Andrew Goodwin's Theory of Music Videos

Andrew Goodwin was a British man who came up with this theory that all music videos feature the same elements.

The General Theory that we can identify include these topics:

Lyrics establishes a general feeling or mood of subject rather than a meaning

Music- tempo or beat often drives the editing- the speed of the music determines the cuts and camera shots

Genre- reflected in types of mise-en-scene- themes, performance, camera and editing styles

Camerawork- movements, reflects the meaning, angle and shot- representation of artist band

Editing- most common form- fast-cut montage- rendering many images together- quick viewing

Intertexuality- references from other media like films, TV or real life. Audiences enjoy noticing references which others don’t.

Goodwin’s Theory- key features of all music videos identified by Andrew Goodwin:

1. music videos demonstrate genre characteristics- a heavy metal band in all black with flames on the stage, a girl band in sexy outfits and lots of bright colours etc.

2. There is a relationship between lyrics and visuals- what you seen on screen is similar to what you hear- illustrative story backed by the music, can also be contradictive

An example: This Nickelback song is about never being alone, and features people meeting together and eventually getting married.

3. Relationship between music and visuals- the style of music, speed and volume can be reflected in the video- slow music has a slow visual storyline. Can be illustrative or contradictory.

4. The demands of record label will include the need for lots of close-ups of the artist and the artist may develop motifs which recur across their work (also know as a visual style since you never see the artist dress differently). The record label are forcing the artist/band to perform a certain style because that’s what everyone is used to see them do.

5. There is a frequently reference to the notion of looking (screens within screens, telescopes) - something in the music video might not be real to the narrative, but actually the actors watching TV themselves. Also, a lot of videos contain particularly voyeuristic treatment of the female body, where women are used as sexual objects who dance on the screen in not much clothes. This is usually done to sell more because male audiences want to watch sexy women pose in bikinis.

6. There is often intertexual references to other films, TV or music so that the audience can feel happy and complimented if they notice these references.

The Power Of Heights Lyrics

Power of Heights

From this vantage point

I can see things as I want to

There's no real point

In pretending I would help you

Looking down on your plight of fancy

Like a flat fish out of water

At this pressure point

I could do enough to kill you

We could put it in a spin

So that everybody hates you

At the height I'm looking down from

Above the people and the law

From this vantage point

I can climb to by selection

It's a precious point

Doesn't happen by election

From this vantage point

It's a precious point

Doesn't happen by election

We could put it in a spin

My initial ideas for a music video would involve some sort of public oppression- since the song is about the government oppressing the truth in the media. Mabye a chase, people reading newspapers full of lies or something involving public anarchy.

Muisc Permission

Above are the replies I got from Tony Bodimead from the unsigned band Limeshark, who e-mailed me saying how it was fine for me to use their song for my music video.

Music Videos- Conventional Features

Music videos- conventional features

A Convention is an unwritten rule which everyone abides by and follows. In Media terms a convention would be like the structure and style of a music video, where all the producers would do the same thing because it is the media conventions that everyone knows. However, these rules can be broken to create something unique and original, possibly re-writing the conventions.

The standard music video example would contain 3 visual elements which are featured in the clip:

1. Filmed Singer/Band- playing/miming on a set

2. Inserted images mixed in- possibly a narrative

3. Experimental arty film techniques- some different images which aren’t included in the first two

A commonly-used theme is the vocalist/band actively taking part in their narrative/story, while simultaneously playing the music which is a commentary to what you are seeing. They might change outfits/clothing between shots, jump around the screen, dance, shift location or even fly but the general layout is similar to each other.

However, this is a very basic model because any video concept has huge variations because of the song and the artist’s ideas.

There are 3 main ‘pure’ forms of visual music videos-

1. Performance clip- this clip shows the artist(s) in one or more settings in each camera shot: such as a recording studio, then a street, inside a building….

There are 3 different kinds of performance clip as well: song performance, dance performance and instrumental performance. Song performances are visuals displaying the artist singing out the song, with them lip-synchronizing with the vocals. Dance performances show some actors or dancers dancing on set while the artist/band are performing, and instrumental are when the band are seen playing/miming their instruments in a controlled set environment. Almost all music videos will contain song and dance performances combined. Instrumental performances aren’t so common, but they do happen sometimes when the artist wants to split away from the crowd. There is a fourth called concept performances, but this is a live stage show in front of a crowd and these aren’t used much as the official music video.

An example of a Performance instrumental dance clip:

2. Narrative clip- this type of video contains some sort of visual story being acted out as the music is played, like a very short film. A ‘pure’ narrative clip will have no lip-synchronised singing at all, whereas a normal one will show someone miming to the song.

An example of a pure narrative clip-

3- Art clip- If a music video contains no visual narrative, no lip-synch singing or instrument playing then it is considered a pure art clip. These are very rare since popular artists like to stick to the music conventions, but more uncommon, alternative music genres might use this.

History Of The Music Video

Birth and development of the Music Video

As part of our Media Project to create our own music video we will begin by researching the history of music and music videos, so we understand how they started and developed over time.

The first film which had audio in it was called the Jazz Singer, produced in 1927 starring Al Johnson as he sung ‘Dirty hands, Dirty face’. This was the first time ever that synchronised dialogue accompanied a visual performance, instead of singers or instruments (most famously a piano) being played live in the cinema itself. This new development began the craze of Hollywood Musicals in the 30’s and 40’s, with the Golden Age of musical film at that period as this genre became increasingly popular.

By the 1950’s and 60’s, musical performances took a different turn as bands started playing live during Television programmes such as Top Of The Pops and The Monkee’s TV Show. However, there still weren’t any proper video performances which advertised the band and their music, up until 1975 when Queen made Bohemian Rhapsody.

The first ‘real’ music video as we know it came into being in the

mid-Seventies with Queen’s Bohemian Rhapsody. The song came out in 1975, along with the promotional video which had the purpose of showing on Top Of The Pops, so the band didn’t have to perform live because of it’s unusual structure and impossibility to perform live.

After this, all artists and bands started creating their own promo music videos, with the intention to advertise themselves and show off to everyone else what they could do. By 1981, there so much demand that Nickelodeon created MTV, a 24-hour channel which played Music Videos non-stop.

In 1983, Michael Jackson’s Thriller was released with what has been referred to as the best Music Video ever, his 14 minute-long epic which sets the bar up for all videos. It shows that with effort and time, amazing-quality music videos can be produced and Thriller has now set the standard for what everyone else should be making.

Today’s music videos are a combination of band performances, music show-offs and originality- such as this video below.

Visual Music

The connection between music tracks and visual material can be linked backwards to the 1920’s and 1930’s, with work such as Oscar Fischinger’s abstract synchronizations, where a visual display of colour and shapes would be played along with a certain piece of music. He was the first person to use a visual production of video to promote a piece of music.

The Panarom, a huge jukebox-style machine which played music along with short films was popular throughout the 1930’s and 1940’s, until it was replaced by the smaller Scopritone in the 1960’s. This contained 36 small films which included barely-clad women and their body parts, the first time ever that woman had been used as a sex symbol in music videos. This however soon died out in the 1970’s as American programmes like Nickelodeon began showing promo pop clips which showcased the band and their music, but these never played the entire song.

Overall then, music videos were born out of the demand for 'visual music' and developed from early 1940's ideas with synchronized singing and instrument-playing. Nowadays every new hit song will have a music video showcase, in order to keep up the tradition and publicise themselves even more.