Klaxons - Golden Skans

This song is called 'Golden Skans' by the band 'Klaxons' and it was released on 22 January 2007. The music video is directed by Saam Faramand and is heavily influenced by "Can You Feel It" by The Jacksons. It features a message at the beginning very similar to the words spoken by the narrator in the "Can You Feel It" video. It also features other elements from the Jacksons' video including an inventive and contemporary use of light and dark with all three band members wearing different coloured ribbons, and moving dramatically to the music. 

The music belongs to the Indie genre, a similar genre to our song choice, and the colour scheme and abstract happenings in the video reflect this music type. The video is in a dark setting and the singers seem to be getting wrapped in brightly coloured ribbons, not something we see in your typical music video. 

The lyrics don't seem to correspond with the visuals in this video because the meaning to the lyrics is unclear. The only thing you could say matches the lyrics is that they seem to be throwing gold around in one stage of the video perhaps linking to the song title and chorus words 'golden skans'.


Although the lyrics don't correspond with the video a great deal, there are similarities between the music and the video. The pace of the song is reflected by the pace of the cutting in the video. During the slow verses the cuts are very slow and less exciting but when the chorus drops the visuals become more dramatic and the tempo increases. Also throughout the song we can hear sounds of explosions and these are shown in the video, they are perfectly placed at the beginning of choruses and at drops in the beat for emphasis.


This was the Klaxons first song and so they had to make a big impression. That they did. They illustrated themselves in a very dramatic and extravagant way connecting to their Indie target audience. There are plenty of close up shots of the band so they audience know who they are listening to. The record company are going to want to sell this track by it being recognised by its weird and different video. When people hear the song played on the radio the image of the singers getting wrapped in ribbons will come to their minds. This video represents their image as a band because it is their first step into the music scene.

The video can be perceived as a bit sexual because the artists aren't wearing any clothes however I think that they are just trying to look natural. Plus as I mentioned above the video is quite abstract and so the naked effect adds to it. The artists are very animated in the video, they are smashing and throwing things. The actions are emphasised with the use of over-cranking, this slows them down so we can see the impact of what they are doing.

There are no clear intertextual references other than the obvious 'Can You Feel It' by the Jacksons.At the opening of the video we see a message across the scene, and this is also featured in the 'Can You Feel It' video. Other elements from the Jacksons' video include an inventive and contemporary use of light and dark with all three band members wearing different coloured ribbons, and moving dramatically to the music.

This music video definitely isn't performance-based, it is narrative-based with maybe a hint of concept. The artists aren't singing on stage but are singing along in their video, at the same time their video doesn't have a story to it either. Again making it quite abstract. I'm beginning to think the video is concept-based because it seems to revolve around ideas rather than have any sort of storyline to it.

Conventions of Music Videos

Different types of shots used in music videos are used to create an emphasis on the artist, location and emotions. Close ups are used to get a sense of how the artist is feeling whilst singing the lyrics whereas long shots gives the viewer a sense as to where him/her or the band are at.

Camera movement is used to trace the performer(s) and follow their movement, the pace and timing of this helps to make the viewer feel involved and primarily makes the video more exciting.

Mise en scene can tell us as a viewer a lot about a song, this helps us to gain an understanding of the music. This includes things like clothing, lighting, colouring, props and settings. For example an artist could be dressed in black clothing, sitting in a room on his/her own and filmed in black and white. The dull colours would reflect the artists down mood in the song, this can also be supported by the type of lighting. It could also suggest that the artist is lonely or isolated because of being in an room without any company. Colour schemes tell us a lot in music videos, they can set the mood of the song and thus create a type of atmosphere. Typically indie/rock videos have dark colours and pop/hip-hop videos have more bright colours.

HipHop/Rap/RnB

In this genre of music we seem to get a reoccurring theme of women and money. Most of these music videos are set at parties or nightclubs and it shows the artist having a good time surrounded by women. Expensive items are also flaunted showing the wealth of the artist and this is also reflected in the lyrics of these songs, lines like 'money over bitches' are used. A lot of over-cranking is used in these music videos to create emphasis of the emotion and the location they are at. Again to show off the wealth and location long shots seem to be used often in this genre type. Bright colours in these videos are used to reflect then cheerful mood. The video below shows most of these aspects especially the idea of the video being set at a party.

Pop

Pop music is mostly associated with happiness, this is shown in the music videos through the mise en scene. Bright colours are often used and the artist is normally dancing around expressing their emotion. The lighting is nearly always high-key to reflect the upbeat music and mood. The editing is normally of a fast pace to create excitement and to please the target audience which tends to be the younger generation. The artist is normally singing in the video and there are lots of close-ups on his/her face to emphasise their joyous mood. Costumes can vary a little bit, sometimes the artist can be wearing quite extravagant clothing to make a statement like Katy Perry in 'California Girls'. Sometimes the artist can just be wearing clothing of the latest fashion and trends. Below is a current music video which has the bright colour scheme and which therefore suggests a happiness about it. The performer has a modern and up to date look about her as shown by her costume, hair and make-up.

