This music video for Paloma Faith's song "Stone Cold Sober" is directed by Sophie Muller in 2009. It follows the indie pop/jazz genre through its colorful, bright visuals that cut along with the beat of the song. The video focuses on Paloma Faith's star image of orange hair, red lipstick, and unique voice. It features her in different scenes and costumes, switching between color and black and white, with scenes including a party, a run down corridor, and her dancing energetically at a party while being the center of attention.
2. The genre of this music video is indie pop/jazz. It follows the genre
characteristics by being predominantly colourful and bright and also
cutting on the beat of the song. This video was directed by Sophie
Muller in 2009 and focuses very much on Paloma Faith’s star image,
which is orange hair, red lipstick, and her very unique voice directed
this video. She is very vintage looking which is very popular in this
day and age.
3. This video starts with a party scene in black and white with low-key
lighting. This then cuts to indoor woodland and quickly pans
around a tree to her, it also switched to colour when it cut. While
the intro to the song is playing it shows her in all the different
scenes and costumes she’ll be in in the video. Once she starts
singing the lighting switches to high key. The video has some
relevance to the lyrics ‘I’ll be the late night lady you won’t
recognise’ while singing this she has red lipstick on and a red
dress and looks very voyeuristic. During this scene the camera
zooms in and out a lot bringing our attention to her all the time and
so we can see she is in a very run down corridor.
4. During the chorus it looks like hand held camera was used
because it is a party scene. Using the hand held camera
makes it look more intense and interesting. There are also
very bright lights as she wanders around over passed out
people. When the video quickly switched back to the run
down corridor it is enveloped in red light.
The next verse shows a small party scene where everyone is
passed out but her. There is high key lighting and lots of
mirrors so we can see more of the room without panning the
camera. The end of this verse cuts to the active party scene
and again there is lots of zooming in and out but always
focusing on her as she sings.
5. During this chorus she is dancing and singing. Her dancing fits
with the lyrics and is again very voyeuristic. Hand held camera is
used to make it look more intense and like we are dancing with
her. This time she has other people dancing around her because
it is a party scene so it is only logical. There is then a very wide
shot of a big stage with a figure running across it with a big
bunch of balloons.
The lyrics then fit with the visual ‘In the madness of the storm’
there is a lot of wind as she runs towards a bright light and
confetti is blown all over the place. This is in black and white so
we can only see her silhouette and the confetti and it looks very
artistic. I think this scene is slightly over cranked too to add to the
effect.
6. There are a lot of close ups of her face as she is singing, it
then cuts to a wider shot of her in a box dressed as a pin up
girl which is again very voyeuristic. There is a quick cut to
the party scene and then back to in the box dancing with a
mime; I really enjoy this scene because it is so odd. Finally it
finishes with her and the mime in the box.
