#BY THE WAY EVERYONE WATCH CHIP’S MV IT GOES SO HARD

[petrichormore]

He’s evil for this.

[ashotatthenight]

could you give a description of all Brandon's characters in the new Killers music video?

Lmao okay so I did my best here. BUT this is definitely subjective andother people might be reading different things from them. This turned out waylonger than anybody wants or needs it to be but oh well. See below the cut if you want to listen to me bullshitting.

Okay so the first character is some kind of washed upsinger-turned-Vegas cabaret performer. Someone who once had a pretty sparklingcareer but now that he’s older and over the hill, his popularity declined tothe point that the only gig he could land was one where he’s performing to double-digitaudiences who yawn and sigh through this forgotten legend’s performance. Thefact that Brandon is wearing a suit that he wore over 10 years ago when heplays this character is what brings me to the conclusion that this dude hadonce made a name for himself, but his popularity declined and performing aspart of some kind of dated residency is the only gig he could land. He’s stillwearing the suit he used to wear because it reminds him of a time where he felthe was doing what he was destined to do. You can tell that the performer in thevideo is pretty unhappy because of his facial expressions and just the lack ofgusto in his performance. He smiles at one point but it’s such a sad smile.He’s kind of hyped up backstage, probably because it reminds him of the oldendays before he’d step out step out to crowds of thousands of screaming fans, butthen when he does go onstage, he steps out to a modest crowd of people whocouldn’t care less if he’d turned up or not. He’s depressed because he remembers how good he used to be and knows he won’t ever be that guy again.

The second character is an ex-motorcycle stunt riderwhose career seems to have come to an abrupt end after he crashed out on acourse and seriously injured himself. He relives his glory days bywatching tape after tape of old recordings of himself in action during theheight of his career. He has video cassettes stacked around his TV labelledwith things like “Hoover Dam,” and “Euro Tour” so it seemslike he had a pretty accomplished career going for himself until he had his accident.One of the tapes has “‘01” as the date on it, so on the basis thatthe MV is set in 2017, it’s obviously been a while since he was in his heyday.Whether it was because he was scared to get back into stunting or if hisphysical condition following the accident didn’t permit it, he crashed out ofhis career and seems to have been unable to move on from it. He’s obsessed withthe life he used to have and is trying to hold on to some semblance of the person he usedto be. I think it’s also important to note that of all of the characters, thisone is the only one (as far as I can tell) to wear a wedding band. This leadsme to believe that his obsession with his cut-too-short career caused hismarriage to fail too. Re-watching these old tapes brings a brief moment ofnostalgic happiness back to the character, but he breaks when footage of theaccident reminds him of the reality of his situation, of all thecould-have-beens, and of all that he’s lost. For me, this guy and the first guyare the two characters that are easiest to sympathise with.

Next we have a gambling addict who seems to actricher than he actually is, showing off by wearing ridiculous clothes that areas loud as his ego and flashing materialistic possessions like his fancy watch,his rings, and his classic car. He walks through the casino as though he’s somekind of renowned casino/gambling mogul but nobody seems to take any notice ofhim at all and he simply takes a seat at a casino table with everyone else.He’s dressed like an archetypal bigshot cowboy, but he soon gambles away whatlittle money he has, and when he runs out of chips, he gambles his jewelleryand then finally his car because he’s an addict and he literally can’t stophimself. I’m personally drawing a link between this character and the oneportrayed in “Welcome to Fabulous Las Vegas” from Brandon’s firstsolo album.

Next we have a guy who’s dressed up to the nines,suited and booted and very clearly wealthy in terms of money and in terms ofhis sense of self. The character is seen flirting with a group of women who, tohis face, flirt back, but behind his back they all seem to be saying what acomplete asshole he is. Clearly his only appeal to them is the fact that he’swealthy. They fawn over him long enough to temporarily boost his ego, but noneof them seem to actually like him. The fact that one of the girls looks at herwatch at one point in the video and they all leave without him to me suggests thathe paid for their company. He winds up alone, and the message here seems to bethat money can’t buy happiness or friendships or relationships. No matter howmuch money you have: If you’re an asshole, nobody’s gonna give a shit.

Last we have a self-obsessed, narcissistic bachelorwho seems to think he runs any joint he walks into. He’s very egotistical andarchetypically masculine/”macho”, and acts like a bigshot even though he livesalone in a beat up old trailer with a beat up old car to match. Everything hedoes seems to be to add to that male bravado: The weight lifting; Shooting tincans that he could just as easily knock over with the barrel of his gun andspare himself a bullet with how close he’s standing; The fact that the hood of hiscar is open and there are tools left out. He’s supposed to embody masculinitybut of course we see that this gets him nowhere. Alone, he goes to a karaoke bar andperforms what seems to be a well-practiced routine that he clearly gives on thereg (only after necking a couple of shots for Dutch courage) and he takes itway too seriously. He thinks he can go around doing as he pleases and havethere be no repercussions, but he learns the hard way that this isn’t the casewhen he hits on a chick who’s watching him sing. Her partner squares up to himand beats him up, and he’s left battered and bruised. Nonetheless, he seems toget off on it somehow.

I think the main things that tie these five guystogether are loneliness, and the fact that the character of “The Man”is for each of them exactly that: A character. A suit that they put on. They each seem to be soself-obsessed and have such an inflated sense of self that they’ve wound upalone and unhappy because they don’t listen to other people’s advice, theythink they know it all. They think that anything they hear that contradictstheir opinion is intended to hinder them rather than help them, and in turnthis has isolated them from pretty much everyone. Each character embodies thesemasculine stereotypes, but the video really highlights the fragility of thatmasculinity, mocking what it means to be stereotypically masculine. These guysare over-obsessed with what it means to be “The Man”, and it winds up ruiningtheir lives. The video really compliments the self-deprecating message of thesong: Even though its lyrics appear to be full of pomp and apparentself-importance, combined with the video it becomes clear that the song’sactually warning you not to turn out like those guys.

I also can’t helpbut feel like those guys are emblematic of different aspects of Brandon’spersonality, only hyperbolised to the point of ridiculousness. I think thecharacters play on Brandon’s fears and on all the ways he could have turned out.They represent things that maybe were important to him when he was younger, butgrowing up has made him realise how little materialisms actually mean in thegrand scheme of things. The karaoke guy needing a drink before he can go up onstage, these guys’ need for validation, a fear of becoming irrelevant andwashed up. Brandon is definitely acting in this video, he’s definitely playinga bunch of characters, but for sure there’s more of him in them thaninitially meets the eye. And that’s why I think it needed to be Brandon whoplayed all these characters, as disappointing as it is that the other guys aren’tin the video. These are five wildly different characters who have somepersonality traits in common, and that’s because those personality traits stem fromthe same person.