Rock/Metal

This genre of music often has a depressing manner about it and this is reflected in the music videos with the low key lighting and dark colours. The bands often wear black clothing and sometimes even dark eye make up to show a sense of evil. Often the artists have dark clothes an black hair but a very pale face to show their lack of emotion. A band known to have a scary nature about them is Slipknot, they wear masks which put the viewer on edge. The pace of editing in this music genre is normally fast to go with the fast pace music and close-ups are used to show the instruments being played. The majority of these music videos are performance. Below is a music video by The Rasmus, the lead singer has the stereotypical rock look as I described above with the dark clothing and hair but white face. The video has consistent low-key lighting.

Eminem - Stan (Short Version) ft. Dido

This video is called 'Stan' by Eminem and it is from the genre of Hip Hop. The dark colour scheme with murky greens and grays is a typical characteristic of a Hip Hop music video, reflecting the serious meaning behind the music.

In the video we see 'Stan' writing a letter and we see and hear him rap it at the same time, thus matching the lyrics. Through the song Stan's words become more harsh and he becomes frustrated, this is also shown in the visuals as we see his face screw up.

Also more specifically there is a line where we see Stan with his little brother standing outsidein the snow waiting for Eminem to come out from his concert and we hear the lyrics, 'That's my little brother man, he's only six years old, We waited in the blistering cold for you, four hours and you just said, "No."' Another example is when we hear the line, 'I seen this one shit on the news a couple weeks ago that made me sick' and the visuals match these lyrics by showing a cut off the news.

There is no obvious relationship between the music and the visuals, like the cuts aren't necessarily on the beat and the pace of the editing doesn't change much. Arguably some would say that the pace of the editing picks up in the last scenes as Stan is driving his car, the pace of the music in this section is still the same pace as the rest however. To add drama to these violent scenes strobe lighting is put in, making it appear even more edgy.


Although what is noticeable is that we see Eminem when it's his part in the song and Dido when its the chorus and she sings. As the viewer we are encouraged to sympathise with Dido because she is the one who has to suffer with Stan's obsession with Eminem. To support this the colour schemes surrounding Dido in the video are all dominated by warm colours like yellow and orange. On the other hand Stan is often under low key lighting surrounded by grey and black colours, suggesting that he is the unfavourable character in the relationship.

Although Eminem doesn't feature in the video much himself the whole song is about a fan who is obsessed by him. This is how the record company are looking to sell the track, all listeners of the track are going to remember it for the video with the obsessed fan in. Eminem isn't actually filmed in the video until the end but his face features in it throughout, with posters of him on walls and clips of him playing at concerts.
I believe that the artist in this video is trying to send out a message to his fans, that he cares about his fans but that he doesn't support obsessive fans like Stan. This is expressed through the line, 'And what's this shit about us meant to be together? That type of shit'll make me not want us to meet each other'. I feel that he's trying to portray himself in a positive light as a star who has such a busy life but still makes time to contact his fans.

Coldplay - The Scientist

I haven't just chose this video because it's one of my favorite songs, the time and effort put into the video is incredible. The idea for the video revolves around the line in the song 'I'm going back to the start'. In the video we see Chris Martin (the lead vocalist in Coldplay) have a car crash and the aftermath of it, however the twist is is that it is all done backwards. But there is another twist still, although his actions are all in reverse, he sings the correct way. It took him months to learn how to lip sync his song backwards.

Michael Jackson - Thriller

Some say that Michael Jackson's 'Thriller' from 1982 was more of a film than a music video, it was directed by the film director John Landis. It's duration is more than double the usual durations of other music videos and it seems to have more of a story line to it compared to other music videos.

This is one of my favorite music videos because I believe it changed music videos forever. Other artists became inspired by this video to make their videos more dramatic and film-like.

History of MTV

MTV

MTV's launch date was on August 1st 1981 and it played a range of songs such as:

'Video Killed The Radiostar - The Buggles'

'In The Air Tonight - Phil Collins'

'Fashion - David Bowie'

'She Won't Dance With Me - Rod Stewart'

On August 1st 1981 launched with the words 'Ladies and gentlemen, rock and roll' from John Lack and played over footage of the first Space Shuttle launch countdown of Columbia and of the launch of Apollo 11, this happened earlier in the year and was therefore massive then. Then in come he MTV theme music with footage of Apollo 11 landing on the moon, MTV used this as conceit to portray it as the most famous moment in television history. The first video was 'Video Killed The Radiostar' by the Buggles and then in between each video the viewers would see a blank black screen while an employee at MTV would insert the next video.

The impact of MTV was almost immediate. This was shown after a couple of months when records stores were selling tracks which weren't being played on radio stations.

Slogans such as "I want my MTV" and "MTV is here" in the eighties became embedded in public thought and so MTV grew in popularity. MTV has been referenced countless times in popular culture by musicians, other TV channels and television programmes, films, and books.

Today however MTV is more popular for it's reality TV shows like 'Jersey Shore' and '16 and Pregnant'. MTV has smaller sister channels today to promote music videos like MTV Base, MTV Dance, MTV Rocks and MTV Classic.