Star Analysis

In earlier posts we have already looked at many professional musicians and described how they influenced our work, these have been musicians such as Michael Jackson to bands such as McFly and Fall Out Boy- but I have decided to do a full analysis of a band that has heavily influenced me personally though our journey: Tenacious D.

     Initially they were low-key and performed local gigs until Jack Black made a name for himself as an actor, which lead to the bands infamous 1999 television series and instant cult fame. The bands comical styling’s were a hit with their songs consisting of humorous lyrics and themes- these included 'F*ck her gently' and 'Karate' as well as their best known 'Tribute' which were all released in their 2001 album 'Tenacious D'.
     In 2006 the band released their first feature film and second studio album both entitled 'The Pick of Destiny' which included cameos from stars such as David Grohl and Ben Stiller. Their Music Videos and Film use a lot of Goodwins' Points as they name their songs after comical lyrics and act in their videos accordingly, this can be viewed as them using the 'Intentional Theory' as the pair are using those lyrics and acting in a humour manor intentionally to meet the expectations of their audience.

'Tenacious D' Album Cover

As you can see their debut album used a very similar cover concept as ours, the black and white contrasted with colour (their devil and our title) to bring emphasis to the coloured object.

This video gets a lot of its comedy value through contrasting its mise en scene in a similar way to us. The video starts with Tenacious D starting a gig at a talent show, as the narrative progresses the mise en scene gets wilder and wilder- their costumes become more stereotypical of ‘rockers’ and their actions become those of rock and roll fantasy, such as jack screaming at the man who’s head explodes.

                The filming and editing is initially basic with cuts between mid-shots to close-ups but as the video becomes wilder so do the shot types with zoom-ins of the band and tracking-shot of a woman collapsing. Our video starts with a faster pace but in a similar way our shots get more interesting as our narrative progresses and our 'party' gets wilder.

Here’s a two-shot from the video showing Jack and Kyle (Tenacious D) dressed in their stereotypical 'rockers' clothing. As you can see in contrast to the photo of the pair at the top, they are wearing metal bands, sleeveless tops and make-up. The Lighting in this shot is also that of the rock and roll mise en scene, with deep purple and bright lights.

Tenacious D are still producing cutting-edge comical music, that influenced bands such as The Midnight Beast and our work, as well as touring the world with live performances.