Music Video Analysis

By James Taggar

Andrew Goodwins 7 Features of Music Videos

1. Music videos demonstrate genre characteristics. (e.g. stage performance in metal videos, dance
routine for boy/girl band, aspiration in Hip Hop).
2. There is a relationship between lyrics and visuals. The lyrics are represented with images. (either
illustrative, amplifying, contradicting).

3. There is a relationship between music and visuals. The tone and atmosphere of the visual reflects
that of the music. (either illustrative, amplifying, contradicting).
4. The demands of the record label will include the need for lots of close ups of the artist and the artist
may develop motifs which recur across their work (a visual style).
5. There is frequently reference to notion of looking (screens within screens, mirrors, stages, etc) and
particularly voyeuristic treatment of the female body.
6. The artist may develop motifs or iconography that recur across their work (a visual style)
7. There are often intertextual reference (to films, TV programmes, other music videos etc

Sven E Carlsson Theory

Music Video artist as a modern mythic embodiment
The music video artist is seen as embodying one, or a combination of modern mythic characters or forces of which there are three general. The music video artist is
representing different aspects of the free floating disparate universe of music video. There are two groups of music video:
Performance clip - When a video shows an artist mostly dancing and singing. There are three types; song performance, dance performance, instrumental performance.
Narrative clip - A short silent movie to a musical background, a visual story that is easy to follow.
Conceptual clip - When the clip has something else during it's duration often with artistic ambitions
In one type of performance, the performer is not a performer anymore; he or she is a materialization of the
Commercial exhibitionist Uses influence to sell products or services
Televised bard - A singing storyteller who uses actual on screen images instead of inner, personal images.
Electronic shaman - Usually a DJ in modern society but can be any artist that doesnt sing e.g. Skrillex and Daft Punk They wear a mask so their identity is concealed and
they can change the mask at any time
Music - Sometimes the musical elements shape the moving pictures.
- Moments like footsteps are often synchronized with the beat, so that people in the music video seem to walk in sync to the music. Melodic phrases can also be visualized by
tilting the camera vertically to match the musical phrases up and down travel on the scales.
Lyrics- lyrics and images interact creating meaning.
- New meaning is added to the banal lyrics through metaphorical language
- The greater the leap between the content of the lyrics and the imagery in this metaphorical joining, the more difficult it becomes for viewers to understand and interpret
the context.
- The environment is made to mirror the feelings of the lead characters
The image - the visual form is close to the musical form. - By manipulating colour, motive setting, story footage, clothing, etc the music video director creates a couple of
ideas which are repeated and varied.
- The concept is to rearrange visual motifs so that the work forms a whole.
There are three forms of visual tradition in music videos they are: performance clip, narrative clips and art clip.
Art Clip - if a music video contains no perceptible visual narrative and contains no lip-synchronized singing then it is a pure art clip. While the music video uses popular music
the artistic video uses more experimental music, such as electro-acoustic
- The connections between the music genre and the visual genre of music are weak. There are, however, some connections: dance music video clips are sometimes art clips.
The editing technique in soft ballads is mostly mixing. The hard rock music genre usually features standard clips consisting of concert shots and inserted narrative shot

John Stewart Theory

The music video has the aesthetics of a TV commercial, with lots of close-ups and lighting being
used to focus on the stars face.

He sees visual reference in music video as coming from a range of sources, although the three most
frequent are perhaps cinema, fashion and art photography.

Stewarts description of the music video as incorporating, raiding and reconstructing is essentially
the essence of Intertextuality, using something with which the audience may be familiar, to
generate both nostalgic associations and new meanings.

The video allows more access to the performer than a stage performance can. The mise-en-scene,
in particular, can be used to emphasise an aspiration lifestyle.

Catfish And The Bottlemen- Rango

https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=v6L
TDsPMDLY

Rango is a song by a British indie rock band Catfish and the Bottlemen. Rango is the ninth
track on Catfish and the Bottlemens debut album - The Balcony. Rango was also one of the first
three singles released by Catfish and the Bottlemen in 2013, when they were signed to
Communion Records. The music video for Rango is 100% computer animated done using CGI
which at 3:03 second we are told is Pedro Chaves who was also responsible for

Darling I'm done for once

And as soon as I get outta here
I plan on coming back for nothing
But then again there's you
And although this town does flaunt
All the stuff you need to feel at home
I plan on taking from it nothing,
But then again there's you
You see, Abby she's got to wait
Until she gets you on your own
So she can make you make mistakes
Then you can offer to take her home
And it's not like I don't miss it none
But the quicker I drink more in here
The quicker I lose track of you
But I know you wouldn't want that
And although this town does plot
Much thicker stories than I care to talk
You, you've ducked them in style
And I've always loved you for that
You see, Abby she's got to wait
Until she gets you on your own
So she can make you make mistakes
And you can offer to take her home
And now she's wearing that top you love
And she's topping it all off
By acting like something's up
She always knew how to pull the strings
You see, Abby she's got to wait
Until she gets you on your own
So she can make you make mistakes
And you can offer to take her home
And now she's wearing that top you love
And she's topping it all off
By acting like something's up
She always knew how to pull the strings

Song lyrics

I personally feel the narrative concept of this music

video is disjuncture. My reasoning behind this
theory that I have is that narrative concept, is the
journey of a sperm cell with an aspect of humour
running throughout. Each cells objective is to win
the race for the first prize of love which ends
up to be eaten alive by the egg that they are
training and trying so desperately to get to first.

