MUSIC VIDEO GENRES:- NARRATIVE- CONCEPT

- PERFORMANCE

Narrative Narrative music videos revolve around a story being told

throughout the entirety of the video. Most Narrative music videos usually explore

relationships. The narratives are also very Todorovian. According to Carol Vernallis’ theory, the story will often

be resolved but this, however, is not always the case. Artists create narrative driven music videos because it

appeals to mainstreamers (according to Young and Rubican’s Four C’s) and a younger target audience.

Example of a Narrative music video;

https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=jx96Twg-Aew This music videos shows a story about a man attempting to gain a

woman’s attention in a diner/cafe, a simple and compelling narrative that holds the audience’s attention throughout the entirety of the video.

Like many narrative music videos the story is based on the dynamics of relationships. I believe narrative music videos use this typical story line heavily based on relationships because it is a universal theme. This means that many audiences will relate and understand the storyline and therefore enjoy. Hence the video will become successful.

This is a very Todorovian approach to narrative and it heavily bases the creation of music videos on the assumption that their audience will be ‘mainstreamers’, according to Young and Rubicam’s 4 Cs and therefore enjoy simple and easily solved narratives.

Concept Concept music videos often include abstract themes and visuals They are compelling, innovative and creative. This genre of music videos are usually based around a single idea or

‘concept’ and are normally obscure or unusual. This unusualness is an attraction to many audiences and it draws them in to watch the video.

A successful concept music video should keep the audience entertained and even sometimes confused throughout the videos entirety. It should hold their attention constantly.

It is not unusual for concept videos to go viral on the internet because of their unusualness. An example of this is OKGo’s – ‘Here it goes again’ which has over 32 million views on YouTube.

Example of a Concept music video;

https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=2_HXUhShhmY This music video is based on presenting images using everyday objects,

focussing on a bed, and the stop motion film technique which creates pictures that makes the audience think about what they are seeing.

It is a really interesting video to watch and keeps the audience engaged, which is the main selling point of concept videos and the reason for their huge success among many different audiences.

This video has over 30 million views on YouTube showing again how concept videos regularly go internet viral because of their compelling visuals.

Arguably, each concept music video has a unique selling point and this videos unique selling point is the use of stop motion film work which is rarely seen in popular music videos.

Performance

Performance music videos are about the actual performance of a song which the band/artist play live for the video or lip sync to a pre-recorded track.

This type of video focuses on the band or artist and the audience’s attention is all on them rather than being on interesting visuals.

Bands that are quirky or interesting often use this genre of music video to promote that quirkiness and showcase it as a unique selling point to the audience. It is also a way of them showing their appearance and promoting themselves.

It is common for punk, alternative and rock artists to use mainly performance in their music videos.

Performance videos leave a lot of room for becoming hybrids. So more often than not a band or artist will create a performance-narrative hybrid or performance-concept hybrid because they are generally more interesting for audiences.

Although performance is a music video genre itself, many bands or artist choose to include short clips of them performing into other music video types.

Example of a Performance music video;

https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=yCMOJ64tYNk This is a very typical example of a performance music video

as the entirety is compiled of clips of the band performing. It uses attention-grabbing lighting, camera movements and

fast paced editing to draw the audience’s notice and to make it more interesting than it would be without all these techniques being used.

This is punk/rock band which shows how a common convention of performance music videos is that these genre of artists tend to use the genre more for their videos.

Advantages of each genre;Concept Performance Narrative Creative Promotes the band/artist and

their lookSatisfies audiences

Engages audiences Focuses more on the music and lyrics rather than visuals.

Keeps audiences watching as they want to see the conclusion

Are visually appealing and draws attention of all audiences

Allows for genre hybrids and therefore more creativity

Story often coincides with lyrics (Andrew Goodwin) and therefore emphasises them

Can often go viral because of their unusualness

Disadvantages of each genre;Concept Performance NarrativeMany audiences often do not ‘understand’ their purpose

Often they can’t have just images of the band performing alone as it disengages audiences.

Are often Todorovian and predictable

Sometimes can become too obscure

Have to have hybrids of this genre because of the simple-ness of the genre on its own.

Follow similar universal themes (relationships and love)

Can be expensive to create because they are so abstract

Often leave enigma codes unanswered because of the short time allotted to telling a story