In the Skin of a Killer by Make It Your Business (3 min. 2006) Directed, shot, and edited by Lester Alfonso for a high school band, a day in their lives.
This epic LA “show-and-tell” continues for the 43rd day in a row. Today’s video captures a glimpse of what it was like to be a teenager in Peterborough 15 years ago when PCVS was a real thing and the Trasheteria was the only place you would go. The band Make It Your Business asked me to make them a music video and gave me a choice between two tracks from their album. There was no question to me about the track In the Skin of a Killer.
I love music videos. I could probably talk for hours about the art of music videos. To be asked to make one, to have the trust of another artist, and to be given the opportunity to flex those very particular muscles is an absolute joy in me. That joy, I think, is captured in this video.
It was Charlie Bierk who approached me one day and said, “My mom said we should hire you to make a music video.” I had known Liz Bierk through the arts community in Peterborough and she had already given me a warning call that her teenage son might be knocking. I was very flattered by this. We agreed on $500 cash and I said that I would listen to the songs and get back to them with a choice and a rough idea.
My concept for the video was basically to document a day in their lives — to capture as much of their reality as possible from the beginning of the day to the end. I suggested that it could be a day when they’re actually practicing, working their part-time jobs, going to school, and performing a gig for their friends. I think it ended up being a Saturday, I shot as much footage as I could while suggesting situations and “poses.” We tried slowing down the song and speeding it up in the edit or lip-syncing in reverse…
We staged the waking up scenes because we didn’t want to travel to many locations, we simply used different rooms in Charlie’s house.
For the part of the song where they all sang together acapella, they sounded like they’re echoing in a large room — like a shower! I thought. I remember storyboarding the band into a sports game at the YMCA (while lip-syncing) and then, hitting the showers for the moment they all sing together in a show of male camaraderie as those I’ve seen in films but seldom in real life.
When it was time to shoot the scene however, the band suddenly had to have an emergency meeting. I waited for about fifteen to twenty minutes. At that time, I was definitely hoping they’d agree to the idea because I was racking my brain for a Plan B that would go with the “story” and I couldn’t come up with one.
After the guys met, Charlie spoke to me for the band and, with all the seriousness of a young mature artist, he said: “We’ll do it but we do it fully clothed.”
“Even better idea,” I said. “Thank you.” So we rearranged the shot list to do the shower scene last. Nothing was altered from the soundtrack except for my adding the sound of the locker slamming shot in the scene after the shower. It seemed apropos to punctuate the scene with this diegetic sound.
At the time, I didn’t have the right kind of camera to shoot the way I wanted to so I just taped the top and bottom of the lens with painter’s tape so I could compose the shot in 16 x 9 aspect ratio. Then, in the editing, I just digitally cropped the image. This is the reason why this file is a cropped 4 x 3 aspect ratio, for those on the techy side who need to know.
More soon! — LA
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