Vidding: Thoughts on Song Choice
Sep. 10th, 2005 03:45 amSo far I have seen two vids to Hallelujah and heard of others. But all of them seem to be to the Rufus Wainwright version. Thus far, I appear to be the only person who has vidded a different version of the song.
The reason that this interests me is because I heard the song via a vid. I listened to the lyrics and said -- wow, this song is almost what I want. And then I looked up all the other versions of the song that I could get my hands on and ended up choosing the Jeff Buckley version.
The differences between the two versions are actually fairly extensive -- Jeff's version is slower and thus longer (I ended up editing out an entire verse, plus some of the ending, and the vid is still over five minutes long), his voice much smoother, and he pronounces 'hallelujah' differently. All of these things made his version of the song feel vastly more suited to the character of Wesley than the Rufus Wainwright version.
Thinking about this makes me think about song choice in general -- oftentimes, I will watch a vid and be overawed at how completely perfect it is, other times, there is interest found in just how the music conflicts with the source, thus drawing out a completely new side of it.
Two examples:
gwyn_r's Buffy vid to Polaroid Millenium really made me go -- that's my girl. That's my Buffy, right there. Brave and determined and scared and loving. Even the voice of the singer is Buffy, the hesitant young part of Buffy, no louder than the music surrounding her but yet still distinctive.
Flip-side, I never would have imagined a Kill Bill vid to a song like Ring them Bells. The song is low-toned and reverently emotional. But
sisabet used the music to show an unexplored area of Kill Bill, illustrating the moments of stillness and of depth. Utterly stunning.
Part of what made me think of all of this was watching rewatching some of the VividCon dvds before Sci-Fi friday. I just really adore vids in general, even stripped of context. Vidding has definitely become a fandom of mine, just one that overlaps most of the others.
ETA: Because renewed interest has been expressed, here (right-click and save) is the 56.3 MB mpg version of my Wes vid, and here is a yousenditlink to a 13.9 MB wmv version.
The reason that this interests me is because I heard the song via a vid. I listened to the lyrics and said -- wow, this song is almost what I want. And then I looked up all the other versions of the song that I could get my hands on and ended up choosing the Jeff Buckley version.
The differences between the two versions are actually fairly extensive -- Jeff's version is slower and thus longer (I ended up editing out an entire verse, plus some of the ending, and the vid is still over five minutes long), his voice much smoother, and he pronounces 'hallelujah' differently. All of these things made his version of the song feel vastly more suited to the character of Wesley than the Rufus Wainwright version.
Thinking about this makes me think about song choice in general -- oftentimes, I will watch a vid and be overawed at how completely perfect it is, other times, there is interest found in just how the music conflicts with the source, thus drawing out a completely new side of it.
Two examples:
Flip-side, I never would have imagined a Kill Bill vid to a song like Ring them Bells. The song is low-toned and reverently emotional. But
Part of what made me think of all of this was watching rewatching some of the VividCon dvds before Sci-Fi friday. I just really adore vids in general, even stripped of context. Vidding has definitely become a fandom of mine, just one that overlaps most of the others.
ETA: Because renewed interest has been expressed, here (right-click and save) is the 56.3 MB mpg version of my Wes vid, and here is a yousenditlink to a 13.9 MB wmv version.