Music Video Research-
Delilah and Sigur ros are a mixture of the genres for my music video. And I have analysed two that are not the same genre to show the difference in certain conventions.
Sigur Ros- Glosoli
Genre- post-rock/ individual
Genre- post-rock/ individual
The music for the video has a very innocent feel to it, and through the micro-elements they have used this is portrayed really well. Firstly this is a purely narrative music video in which the characters they have used for this video are all children and the setting they have based purely around natural environments; hills, rocky land etc. Children are a clear signifier for innocence, because they are young and have not yet experienced the world to it's full capacity and the setting of hills and rocky lands are natural and present again an untouched land. Children are stereotypically portrayed as pure and crime-less, therefore the audience clearly picks up on what the band are explaining in their music- this is what Andrew Goodwin says in his conventions for a music video: there is a relationship between the song and the visuals.
The main micro elements that help to represent this theme are the lighting and editing. The lighting has been used mostly with natural lighting at dusk; it is only just getting light towards the start and this implies that they are up early and in the 'young' of the day. The morning denotes early, but connotes neutral and calm, happy time of the day when children are mostly awake- basically the most innocent time of the day! Gradually throughout the video the light begins the get brighter and the day starts to mature, which if linked to the characters it represents the children are growing up and maturing too.
This video is showing a journey of the young children and uses the editing and body language within specific camera angles and movements to construct this; they have used many close up shots which allow you to see the detail of the characters and then they normally use a mid-tracking shot of the character or in some cases it uses a mid-two shot with tracking which allows the audience to see their movements. Most of the shots include the children walking or running (active body language) and in these shots there is normally quite medium paced continuity editing to allow you to pick up on their body language and see the progression of the journey.
This video is showing a journey of the young children and uses the editing and body language within specific camera angles and movements to construct this; they have used many close up shots which allow you to see the detail of the characters and then they normally use a mid-tracking shot of the character or in some cases it uses a mid-two shot with tracking which allows the audience to see their movements. Most of the shots include the children walking or running (active body language) and in these shots there is normally quite medium paced continuity editing to allow you to pick up on their body language and see the progression of the journey.
The editing they have used 'slowmo' editing, commonly know as slow motion editing. This allows the audience to see the detail of the children's actions and most importantly their facial expressions, which again look very sweet and not yet scuffed by the stresses of life and also use a soft focus on the camera to emphasize the focus on the children.
At the start they used lots of extreme close up shots of the child's costume which showed you a lot of detail- the small shoes and small hands with short nails, and all of these features of the costume/ make-up (body appearance) signify a child which in most cases is stereotypically quite 'cute'. This use of camera angles allows the audience to start off with a very delicate image of the music video, and it also forms an attachment to the young boy because he is made to look so alone and unsure of what is happening to him- it draws to audience into the video in a really calm way. Also part way through the song the children are all in a field and the camera work here is an over the shoulder shot with a shallow focus within the grass framing a young girl. This shot captures the light behind her and gives her a very pure look to her because it shines through her hair. Light is normally seen as 'god-like' or signifies an 'angle' like quality, therefore she is made to look very innocent. At the end of this music video you get a long shot of the children jumping off the cliff which has inter-textual references to the famous 'The Catcher In The Rye', "I have to catch everybody if they start to go over the cliff - I mean if they're running and they don't look where they're going I have to come out from somewhere and catch them. That's all I do all day. I'd just be the catcher in the rye and all."
The institution for this band is EMI/ Universal Music Group (since the takeover in 2012), this means they are signed to a major label which allowed them to have a large budget for this music video and spend the money that was needed to make it their own. And when I say their own, you can see a pattern in Sigur Ros's music video's, almost an iconic style (Andrew Goodwin) of abstractness that runs through them as a theme. The band members themselves are never usually present in the videos, which makes their iconic look, well non-existent, but to us as an audience, 'mysterious'. Their genre of music is post-rock alternative and the audience for this is largely from a hipster/indie subculture that looks to authenticity and originality which is pretty much reflected in all of their music videos, this one included. As Railton and Watson would say it is an 'art music video and the audience for this looks for the artistic originality within it's construction.
