a reoccurrence. “The rhythm of visual editing subsumes the larger rhythm of the song” (Frith, Goodwin, and Grossberg, 1993: 38), therefore the cuts are made on the beat and the location changes happen with the pace of the music. Vernallis suggests, “Many directors employ heightened camera work – dollies, quick pans, finely nuanced types of camera reframing, as wall as rapid cutting – to keep pace with the music” (Vernallis, 2013: 234).
Goodwin continues, musical “illustration will often involve the effort to signify a mood, as opposed to telling a story” (Goodwin, 1993: 87). The editing of the video isn’t quick paced whatsoever. It focuses on one scene at a time, using varied close ups and long shots to portray a mood though body language and movement. The duo is usually solemn and expressionless unless they are performing, where they dance and come alive, an “emphasis on emotion, rather than on analytical character development or ideas” (Reiss and Feineman, 2000: 13). The adult solemnness paired with the childhood activities create a contradiction, the former stifling the latter.
The video is a glorified home film, an homage to the ‘good ‘ol days’ when the duo was only performing for their families and practicing in their homes. While the video is reminiscing, it doesn’t romanticize childhood being better than what it was. The saturation could have been boosted and the theme could have been over the top, but instead the video is filmed very realistically with natural purity and hue. The depiction is as it should be, with no CGI or special effects being used. For the band, childhood was about riding around the neighbourhood and going to friend’s houses to play.
The fact that the duo used their childhood homes and actual families in the video, asserts their credibility to the audience, depicting them as humans as opposed to pop stars. The intimate look at the Ohio suburbs where they grew up shows they had a generic upbringing, in an average looking house, on an average street. It brings the band down to earth as ‘one of us’, with normal human fears and wants. Fans feel included with the use of “we” in the lyrics and have “more varied access to the performer than a stage performance can. The close-up, allowing eye contact and close observation of facial gestures, and role-play, within a narrative framework, present the artist in a number of ways not possible in a live concert” (Fraser, 2005: 31).
Reoccurring colours are used throughout the video, most noticeably red, black and white – for example the clothing of all cast, the living room walls, and Dun’s hair. Vernallis states, “A video that stays within a restricted color scheme maintains visual consistency as well as uniformity of mood” (Vernallis, 2004: 127). While no connection can be drawn between the colours the lyrics, it is an intertextuality marketing tool for the album, also acting as a steady colour scheme throughout the video. Blurryface, the record from which ‘Stressed Out’ is derived, features this colour scheme on its cover artwork. Album connection also explains the black paint seen on Joseph’s neck and hands. He explained to MTV News that the paint represents the suffocation he feels from his insecurities about the things he creates with his hands (Ehrlich, 2015). Fraser states:
“Not all audiences will necessarily spot a reference and this need not significantly detract from their pleasure in the text itself, but greater pleasure might be derived by those who recognise the reference and feel flattered by this. Arguably, it also increases the audience’s engagement with, and attentiveness to the product, an important facility in a culture where so many images and narratives compete for our attention” (Fraser, 2005: 30).
The paint is seen in all of the videos filmed for Blurryface, a fact that only fans of the band would connect and understand.
Twenty One Pilots’ use the video for ‘Stressed Out’ to amplify and enhance the meaning and overall feeling of their song. It is a successful accompaniment that shows the band in a pleasant light and gives the viewer an intimate view into their life and insecurities, making fans want to click replay over and over.
Bibliography
Austerlitz, S. (2007) Money For Nothing. New York: The Continuum International Publishing Group Ltd
Browne, S., 1998. Nonlinear Editing Basics. Woburn: Focal Press
Ehrlich, B. (2015) Um, Why is the Dude From Twenty One Pilots Covered in Black Goo? MTV News, [online]
Available at: <http://www.mtv.com/news/2145391/twenty-one-pilots-blurry-face-stressed-out-
video/>.
Fraser, P. (2005) Teaching Music Video. London: British Film Institute
Frith, S., Goodwin, A., and Grossberg, L. (1993) Sound & Vision, The Music Video Reader. London: Routledge
Goodwin, A. (1993) Dancing in the Distraction Factory. London: Routledge
Houghton, K. (2014) Peter Pan Syndrome. Huffington Post, [online] Available at: <http://www.huffington
post.com/kristen-houghton/the-peter-pan-syndrome_b_6127308.html>.
Railton, D. and Watson, P. (2011) Music Video and the Politics of Representation. Edinburgh: Edinburgh
University Press
Reiss, S., and Feineman, N. (2000) Thirty Frames Per Second, The Visionary Art of the Music Video. New York:
Harry N. Abrams, Inc.
Vernallis, C. (2004) Experiencing Music Video: Aesthetics and Cultural Context. New York: Columbia University Press
Vernallis, C. (2013) Unruly Media. Oxford: Oxford University Press
