Conventions of music video’sAndrew Goodwin’s Theory

Lyrics and Visuals

The lyrics of a song are often represented through the images on screen. For example in this Katy Perry music video she sings “did we get hitched last night, dressed up like Elvis” and as you can see they’re getting married and there is a man dressed up like Elvis Presley.

The images within the music video usually use one of three things illustrate, amplify or contradict the lyrics. Sometimes the images throughout the music video will contrast with the lyrics in order to reinforce the message of the genre.

Genre Conventions

Certain conventions and iconography are associated with certain genres

Rock – guitars, performance, group rather than solo, rebellious

Hip-hop – Jewellery, women in bikinis, drinking, cars and pools

Boy/Girl bands – dance routines, fun

Music and Visuals

The theory states that there is not only a link between the lyrics and visuals but also the music and visuals. This means that the image and visuals on screen may be edited in time to the beat, pace and the emotion of the song. In this Amy winehouse music video she mentions “we only said goodbye with words, I died a hundred times” and the video is showing Amy at a funeral showing her emotions through visuals on screen.

Voyeurism

Voyeurism is concerned with motions of of looking. In music videos there are often direct references to the idea of looking. This is often shown with representations of mirrrors, screens within screens, telescopes etc. In justin timberlakes music video the lady is relving her life she’s seeing her as a young girl and they show this by having the lady on screen watching herself.

Handheld cameras are also a technique that can be used that gives the idea of looking. In justin biebers music video he holds a handheld camera throughout his video.

Women are particualarly subjected to voyeurism objectification in music videos, this helps increase the appeal of the videos to men.

Intertextual References

Intertextual references are common now within the music videos and the media in general, Intertexuality means when a media text references another media text. This is used to engage the audiences and provide them gratidication if the recognise a line from the lyrics.

Demands of the record label

The most common thing that the labels demand is that there a lot of close ups of the artists. You will often see lots of close ups throughout a music vidoe of the aritst or if they’re in a group a few close ups of each member will be shown on screen.

Artists will look directly into the camera mostly throughout the video and some may point to the camera to make the audience feel as if this video was aimed to them.

Method Secondary Research

Techniques I watched a number of music videos that were quite popular and found genre conventions

Information Log

www.youtube.com

Organisation

Unit 5

Relevance I was assigned to look at different music videos and identify different genre conventions