Flowered Up - "Weekender" (directed by Wiz.1995)

The kind of video that has been influenced most by film is probably the extended music video, or the mini film. One example of a mini-film is the promo clip for Flowered Up's twelve minute single "Weekender", premiered on MTV in 1992. This is another video with a visual narrative structure, though the music itself is less "epic" in nature, in that it is divided into clearly defined sections with the main theme of the first part returning at the end. The film also ends as it began, with the main character (played by Shine On Harvey Moon's Lee Whitlock) at work as a window cleaner, lying on a platform, which is slowly descending the side of a tower block. The recapitulation of the main theme (which was edited to four minutes for radio airplay) suggests that this is the film's main theme, and serves as title music for the opening titles (which tells us the stars, music writers and director's names) and end credits (reduced to a single END extending out to say WEEKENDER at which point the visuals fade to black).

The film itself is a story about going out at the weekend, beginning on a Friday evening after work and ending barely a few hours before work begins on a Monday morning. The visual narrative consists of a set of images of social nightlife, drugs and hallucinatory "trip" sequences, all contrasted with the dull reality of everyday work and family life. The music is a similar combination of various styles and instrumentation, the mostly instrumental, drum-machine and synth-based middle sections (the club scenes) contrasting with the gritty, guitar- (and therefore more "real"?) based sounds of the outer (pre- and post-club) sections of the song. It is interesting to note that while "Weekender" is not a "rave" song as such, its accompanying promo clip became legendary in rave circles for its depiction of club/drug culture, and the film even begins with an excerpt of the Club Remix of the song as source music, remixed by Andrew Weatherall and released as the "Audrey is a Little Bit Partial Mix" a week after the single's initial release. The use of the remix as source music strengthens the promo clip's ties with film music.

The promo clip itself can be compared to the film Trainspotting even though the clip precedes the film by fours years. Both deal with the subject of drugs, and though treated differently (Trainspotting deals with the struggle to give up heroin, while Weekender is about the almost reckless over-taking of recreational drugs), they both seem to strive for the same goals - both try to portray what it is like to be high on drugs through the combination of sound and visuals. The nearest the viewer can get to character empathy is to respond to facial expressions and gestures of the characters in the visual narrative and the position of these characters within a particular social group (e.g. friends, lovers, workmates, drug suppliers etc.).

Though the video clip is intended as a "visualisation of music", the director has chosen to adapt the twelve-minute soundtrack rather than use the original form that appears on the single. As mentioned previously, there is an excerpt of a remix used as source music at the beginning of the clip, heard on a radio as two window cleaners are discussing what to do at the weekend. One is reading a newspaper which carries the headline "IN THE GRIP OF E" while the other, younger man is preparing a spliff (filmed in extreme close up), setting the scene for the rest of the video.

Just as the visuals are used to convey the main character's state of mind while on drugs by means of a series of "trip" sequences, so the music is manipulated to convey the aural equivalent of what we see. When Whitlock inhales amyl nitrate on the dancefloor, there is some cutting up of the soundtrack, with repetitions of a split-second sound bite which act as an episodic marker both to a solo section in the music, and to a trip sequence in the visuals. This occurs around eight minutes into the film, and a minute later, when Whitlock is feeling a little worse for wear he is splashes water onto his face to revive himself. Two men come over and talk to him, and though we cannot hear what they say, the excerpt is filmed in slow motion and the music slows down (both in tempo and pitch, as if a vinyl disc is being slowed down manually) becoming slurred and distorted, suggesting that this is what he hears of the two men's voices as a result of the drugs he has taken.

Both visuals and sound change for the second trip sequence. The music moves into a different section, characterised by a drum machine, synth chords and an oboe solo, while we see Whitlock on the dancefloor, surrounded by a group of children, filmed in monochrome and in slow motion. This occurs ten minutes into the film, quickly followed by a third trip sequence, in which the music and visuals change again. Whitlock believes he is sharing an intimate experience with a girl he has just met. The camera is filming both characters topless, in many short, close-up shots, and we are aware that they are alone - the other dancers have disappeared. One section of the music fades into a deep echo for a second or two before a different theme and instrumentation takes over.. We eventually become aware that the two are still on the dancefloor and that he has imagined the whole experience. The trip sequence ends as the guitar chords of the main theme come crashing back.

When Whitlock leaves the club, it is Monday morning, and as he pushes through the double doors of the club, the music stops abruptly and echoes quietly for a second or two. As Whitlock makes his way from the club to work still suffering from the previous nights" consumption of drugs, we hear random noises, musical(a few chords played on piano), non-musical (the sound of a motorbike starting as Whitlock bumps into it) and vocal (the taxi drivers who are waiting to carry the clubbers home) all heavily processed with reverse effects, reverberation and first heard as a cacophony of sound. We are obviously intended to think that this is the way the central character hears the sounds around him as he leaves the club, disoriented and exhausted.

In summing up the effects of the Weekender mini-film on the listener/viewer, we find that the combination of sound and visuals is much more effective in portraying nightclub culture than simply listening to the song on the radio or from a CD copy. Whitlock's hallucinations are not only represented visually, but musically, which makes Weekender much more than a mere "visualisation of music" (Tagg), and certainly more than a case of "the music providing a backcloth to the visual narrative" (Bjornberg, p.69).

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