Saturday, 22 September 2012

Research: Andrew Goodwin's theory



Andrew Goodwin expresses that pop videos nowadays have no traditional narrative analysis. He thinks the reason for this is that music video directors approach narrative from a different angle to novels and films. He thinks that Pop videos are built around songs (often songs do not have traditional narrative structure)

Repetition is also something that is often seen in modern Pop videos. It means that the audience would become familiar with the genre and have certain expectations, and as the video will be played on TV, the song will also be played on the radio and the video act as an advertisement to buy the CD.

The visualisation of a song in videos may go beyond the original meaning because sometimes the video provides a visual pleasure that makes the viewers want to watch it repetitively and therefore it promotes the song. 







There are 3 types of relations between songs and videos
·  Illustration : where the video tells the story of the lyrics
For example Lady Gaga's 'Paparazzi' music video


The way Lady Gaga narrates and also participates in this music video illustrates the song is very unique way. She uses costume and the mise en scene in the video to express the mood of the song. The editing and choreography makes the video very illustrative that it is rich in visual aspects. Which is why I think that this video represents Goodwin's illustration definition.


· Amplification: When the video introduces new meanings that do not contradict with the lyrics but add layers of meaning.
A music video example is Adele's 'Chasing Pavements'



The lyrical meaning of the song is Adele's own personal memory of when she broke up with her boyfriend after he had cheated on her and I think that this video suits the amplification idea because the video has a very unique story line and choreography which centres around a car crash in Hyde Park. I think that the video gives a literal meaning to "Chasing Pavements"


  • Disjuncture: This is where the is little connection between the lyric and video or where the video contradicts the lyrics.
An example of this is Lady Gaga's 'Alejandro' video


Alejandro is a key example of Disjuncture as there is no connection to the lyrics with the music video. The meaning of the song is ignored and there is little to no connection between the lyrics and the music video itself.


No comments:

Post a Comment