Music Video essay

Media music video essay

Music videos have changed drastically over time and are now unrecognisable from their historical counterparts.

A music video is something that involves a soundtrack and imagery integrated into one to create a short video accompanies by the song. Music videos are produced as a form of promotion and an artistic purpose. Music videos first started to be introduced in the 1980s and they were produced through a company called MTV.  When music videos were first introduced they were very much just another form of entertaining and new way to listen to music. However in the modern society, music videos purpose is mainly a form of promotion to increase the sales of albums etc. music videos use a wide range of styles of video making techniques such as animation, live action filming, documentaries and many more. Many music videos interpret images and scenes from the song lyrics and others are sometimes live performances of the song made into a music video. Both of these are very effective ways of promoting and advertising a song and making it more enjoyable for the audience.

However over time the way music videos have been produced has drastically changed and has opened a whole new range of ways that music videos can be made, and what is actually included in a music video. Take for instance a historical music video such as Rod Stewart hot legs which was written and produced by Rod Stewart himself. Rod Stewart’s video is a clear example of how the theory behind music video has been used correctly to complement the song. . Andrew Goodwin’s views on the narratives for music video were that the video should link to the actual lyrics of the song. The reason that this song is a good example is because Rod Stewart follows Andrews’s implementation of music videos. We know the song is called hot legs therefore in the music video when Rod Stewart says the words “hot legs” we see on the screen women’s legs that the people in the music video are looking at. This clearly shows the audience what Rod is singing about and gives us more knowledge to why he is singing this. Hot legs comes under the genre of rock and by seeing the band in the music video playing the instruments such s guitars and drums also gives the audience a clearer understanding of what the genre of the song is. All this is through simply relating the imagery to the lyrics which is a very effective thing to do.

In the contrary to this take a modern rock song such as ‘can’t stop by the red hot chilli peppers’, this music video is very different to the song hot legs. The reason for this is because the video includes some forms of animation that isn’t used in hot legs. This shows how music videos have changed because music videos used to be just imagery from a video camera however music videos today are combined through cameras and other forms of digital technology. Another reason that this music video isn’t the traditional sort of video is due to it not following Andrews’s theory of the lyrics of the song linking with the imagery that’s in the video. This shows to us that over time music videos have gradually steered away from the traditional conventions and have taken a league their own. This could also mean that in the modern society music videos have no real purposes they are simply just for advertisement to bring more profits to the music labels/companies.

Linking both hot legs and can’t stop together relating to Andrew Goodwin’s theory there is also another big difference between to older video to the more modern video. Andrew stated that the camera shots in the music video should centre one main character making him or her star person. In rods Stewart’s video as he is the main singer the majority of the camera shots are based around him, however in the red hot chilli peppers video the main singer is seen in roughly the same amount of shots as the rest of his band. This once again shows how modern music videos have changed in the fact they can be quite confusing to understand who is who unlike the more historical videos.

Another example of how much music videos have changed over time is by looking at a historical video such as candy by cameo. For this video I will present how Laura Mulveys theory has been shown. Laura Mulveys theory is that ‘In a world ordered by sexual imbalance, pleasure in looking has been split between active /male and passive/female. The determining male gaze projects its fantasy onto the female figure which is styled accordingly’. This quote can be linked to this theory because in the video we see lots of women who are wearing short skirts and tops which are a way of making them more sexually attractive for the audience. This is also a way of making them stand out more, and make the audience feel that this is who they are singing about. Also these women are not actually being intimate in any way with the male characters in the film. By this it doesn’t make the music video turn into a video of lots of women it still has the narrative, an effective video but it does make it more appealing for the audience to watch. From the video we also know that the women are seen as the ‘candy’ which shows us that even though women in more sexual clothing are still able to be linked to the lyrics of the song and have meaning to the audience. This means they can enjoy the video but also have a good idea of who they are singing about.

However over time this theory has changed has become very different to what it used to be. The change in music videos and sexuality has been adapted around the rise of the American rappers with people such as Biggie smalls, 2pac and snoop dogg using scantily clad women to promote their music video. An example of this would be Robin Thicke blurred lines. Although this song doesn’t come under the genre of rap it is a very good example of how drastically the way women are being shown is.  Blurred lines has two different versions, one version includes women wearing bikinis and the other which is the unrated version includes the same women wearing only skin coloured bottoms. This would have been seen as disgusting many years ago, but it shows just how drastically music videos have changed. This also meant that women in today’s era are not worried about how they look, and they are not scared to get there body out. Not only are the actors wearing barely anything but also singers such as Miley Cyrus and Beyonce which once again is taking music videos to a whole new level. Also going back to Blurred Lines the imagery in the video doesn’t actually link to the lyrics. This means that the video is actually pointless and isn’t a form of entertainment for the audience, it is simply a way of advertising so more people will want to watch the video due to the naked women included. This shows how music videos are doing whatever they have to, in order to get there film more well-known and to boost their profits.

Overall there are many ways in which music videos have drastically changed over time. This is able to be shown by linking it to many different forms of theory that was introduced many years ago. Also the way that music videos have changed may be seen as both good and bad by different people due to some people wanting to actually see the link between the music and the video, and others who are only interested in the video.