The institution for this band is EMI/ Universal Music Group (since the takeover in 2012), this means they are signed to a major label which allowed them to have a large budget for this music video and spend the money that was needed to make it their own. And when I say their own, you can see a pattern in Sigur Ros's music video's, almost an iconic style (Andrew Goodwin) of abstractness that runs through them as a theme. The band members themselves are never usually present in the videos, which makes their iconic look, well non-existent, but to us as an audience, 'mysterious'. Their genre of music is post-rock alternative and the audience for this is largely from a hipster/indie subculture that looks to authenticity and originality which is pretty much reflected in all of their music videos, this one included. As Railton and Watson would say it is an 'art music video and the audience for this looks for the artistic originality within it's construction.
Alt-J - Tessellate
Genre- indie-rock, experimental, alternative/art-rock
Genre- indie-rock, experimental, alternative/art-rock
This music video is used to represent a love triangle where there are multiple people seemingly into one person and that there are patterns and repeats in history. It is shot as almost a performance/ narrative (Andrew Goodwin), but it doesn't include any of the actual band members, which is not a normal convention for a performance video. The style can be narrowed down to an art music video and seen as a very post-modern style. It uses inter-textual references such as the use of the mosaic artwork and from a post-modern perspective is taking what has already been created to produce another product (pastiche).
In this video I have picked up on the idea of the representation of 21st century attraction for young adults to one another. This music video is cleverly constructed because the setting they have used is a painting done by Raphael which symbolises a lot of philosophy (at that period) which is the understanding of life itself, also the fact that the song is called 'Tessellate, meaning a mosaic pattern, of repeated pattern using certain shapes- therefore because this video represents the love triangle of different youths in the 21st century the setting signifies the philosophy behind their feelings and also the patterns in the mosaic and the actions themselves of the characters.
In this video I have picked up on the idea of the representation of 21st century attraction for young adults to one another. This music video is cleverly constructed because the setting they have used is a painting done by Raphael which symbolises a lot of philosophy (at that period) which is the understanding of life itself, also the fact that the song is called 'Tessellate, meaning a mosaic pattern, of repeated pattern using certain shapes- therefore because this video represents the love triangle of different youths in the 21st century the setting signifies the philosophy behind their feelings and also the patterns in the mosaic and the actions themselves of the characters.
In this video the main microelements that help to construct it are the editing, camera work and the mise-en-scene. To start with the camera work is used very diversely which makes the video seem very '21st century'. The main form of camera work they use is tracking which follows the characters at different paces that have been edited in (mostly going from a calm slow pace to a very fast blurred pace), and sometimes uses zooming to emphasize the body language of the characters (their body language is always based around being alpha, sexual and rebellious). When the camera work isn't tracking it is normally using extreme close ups or close ups to get the finest of detail that helps to signify certain lyrics of the song or framing all of the actors in a long shot.This is a convention which Andrew Goodwin stated in his music video theory- the visual image will relate to the text and the song. One example is when it uses a extreme close up on a man smoking and he lip syncs the chorus to the camera.
The editing in this video has helped to make it seem very 21st century (modern) and also tie in the idea that there is a love triangle and that the patterns repeat (tessellate). The editing is mostly fast pace with breaks of long takes and straight cuts which show you quite a few of the characters. The fast pace implies the feelings of the youths/ people because they are constantly between more than one person at a time and are flustered therefore they are constantly changing how they feel about things and the fast editing makes the audience aware there is tension between the characters. And also the editing does the same thing each chorus which creates the pattern, the 'tessellation'.
The editing in this video has helped to make it seem very 21st century (modern) and also tie in the idea that there is a love triangle and that the patterns repeat (tessellate). The editing is mostly fast pace with breaks of long takes and straight cuts which show you quite a few of the characters. The fast pace implies the feelings of the youths/ people because they are constantly between more than one person at a time and are flustered therefore they are constantly changing how they feel about things and the fast editing makes the audience aware there is tension between the characters. And also the editing does the same thing each chorus which creates the pattern, the 'tessellation'.
The mise-en-scene in this video such as the wardrobe of the characters represents them as young and the females especially are dressed in provocative clothing which presents to the audience a very sexual image of themselves, as if they are trying to entice the men in their love triangles, but this can also be taken in the other direction that there is a strong sense of the 'male gaze' used in this video; women are presented as a males ideal image (short dresses and sexual objects) Laura Mulvey. Also the props are all very 'hegemonic masculine- Antonio Gramsci' such as the alcohol and the large fierce looking dogs. These props help to decipher the gender roles that lie between the characters and show the men as sexually dominant too.
