Genre Characteristics
There are many varieties of genres so the variety of genres involves; Hip Hop, R&B, rock, heavy metal, classical, jazz and much more. These groups of genres can be seen differently based on the clothing and dance routines. So a heavy metal band for example Metallica will be wearing black leather clothing and performances will be live on stage.
There are three main ways in which a music video has lyrics that relate and they are through illustration, amplification also contradicting. Illustration means that music videos can use a set of images in order to illustrate the meaning of lyrics and a genre which is the most common. Amplify means that particular words can be amplified as repetition, so it visually drums it into our vision. Last but not the least contradicting means that all the lyrics are being ignored compared to the video. An example of an illustrative music video is by Vance Joy called Riptide, and amplified song example is Hall of Fame by The script. The video that contradicts is Call on me by Eric Prydz.
The way in which this video illustrates through the visuals is by the first lyric being that a girl is afraid of two things which is the dentists and the darkness, this is then shown as a girl in the dentist looks distress but all of a sudden it goes black. This is a good form of a music video as it is very easy to remember the lyrics if the imagery is flowing perfectly to the lyrics.
The Hall of Fame video is trying to imply to everyone that when we get knocked down we should not give up, and bring ourselves to try again to achieve our ambitions. In the video there is also repetition of "you can be the champion", which is played in the background and it shows that at the end the guy has reached his purpose of becoming a well known boxer as he holds the belt.
This music video has ignored the lyrics to the visuals and just shows that these women and a man are enjoying their yoga lesson due to the music. Also the women are being sexually objectified because there is just one man who is focusing and following the instructor.
Relation of music to the visuals
This convention is to do with the visuals that will have some form of connection with the pace of the song. So a few examples include Arctic Monkeys;Do I Wanna Know?, Nirvana;Smells Like Teen Spirit and Bangarang by Skrillex. The third example being Bangarang by Skrillex has a lot of fast movements as the pace of the song has to be edited to the actions, thus the video seems smooth. Additionally, the Arctic Monkeys video is a good representation of the music pace matching with the visuals because the wavelengths are exact along with being uptempo and not to fast or slow.
Across all music videos there is a demand from record labels to attempt to develop a motif which would be to have a reoccurring style that recurs regularly across the artists and record labels work. There is usually quite a lot of demands of close ups of the artist to help create a vivid visual. Examples of artists that have completely different styles is P.Diddy and Katy Perry, because P.Diddy's video he uses new futuristic technology which implies that he is perceived as being rich. Whereas Katy Perry's style is more quirky and unique in the sense that props and costumes used in the video is almost over the top, to exaggerate how the music video is going to be good to watch as well as it appealing to a younger audience.
Andrew Goodwin states that the fifth convention in music videos involves frequent references to the notion of looking. Notion of looking is where there would be screens within itself or telescopes etc. An example of this convention is shown in Video Phone by Beyonce ft. Lady Gaga and this video is particular in having voyeuristic treatment of the female body. Some by the name of Laura Mulvey is a feminist media theorist, and her theory relates to classical Hollywood cinema. Although a few of Mulveys' ideas can apply to pop videos, because there are characteristics such as the male gaze where women are viewed as the objects of male desire in the film as well as audience. Plus men would be active whereas the women would be passive, and a music video such as Can't Remember to Forget You by Shakira often reflects a patriarchal society.
For this last convention, Goodwin had mentioned that music videos can often be filled with intertextual references to films, TV programmes and other music videos. An example that is linked to another example is Jennifer Lopez's video of I'm Glad is clearly connected to the movie Flashdance. Another video is by The Wanted which is called Walks like Rhianna, where the video has referenced three other male music groups for example N'Sync, Backstreet Boys and Take That.
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