Viewing And Textual Analysis For Two Music Videos
The Horrors: She Is The New Thing
The Horrors represent themselves as a serious art-punk band. They made a violent video because they do not care (or wish to give the illusion that they do not care) if it does not get shown that often, either due to censorship or its graphic content. They would like to be perceived as a rebellious band. From the video you can learn that the band is a dark and scary band as they have made their music video violent, the content of the music video helps illustrate the sound of the band’s music. You can learn from the video that they are an arty band due to the way that all the animations are shown are drawn to look untidy to match the band’s iconography.
Andrew Goodwins theory is that in music videos, the visuals illustrate the lyrics and I think that this video fits into Goodwins theory, for the reasons that the visuals illustrate the lyrics and music. The Horrors Genre is their own music style.
The narrative for the music video is that the band are playing and then they start getting attacked and killed by all manner of strange creatures and monsters. It is not a complicated but it is a technical problem as it is difficult to have real people and animations interacting without looking unprofessional. This tells me that it required a lot of work.
The band image is completely black clothing, skinny jeans and over the top hair cuts. Their image fits the stereotype of Goth; they use their image to appeal to that certain target audience. It attracts fans in that if the audience look like the band, they can then relate to the band. Other aspects of The Horrors image are that in this video they look cartoon-like and like they have been animated. The video is part animation and also including the real people from the band. Eventually they become animated themselves.
The target audience for the video as previously mentioned are Goths, they appeal to Goths as they dress in a typical gothic style, also because of the gruesome subject of the video. The age of the viewer could range from anything between 14 and 50 because the band are not very conventional and appeal to younger people with alternative music tastes and older people who remember the original punk music, which the horrors imitate.
The video is quite artistic for the reasons that it only uses three main colours, red black and white, and it is animated in a wild style so it looks like it was scratched into the paper, this fits with the bands scary style.
The visuals illustrate the lyrics since the song is called "She Is The New Thing" and in the video a zombie girl attacks the band and they keep referring to her as "the new thing".
The camera work in the video is very simple. It is mainly static medium shots of the band, various members and the animated monsters. There are many close-ups of the vocalist as he is meant to be the leader of the band and the record company desires the vocalist to be the centre of attention. A high angle shot is used on occasion to look at the small creatures like the beetles and the insects. There are close-ups of the vocalist, the band members and the various creatures throughout the video.
In this screen shot you can see the band, they are playing to the viewer but they have no real background. There are lots of tears and scuffs to make them look like a drawing. There is also a giant animated spider in the bottom left corner of the screen to show that this is not just a performance and that the band are also part of the narrative.
This Screenshot shows the band interacting with the animations, for they are part of the narrative. The image also shows that the band is wearing entirely black clothes to add to the black and white effect of the video. The background of the entire video is basically bare apart from the shading of the background to make it look like paper; there is not a lot of mise en scene.
This Screenshot shows the animations killing the band in gruesome ways; the video has a similar appeal to gory movies. This image shows that their target audience is mainly for people who are not frightened by gore and blood and definitely not for children. This helps narrow down the videos target audience, it is more evidence that this music video is for those who are not frightened by gore. The violence is cartoon gore and meant to be tongue in cheek.
This screenshot shows the band being killed by monsters. This is also when the band themselves become animated. This image is more evidence that the band is trying to appeal to a certain type of person. The fact that they are animated gives the connotation that the band has become monsters themselves.
Steriogram: Go
The narrative for this music video is that it is a group of friends going on a road trip in an old car which begins to fall apart. The video is almost one continuous shot of the band messing around in the car with the occasional close-up of a band member.
Stereogram represents New Zealand. They pride themselves about originating from that country and becoming popular. The band also represent young people having fun, this is for the reason that the song is all about running away, escaping due to boredom. This is illustrated in the video by showing them in a car, driving very fast. The fact that the band fall out of the car one by one could signify friends lost on the way which in the end causes the lead singer to be on his own in the car. This is a possible reference to road movies and other driving videos, e.g. Maddness.
The camera work involved in this video is again quite simple and uncomplicated. The video is mainly made up of lots of close up shots of the band members individually; medium shots of the entire band and the occasional long shot of a band member falling out of the car. The scene uses high key lighting to make the scene look naturally lit and as if it was outdoors. The colours are generally bright greens for the grass, blues for the sky, darker colours for the band and an old yellow colour for the car. The backdrop is meant to look fake and unrealistic.
The band’s image is a casual relaxed image, perhaps slightly bored due to being on a long car journey. They are dressed in a slight pop punk style with a good few piercings between them, a Mohawk and general untidiness. The band does not look very threatening and they all look quite happy, which shows them as a fun band rather than serious.
The mise en scene in the scene has some intertextuality; for example there is a Playstation 2 in the video and an "AA" sticker on the front of the car. The Games console connotates that they are a playful band and that they don’t take things too seriously as the band use it in a relaxed manner. The "AA" sticker is there for ironic humour because the car is falling apart and breaking.
The target audience is quite diverse as the song is very catchy and the music video is easy to watch and to enjoy because it contains some humour. The target age could be quite wide because it is just a catchy rock song and the ages could range from 12-40.
The video could be analysed using John Stewart’s theory that videos are more like complicated stage performances. The video is like a stage performance but offering more than a real stage performance can.
In this screen shot it shows how most of the video is filmed, making it quite a simple video to film because its mainly just green screen, a camera and a car. This demonstrates that the band have not hit it big yet and are still trying to save money by having an inexpensive video or making it appear cheap on purpose so they do not give off the impression that they are a huge rock band.
This screen shot shows that the lead singers are at the front, in the driving and passenger seats, the record company may have requested this. It is a medium shot from the side of the subject of the image (in this case the performers). This shot was filmed on a dolly, after a brief look at the front of the car, the camera pans left to look at the rest of the band playing on a games console in the back seats.
In this screen shot it shows one of the band members falling out of the car using a long shot. Whilst he is falling he is making a funny face which is more evidence to say that they are a humorous band. To do this shot they used wires and a green screen, which would probably be most of the money of the music video.
I can conclude that Stereogram and The Horrors have taken two different approaches to making a video, as they are almost opposites. The Horror's video is dark whereas Stereograms video is bright and colourful. The Horrors have aimed to be arty whereas Stereogram’s is fun, and they have different types of humour, black humour in contrast to light.
due to unknown reasons i am unable to post the screenshots of the two videos
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