All the microelements used in this music video come together to construct an obscure idea of attraction/ love patterns between more than two people with a strange hint of 21st century culture to it all.
Red Hot Chili Peppers- Dani California
Genre- funk-rock, alternative rock
This music video uses inter-texual references to the full extent because it is based on the evolution of rock throughout the last few decades. The video is constructed through quite a few microelements, the main microelement that constructed this music video is the mes-en-scene.
At the very start of this music video the setting of it is a signifier for the time period (old fashioned stage, long curtains etc. the image has also been edited into black and white which signifies it was an artist quite some decades ago. The artist they are impersonating is Elvis Presley who performed around 1950-60's when television was still in black and white. The mes-en-scene is used very strongly throughout this video in each different impersonation, mostly the setting, props and costume are exaggerated which helps to connotate who the characters are. With the Elvis Presley impersonation they have used an iconic outfit of a white suit jacket with the rest of the suit in black. This look is globally recognised by the audience and along with the body language the lead singer uses (constant leg movements) this is the 'iconic' performance style of Elvis Presley.
Later once it had moved from black and white to colour you can see why the lighting is more important in that it is incorporated with the setting which helps to signify the time period and narrow down the artist; the lighting used is all high key, multicoloured staged lighting which is used harshly implying that it was a loud era and the movement into a more poppy music period. The artist they are impersonating is Prince. Prince's look was loud, outrageous and again iconic. In the music video they have used the costume and make-up again to emphasize the character. Prince was renowned for wearing a mod-like suit styled like a sailor and always had messy hair. Here they have taken his style and copied it to the full extent, including the same shave Prince had.
At the very start of this music video the setting of it is a signifier for the time period (old fashioned stage, long curtains etc. the image has also been edited into black and white which signifies it was an artist quite some decades ago. The artist they are impersonating is Elvis Presley who performed around 1950-60's when television was still in black and white. The mes-en-scene is used very strongly throughout this video in each different impersonation, mostly the setting, props and costume are exaggerated which helps to connotate who the characters are. With the Elvis Presley impersonation they have used an iconic outfit of a white suit jacket with the rest of the suit in black. This look is globally recognised by the audience and along with the body language the lead singer uses (constant leg movements) this is the 'iconic' performance style of Elvis Presley.
Later once it had moved from black and white to colour you can see why the lighting is more important in that it is incorporated with the setting which helps to signify the time period and narrow down the artist; the lighting used is all high key, multicoloured staged lighting which is used harshly implying that it was a loud era and the movement into a more poppy music period. The artist they are impersonating is Prince. Prince's look was loud, outrageous and again iconic. In the music video they have used the costume and make-up again to emphasize the character. Prince was renowned for wearing a mod-like suit styled like a sailor and always had messy hair. Here they have taken his style and copied it to the full extent, including the same shave Prince had.
Later at around 1:56 seconds they move to a heavy/punk era in music and this is constructed through mostly the camera work; lots of canted angles and using zoom/reverse zoom and almost a hand held movement which is edited at a fast pace with lots of straight cuts which is denotes bad practise but in actual fact it connotates violence and energy which is a stereotypical image of the punk culture and music.
Towards the end of the video they are impersonating Nirvana who are a soft rock/ heavy rock band but their iconic look is casual, indie and could say slightly hippy. In this scene they have used the props and costume as the main signifier for the artist; the props are candles and mats which when placed on a stage imply that the artist is quite indie and spiritual (hippy), and the costume consists of ripped jeans and cardigans that signify they aren't interested in the 'star' image which is seen as a very 'indie' quality. Also because of the extreme close-ups on the props (candles) they are emphasizing the significance of them with the artist and the audience can see a pattern in this.
At the end of this music video it comes to the present time of music and the band are representing themselves. This is shown by the logo of the band incorporated into the the setting and if the audience don't know the logo they have used almost a montage editing to create a link between the previous shots in different eras and the present shot to imply it is now present day and the rock that is being performed now is how the Red Hot Chili Peppers are.
