PRODUCTION FOLDER: Treatments for pitched ideas - Idea 1 - 'Change The Record'

Change The Record is a 5 minute investigative documentary following the story of one of Liverpool’s most iconic record stores, The Vinyl Emporium, which after having been closed down for almost a year has recently sold it’s entire collection on EBay.  With the store being well recognised as one of the key locations that brought the independent music scene to Liverpool, the documentary will delve into the highs and lows of this one Liverpool story, and will explore the reasons behind the store selling it’s entire stock in one load on eBay in February 2014. Through telling the tale of this one store’s journey from high street to online, it will investigate where the future lies for independent retailers now that we live in a digital age.

The documentary’s opening will focus on introducing Liverpool as a city of music and the story of the Vinyl Emporium through showing the Bold Street location where it once stood. Vox pop interviews will be held with the public directly outside where the store stood, aiming to discover local people’s memories of the store and how they feel now that it no longer exists. The interviews will also explore people’s personal preferences on shopping; whether they enjoy their high street shopping experience and how they feel about stores like this selling valuable collections via the internet.

Interviews will be main driving force of the documentary, including those with the previous owner of the store as well as  local Liverpool musicians. Stock footage and our own captured footage showing the contrast between what was once there and what remains today. will also be used A series of updated images as the bid for the collection progressed, will be used to tell the story here alongside voiceover narration. - The range of interviewees will enable the film to capture a variety of experiences and explore memories and opinions on a personal basis, as well as on the larger scale of what this meant for the Liverpool independent music scene. The documentary will question the impact the store has left on Liverpool now that nothing remains apart from memories, and will discover the reasons behind selling the whole stock in one large collection on eBay specifically. The story has recently been covered across social media networks and local Liverpool newspapers, however telling the story through film as opposed to print based media will open up a new way of visually telling the story and will capture the sense of the place as well as a first hand account of the story.

The documentary will be stylistically shot in a classic cinematic way to reflect on the store's history, and the idea that the records as individual items also have a history of their own. Low key lighting will be applied to support this idea visually.
The documentary will wrap in quite a moving tone, by questioning the ongoing uncertaintiy of the future for independent music retailers on the high street, via briefly recapturing this one current Liverpool story. Visuals here will include a low key lit record player being very gradually moved in on.