The Kill

Infobox Single
Name = The Kill (Bury Me/Rebirth)


Artist = 30 Seconds to Mars
from Album = A Beautiful Lie
Released = Flagicon|Europe January 24 2006
(re-release)
Format = CD
Recorded = 2004
Genre = Alternative rock
Post-hardcore
Length = 3:51
Label = Immortal
Producer = Josh Abraham
30 Seconds to Mars
Misc = Extra album cover 2
Upper caption = Alternate cover
Lower caption = UK Release artwork
Type = Single

Extra musicsample |filename=The_Kill_-_30_Seconds_To_Mars.ogg |format=Ogg |title=The Kill |Type=single
Chart position =
* #1 (Portugal, U.S., Latin America)
* #14 (U.S. Mainstream Rock)
* #17 (Brazil)
* #20 (Australia)
* #22 (New Zealand)
* #28 (UK)
* #65 (U.S.)
Last single = "Attack"
(2005)
This single = "The Kill"
(2005/2006)
Next single = "From Yesterday"
(2006)

"The Kill" (subtitled in its single release in America as "Bury Me" and in the UK as "Rebirth") is the second single from 30 Seconds to Mars' second album, "A Beautiful Lie". Jared Leto described the meaning of the song as, "It's really about a relationship with yourself. It's about confronting your fear and confronting the truth about who you are." He has also said it is about "confrontation as a crossroads" — coming face-to-face with who you really are. [30 Seconds To Mars A Beautiful Lie CD/DVD "Making of The Kill music video" - "Jared Leto & Matt Wachter talk about the songs meaning"]

Since September 2007, "The Kill" was re-released again in the UK to help the song out on the charts there. It is currently available as a CD with an "A Beautiful Lie" poster and two stickers, and a special limited edition 7" vinyl version. The song was used as one of the themes of "The Invisible", and a live music video is included on the DVD releases, as well as the song being part of the soundtrack.

Music video

Being loosely based on the American film "The Shining" (1980), several scenes are versions from the movie, such as when Shannon Leto enters Room 6277 and encounters the woman in the bathroom, when Matt Wachter being served drinks at the bar by an apparition, when Tomo Miličević is sitting on a bed receiving oral sex from another man dressed in a bear costume, and when both films culminate in an elegant ballroom.

As for the cinematography, Jared Leto has clearly adopted the split screen visual from working with Darren Aronofsky in "Requiem for a Dream" (2001).

The number 6277 is used for the room number because it spells out "Mars" on a telephone keypad. The number also makes an appearance in the video for "From Yesterday".

The music video was selected as the second best video of 2006, falling short only to "Savin' Me" by Nickelback.Fact|date=October 2007 And it was voted the 2nd greatest of the 21st century on Scuzz TV.Fact|date=October 2007

At 1:29, the papers that Jared Leto has been typing are briefly made visible and the words on them appear to read, over and over, "This is who I really am." This is another allusion to The Shining, in which Jack Nicholson's character types up pages and pages of the same line, "All work and no play makes Jack a dull boy", over and over in the same sense.

Also, if you look closely in frame-by-frame mode, between 2:15 and 2:22, a negative of what appears to be the woman's corpse appears on the screen briefly.

When the press release info for "The Kill" video was released, Jared stated that the video was directed by an albino Danish man named Bartholomew Cubbins. This was intended as a joke as Cubbins is the main character of the Dr. Seuss book "The 500 Hats of Bartholomew Cubbins", however airings of the video on music channels still list Cubbins as the director.

The hotel scenes in the video were filmed at The Carlu in Toronto, Ontario. [30 Seconds To Mars A Beautiful Lie CD/DVD "Making of The Kill music video"]

;PlotThe music video features the band exploring a hotel which they are care-taking. At the start, Jared Leto states that they have the hotel all to themselves for three days; although, later on, after the first chorus, it comes on the screen saying "One Week Later", before showing the pages saying "This is who I really am". In the extended version of the video the other band members complain that they have been at the hotel longer than expected and have canceled shows because of Jared's peculiar behavior, explaining the discrepancy.

A letter from the hotel owner tells the band to "Enjoy your stay and please stay out of Room 6277." The band does not heed the warning and opens Room 6277. Following the opening of the door, each band member begins to experience the effects of the room. Each member experiences the effects differently, but one thing remains constant for each individual — they encounter a tuxedoed version of themselves. Several other apparitions then take up residence in the hotel, dispelling the promise Jared made in the beginning of the video that the band will have the hotel all to themselves and that "there's not gonna be a single fucking soul". The video reaches its climax when the tuxedoed bandmates are shown performing the song in the hotel's ballroom in front of an elegantly-dressed crowd dancing with themselves.

Track listing

:Standard
#"The Kill" - 3:52
#"Attack" (Live at CGBG, July 2006) - 4:06
#"The Kill" (Acoustic, Live on VH1) - 3:48

:UK Release
#"The Kill" - 3:52
#"The Kill" (Acoustic, Live on VH1) - 3:48

:UK Re-Release
#"The Kill" - 3:52
#"Was It a Dream?" (iTunes Live Session) - 3:46

Chart positions

*The song broke a record on "Billboard's" Modern Rock Tracks chart. Along with The Red Jumpsuit Apparatus song "Face Down", "The Kill" spent 52 weeks on the chart.
*This song was #67 on "MTV Asia"'s list of Top 100 Hits of 2007. [MTV Asia. [http://www.mtvasia.com/Funstuff/Contests/MTVTop100Hits2007/top100.html "Top 100 Hits List"] . Retrieved 2007-12-27] In 2007 on MTV TRL Mexico it was # 1 and also on Hit List Portugal it was too.
*30 Seconds to Mars re-recorded the song, featuring the Brazilian singer Pitty, as a single released only in Brazil.

Awards

*Won "Best Single" at the Kerrang! Awards 2007.
*On August 31, 2006, the band won the MTV2 Award for "The Kill" at the MTV Video Music Awards, one of their two nominations. The second nomination was for best rock video; however, they lost to AFI's "Miss Murder".
*"The Kill" was awarded Best Video of the Year and Best Rock Video at the MTV Australia Video Music Awards (AVMAs).
*Won The Rock Out! Award at the 2007 MTV EMA's (Europe Music Awards).

In popular culture

*"The Kill" was featured in the January 21, 2007 "Without a Trace" episode, "Primed".
*During the 2007 MTV Movie Awards, "The Kill" was played as the background music of the nomination screen for the film "300", which was nominated for the Best Movie award.
*"The Kill" was featured in the October 25, 2007 "Hollyoaks" episode.
*In the video game Rock Band, the song is available for play as a downloadable song. [ [http://www.rockband.com/dlc Rock Band official website] "Downloadable Content for Rock band video game"]
*"The Kill" will be playable in the upcoming video game .

External links

* [http://boss.streamos.com/wmedia/virg001/30_seconds_to_mars/video/a_beautiful_lie/30_seconds_to_mars_the_kill_orig_unedit_hi.asx Music video stream] provided by Virgin. [ [http://promo.virginrecords.net/misc/vma_tools/ virginrecords] "Promotional material for 30 Seconds to Mars' The Kill music video]
* [http://www.thirtysecondstomars.com/thekill/player_v3.html thirtysecondstomars] Official The Kill/Attack music player.

References