Genre:

Pendulum is a drum & bass band that use many sci-fi related things that help represent them as a group, such as a planet in outer space used in the their ‘Watercolour’ video. Their music videos tend to be in dark blue lighting with over-exposed lights throughout to make the video uncomfortable to watch. There tends to be a lot of close ups of the characters in the video and of objects. They like to use unusual weird objects in there videos to continue the supernatural feeling and they are also at a fast pace with lots of cutting, which relates to the genre, drum and bass. In their videos we see the crowds dancing in the audience along with the beat and them performing the music, which is also relevant to the genre. In some of their earlier videos we see people running, such as in the video ‘The Other Side’. In their older videos they tend to use special effects less due to the low budget they had like in the video ‘Propane Nightmares’ where the only effect is colour tinting. They also tend to fade out objects and make things look to difficult to view. Their earlier videos seem to be a bit simpler, whereas nowadays they have incorporated more special effects like in their latest album ‘Immersion’. Pendulum tends to use a familiar story line in all their videos with someone trapped in something and trying to escape. However as they’ve become more popular, their videos have also evolved due to new forms of technology.

Visual style and image:

What signifies Pendulum is mainly down to the use of special effects they use nowadays. The continuous use of dark blues and whites in their videos also help the audience to recognise then like in the ‘Watercolour’ and ‘Other Side’ videos. They like to use fading and cloudy effects to make their videos look difficult to watch. This may be done to reflect on their personalities as they don’t like to give too much away about themselves and are reserved people. They sci-fi element in their videos may also be used to reflect on their interest in science and the world. The artists tend to wear black costumes and seem to be quite laid back and they’re usually just standing singing or performing in their videos. The artist uses a lot of fast cutting in their editing in order to create the sense that they are in a rush to do something or achieve something. This can be reflected on themselves as a group and their intentions. They use all types of shots including a few master shots, repetitive close-ups to show emotions of characters in their videos and mid shots. In their video ‘The Island’ they’ve used a couple of canted angle shots to add the element of confusion in their videos. Pendulums song ‘Slam’ was used as the theme song in the Playstation 3 game Motorstorm, which is a car racing game. This has helped identify the artists image of being identified with pace. Pendulum tend to use the theme of escape in their videos as they usually involve the story line of someone trying to escape but being trapped by some type of darkness.

By Chris Wilson