Towards the end of the video they are impersonating Nirvana who are a soft rock/ heavy rock band but their iconic look is casual, indie and could say slightly hippy. In this scene they have used the props and costume as the main signifier for the artist; the props are candles and mats which when placed on a stage imply that the artist is quite indie and spiritual (hippy), and the costume consists of ripped jeans and cardigans that signify they aren't interested in the 'star' image which is seen as a very 'indie' quality. Also because of the extreme close-ups on the props (candles) they are emphasizing the significance of them with the artist and the audience can see a pattern in this.
At the end of this music video it comes to the present time of music and the band are representing themselves. This is shown by the logo of the band incorporated into the the setting and if the audience don't know the logo they have used almost a montage editing to create a link between the previous shots in different eras and the present shot to imply it is now present day and the rock that is being performed now is how the Red Hot Chili Peppers are.
Delilah- Go
Genre- acoustic and dub/drum and bass/pop
Delilah's music video 'Go' is the closest linking music video to the music video I want to make. The song is obviously based around a bad case of love and because of the genre it is very much a performance/narrative music video (Joe Gow) which uses the artist as the main character along side another man as a lead. The main narrative is 'payback' to a hurtful love (the man) and it is based within urban (London) settings following the movements of the man running from her as she calmly follows.
Delilah is owned by Warner Music Group which is one of the four large music conglomerates meaning that they are seeking maximised profits and awareness of the artist, and in this music video the camera work demonstrates both that and the link between the genre conventions too. A few seconds into the music video you are introduced to the artist with a tracking close up shot of her walking along the streets of London, with complimenting make up and fashionable clothing and accessories. The intentions of pop music videos are to expand the awareness of the artist to increase the profits and idolise the artist to the public, therefore they use a lot of close up shots and the mise-en-scene, wardrobe and make-up to connect and it is normally professionally applied and uses stylists to get the fashion that is 'in' for the audience that listen to pop/D&B/acoustic music. The conventions stem from the intentions, therefore throughout this music video you are presented with a high percentage of shots being close up shots, which allows the audience to know the artist, see her 'cool', calm body language which goes in pace with the song's beat and establish a relationship with her through connecting the lyrics to the emotions in her facial expressions when she lip syncs (making the connection between the visuals, music and lyrics- Andrew Goodwin). Stepping away from the institutions influence and into the construction of the music video, the music video's key micro elements that help to create the narrative/ performance are the camera angles, mise-on-scene and lighting which are tied to the sound (the music). Firstly the camera angles used on Delilah are mostly front facing close ups, extreme close ups of details such as hands running against walls (atmospheric shots) and long shots framing all of her walking. Nearly all of the shots of her are of her walking or in movement as such. While the other main character (the man) is quite often filmed from behind and in an extreme close up while tracking which emphasizes the narrative of him running away from her. His body language is sharp and nervous which implies that he is fearful and the narrative has really been created through the after effects of the editing. The editing used is using quite slow paced cuts (to match the music) and it helps to tell the story by cutting from Delilah singing to the man walking/running which has been edited into slow-mo to emphasize the body language (the fear and stress in his constant over-the-shoulder checks). The contrast between her behaviour and his signifies there is tension between them and that he is in the wrong to the audience, so in the narrative, although quite plain with not much actions, they are tied into the characters. Barthe would state that the director has created a narrative with an Enigma Code which makes the audience seek to know more about the enigma (which is the conflict between the Delilah and the man).
The final key microelement that helps to construct the music video is the lighting. The lighting used is based on constructed lighting in urban sceneries, such as street lights, cars, flat lights etc. Obviously for the quality of the visuals more lighting such as artificial professional lighting is used, due to the constructed lighting being quite low key, shallow yellow/orange/white colours which wouldn't give such a HD look to body language. The lighting used though is soft key and due to being shot at night in the low key lighting you can't see all the detail in the streets which can signify to some audiences as mysterious and troublesome, which ties into the narrative of following after the man, with most likely bad intentions. Due to it being urban settings and the costumes being all black and gold like for Delilah due the stereotypes such as 'rough city life' and 'hoodies means trouble' then together they connote the idea of 'trouble' and this is also emphasized by the dog which looks like a Doberman. These dogs are usually used for protection and emphasize power and authority, a lot of these dogs are used to guard criminals houses in other media products too.
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