The Fray - How To Save A Life

July 24, 2012 Critic Jonni 0 Comments

This is the first time The Fray have appeared on my blog, but will it be their last? To be honest I'm not much into their music, I only like this one song because it's stuck in my head, and has been since Nathan James sang it on Superstar, for those of you who don't know what that is, it's a TV show in the UK that is looking for a someone to play the lead role in the Andrew Lloyd Webber production of Jesus Christ Superstar.

The Fray are a four-piece band consisting of Isaac Slade, Joe King, Dave Welsh and Ben Wysocki. They come from America and have been getting a few chart hits over the years, however they have stopped charting in the UK, and this song is definitely their signature song, I doubt that they'll ever come back into the limelight, however I would've said the same things about Maroon 5, so there's always a possibility.

"How To Save A Life" was written by Isaac Slade and Joe King, this explains why this song feels so emotional, because they are singing about something precious to them. According to the band, the song's meaning is about going to this camp for troubled teens that's called Shelterwood and Isaac Slade was a mentor there. There was this one boy there where no one could get through to him, and no body knew how to save him, there were all these theories and none of them worked. And that is where the song came from.

The music video is extremely clever and connects with the song perfectly, however it's one of those music videos you'd probably watch a couple of times and no more. I know what happens and it doesn't hook me, it kind of reminds me of The All-American Rejects' song "Dirty Little Secret", there are 3 different music videos for this song, this is version 3, which is the most known.

This video contains quite a few teenagers all upset over losing someone, they scream, shout and cry and grieve for the person they've lost. There are various numbered words shown going from "1. Love" to "99. Say Goodbye", these are steps that people probably take to save a life, but they get on my nerves, there are obviously 99 steps, maybe more, except we are shown what? Like 15? Why do they have to have random numbers by them? It just suggests that there is a lot of steps people have to go through yet we aren't allowed to know them all.

Okay so this is a very emotional song with a good emotional music video, but it's not gripping enough, I'm not drawn to watch it again and again, and it kind of makes me feel sorry for these teenagers, and I think that is the desired effect. But they find closure at the end yet why would I want to put myself through all that again, I've watched it twice now and I can't watch it again.