What is a music video?

Purpose of a music video

• To entertain the audience.
• To give the viewer a better understanding of the song.
• To sell the song and let the viewer remember the song.
• To show and reveal the artist/bands image.
• To make money.
• So fans can buy into the artists lifestyle.
• To build a relationship between the artist and fans.
• To promote the song and artist/band.

The different styles and types of music videos:

• PERFORMANCE based: Performance based music videos focus on footage of the artist or band actually singing the song and/or playing the instruments to the song, and possibly dancing. This means the band or artist are seen throughout the majority of the video, so their talent is the main focus of the video. Not all genres use this type of music video, but it is mainly seen in rock and indie videos where playing the instruments and the voice is the main aspect of the song.
  e.g. Foo Fighters - Rope

The genre of this music video and the band Foo Fighters, is rock and the music video does contain many codes and conventions of a typical rock music video, such as playing their instrument and singing throughout the video, which is also what makes it a performance based video. Foo fighters appear to have a large target audience, so the target audience for this video is mainly males aged 16-30. The main purpose of this music video is to entertain the audience as it is a purely performance based music video, so it does not follow all of Goodwin's points, such as visuals link with lyrics. The connotations of a typical rock music video that this video follows are; performance based, close ups, band logo being shown and a piece of action being shown when the song reaches its climax.

 

• NARRATIVE based:A narrative based music video usually has a story played out throught the entire video or a short movie, usually linking to the lyrics to help the
  audience get a better understanding of the song.
  e.g. Britney Spears - Everytime

Britney Spears is a famous pop artist and many of her music videos are usually narrative to enable the audience to understand the lyrics and the artist in more detail. This music video follows her hard life in the eye of the media and her struggle in handling her fame, throughout the video she is noticed by all of the paparazzi, but not by her boyfriend, the one person she wants to notice her. So the narrative and lyrics are about her weakness of wanting his attention, and this links to Goodwin's theory as the lyrics stronly relate to the visulas as for example when Spears sings the line 'I feel so small' in the music video a newborn baby is shown who is tiny in comparison to the adults and the world. The main purpose of this video is to entertain the audience, but to also help them understand the lyrics more and understand what the artist is trying to convey within her lyrics, so this is the main purpose of most narrative based music videos. The target audeince for this music video and Brintney Spears' other music is females aged around 13-25, so the narrative based music video will appeal to this audience as most females of this age enjoy love stories and what to know more about the artists life so they will be throughly entertained by this narrative based music video. This narrative based pop music video does still follow many of the pop gere conventions such as iconic settings, expensive revealing clothing, luxury hotels and close ups of the artists face, however this music video does also show the not so glamourous side of being in the limlight which chalenges the genres conventions as Spears is seen having a fight with her boyfriend and also dying.
 

 

• CONCEPT based:These music videos are centered around one theme or idea and does not follow a narrative, these videos are usually unusual or unique and not many mainstream musicians use this style of music video alone as it can make a music video quite strange.
  e.g. Green Day - Boulevard of Broken Dreams

Green Day are a famous rock band with a target audeince of mainly males aged around 15-30, and the music video for Boulevard of Broken Dreams is strongly concept based as the whole video is based around the lyrics and a person walking through life all alone and being used to the solitude and waiting patiently for someone to join him in his walk through life. The music video does follow some of the genres characteristics, such as their clothing, make up and playing their instruments. All of the band members are wearing shirts, black skinny jeans and converse type trainers which is very typical in relation to their music genre, and they all appear to be wearing black eyeliner which is common to the rock/punk music genre. Due to this music video being concept based the video also strongly applies to one point from Goodwin's theroy which is that the lyrics relate to the visulas, as the lead singer continously sings the line 'I walk alone' as he walks through different backdrops in the msuic video. This concept based music video is very dependent on the editing effects and camera angles, as these help create the dreary scene, and the props and location used are important aswell, as they relate to the sad tone of the song. The purpose of this music video is mainly to entertain and also to set the tone of the song, as concept based music videos don't usually offer msuch more information about the song as they focus on expanding one idea usually.