Goodwins Music Video Analyses

Goodwin's six point analyses:
1 Music videos demonstrate genre characteristics.
2 There is a relationship between the lyrics and visuals.
3 There is a relationship between music and visuals.
4 Selling the Artist - Close ups of band/artist, band may have a visual motif /persona to keep up through their work.
5 There is frequently reference to notion of looking (screens within screens, telescopes etc) and particularly voyeuristic treatment of the female body.
6 There is often intertextual reference (to films, tv programmes, other music videos etc).

Music video Analyses 1:

Video name, Jethro Too old to rock n roll

The music video centres around the band dressed as old men with the mise en scene placed on a giant pin ball machine. The visual themes reflect the lyrics with one particularly good scene in which the band stand in a line sipping tea to the rhythm of the song. The video stays within the confines of Jethro Tulls very individual music style, with editing being done to great effect as it matches the speed of which the song changes (numerously), for instance in the beginning when the band portrays elderly gentlemen the song and cuts reflect this slow order, while the song progresses the video cuts become faster to match the songs increasing rhythm.

One scene demonstrating both intertextual reference (taken from some stunt video extract) and the visual connection of the video to the lyrics is from 3:20 to 4:11. This scene takes footage from an outside source (perhaps tv) and then mixes it with a close up the band have done themselves using special effects to show the connection between the footage and the lyrics. This scene both interlinks the visual to the lyrics but also the music as near the end of this scene the lead singer sings," And as he flies, the tears in his eyes, the wind echoes the final take". This then in time with the singing transitions to the next scene, away from the flying biker.

There is a lot of focus on the band throughout the video, however they are often portraying different entities than themselves, this ranging from army men, sailors, old citizens to younger looking glam rock near the end of the video. Straight after the scene described in the last chapter it cuts to the blond band member on the violin staring bulged eyed towards the audience, thereby giving the feeling of the band knowing they are being watched.

The end scene which shows the lead singer dancing in time to the music shows the most section of the band actually preforming instruments in the video. This shows a lot of what makes the band rock n roll. Visual effects used ranges from heavy usage of disco lights and even firework type displays. This shows quite an amount of energy and thus is reflected by the increased tempo of the song. I think this video is quite successful in portraying the song and is rather entertaining throughout thereby keeping my attention. While the musical genre is hard to place because of the bands unique style, I think they do well to reflect this in their range of make up choices, costumes and clever usage of stage to create multiple mise en scene, even using a basic green screen type effect over half way through (the video clip interlinked with the lead singer flying the bike through the sky afterwards).

Music video Analyses 2:

Video name, Powerglove "Batman"

The video starts upon a green screen backdrop of what looks like a video game metropolis which could perhaps represent Arkham city, in which 18 seconds later the guitarists appears and rifts the guitar in time to the music. Already the video is selling the artist in keeping with the traditional stereotype of metal bands, giving a sense of toughness and mystery. This furthermore shows a very early representation of looking towards the audience.

The most interesting feature of this video is the usage of intertextual references to video games. While the band themselves originate from the sound track of video games (the band name itself taken from a nintendo entertainment system controller accessorie), the usage of video game sprites to make a music video creates an interesting effect. The video snaps between video game and live action sequences of the band playing instruments. Showing the songs story through the use of video game type animation creates a strong tie-in so the audience (gamers) feel comfortable with the familiarity of what unites them being on show.

The music video manages to keep a sense of continuity with the bands costumes being matched in both the animation and real life counter parts. There is a lot of effort being revealed here as the producer has invested time in creating the actual sprites of the band rather than using predone ones and simply modeling the band around them.

I think the area that the video struggles in is the plot. This is an area where most metal influenced songs seem to struggle in, especially instrumental where the plot can be abstract with the only plot being relevant to the emotional tempo the song is going on. I think that the video does its best to try and keep to this emotional context, with more action being displayed in heavier parts of the song(3:40 the boss battle), and less action being shown is slower parts of the song (see 1:42 ,"Space...the final frontier..."). The plot shows the band off as heroes mimicking the traditional viking type hero donned in battle armor trying to stop a race of evil crab people. The whole video makes me think of what golden axe would be like if it were a musical. In that sense I think the video achieves the goal of representing the band as your traditional metal band but with heavy routes in video gaming, therefore being right for the audience it is aimed toward.

I think the worse feature of the video is the segments showing the band playing instruments behind the green screen clouds. While it does fit, it isn't particularly original, and only one shot is ever shown, which is the band facing the audience directly forward. This isn't to say it doesn't work at selling the band, but this simply could have been made more interesting, perhaps a few different backdrops. The element which did make these scenes relevant and consistent came toward the end of the video (around 4:37). This scene shows the band as animated sprites again, however they are now playing instruments while flying through the clouds. This now makes the audience realize that the live action sequences shown in the beginning were up close shots of the band after they had beaten the enemy in the story. This ties up the loose ends in the plot and links the live action and animated sequences well.

What my blog is about

This blog is a documentation process showing the Research and development of my music video promotional package (including a video, overview, research, cd cover etc) through to the conceptualization and market report and evaluation. I will be using several different forms of media to showcase my work on this blog, this ranging from video recorded analysis , to audio files with dictation over certain documents for instance me discusing what I like or dislike about a certain section of my work or blog.

This project will start from september through to December the 19th 2011.