Eye Black is the style of face paint that Rango applies at 2:07 it is commonly applied by
American football, baseball, and lacrosse players to reduce glare. Rango uses it as a form of
war paint when the race starts conveying a determination to win.

Humour
The use of the pun Sperming ham is
humorous and at 9 seconds into the video
the audience already has a brief insight to
the content of the music video despite how
vague it could appear to some.

14 seconds into the music video the audience is

again reinforced with a closer visual representation
to what Sperming ham is

At the last moment of the music video the audience is

presented with a CGI message that would commonly be
associated with music videos and films that feature and
include animals within the filming production.

The hidden band

Not only does the butterfly reappear during the 3 minutes and 6 second song. Catfish and the Bottlemen
themselves in animated sperm form also appear 6 times and also have a total screen time of
approximately 19 seconds.

0:12 - 0:15

1:43 - 1:48

0:46 - 0:48

1:48 - 1:51

1:15 - 1:19

2:51 - 2:53

The reoccurring band turn this music video from purely narrative to narrative with a hint of performance
which uses Steve Archers theory that a music video needs to be both performance and narrative not just
one.

Butterfly
Throughout the entire 3 minutes and 6 second song the viewer repeatedly sees a butterfly that has 6
different moments where it appears on screen, in total having a screen time of roughly 19 seconds.

0:06 - 0:08

1:24 - 1:27

0:24 - 0:30

1:49 - 1:51

1:16 - 1:20

2:07 - 2:09

Reasoning behind the reoccurring butterfly

I personally believe that the reoccurring butterfly acts as a form of amplification as the butterfly has many
symbolic references: One being that the butterfly mirrors our own life and the stages in our life as the
butterfly progresses through its life.
In Greek mythology, Psyche (which translates to mean "soul") is represented in the form of a butterfly. It is
said that Psyche is forever linked with love as she and Eros - the Greek god of love (More renowned in
Roman as Cupid) Share an endless passionate bond together - both hopelessly in love with the other.
An interview with the lead singer of Catfish and the Bottlemen - Van McCann. States that Abby (An
unknown girl in the song) is actually McCann first ever girlfriend from when [he] was in school and how
the song was about her, almost an attempt to win her back which was unsuccessful.
To conclude the butterfly represents what McCann and Abby could have been .

Rocky intertextual reference

The intertextual references for Rocky occur a total of four times in the entire
music video. All references are re-enacting the Rocky training moments. The
first occur at 1:11 when Rango is boxing with the animated version of Mr
Miyagi; the next is at 1:18 when Rango is doing extreme sit ups on a pull up bar. 10 seconds later is Rango running
with Mr Miyagi on his back. At this point the
animate sperm version of Sylvester Stallone
who was the original Rocky appears on
screen. The final intertextual reference of
Rocky is at 1:45 when Rango is running up
stairs (Again with Mr Miyagi on his back)

Karate Kid intertextual reference

The intertextual references for Karate Kid first occur at 1:01
when the protagonist Rango is presented with a letter
proposing an opportunity to be trained. This letter is
presented by the animated version of Miyagi-San who is
the Japanese trainer in the 1984 Karate Kid film.
The animated version of Miyagi -San is later seen at 1:36
when Rango and him are re-enacting a scene from the
original 1984 Karate Kid - The famous scene where Mr
Miyagi is teaching Daniel the wax on, wax off technique.

Star Wars intertextual reference

The final intertextual references is a Star Wars reference that is
shown on screen at 2:34 when Rango kills the antagonist
with a Star Wars prop lightsaber.
In addition, the entire duration of the music video has been
created using a monochrome theme that is seen throughout,
this colour palette is a common genre characteristic found in
indie rock music videos. This however changes when
lightsabers are drawn. The lightsabers also look like the only
objects that have been created using a different tool as it
doesnt share the same hand drawn style the remainder of the
video does, this is because the battle between the main
protagonist Rango and the unknown antagonist is a key
moment in the music video, that emphasizes the end of the
video and exaggerate the winner of the race.

Song conclusion
To conclude Catfish and the Bottlemen song, Rango has a well constructed animated music
video that often cuts to the beat throughout the whole song. It follows Steve Archers theory as it
is both a performance and a narrative because of the hidden animated Catfish and Bottlemen that
play in the background of the main narrative story. The intertextual references regarding Rocky
and Karate Kid are metaphors for the lead singer of Catfish and the Bottlemen, Van McCann and
his struggle to get back Abby. Similarly to the struggle that Rocky and Daniel had to go through to
get what they wanted. The true symbolic meaning of the reoccurring butterfly is left unknown and
for the reader to make their own justification what it represents in relation to the music video.
Finally the sudden use of colour in the form of a lightsaber emphasizes the final ending of the
video and how Rango himself has developed compared to the start of the video where he was
initially bullied and appeared weak.