Analysing Music Videos

Muse - Uprising

(directed by American collective Hydra)

• At the start there is a fuse, which starts a fire, and then by the end the fire has become massive and has spread around.
• The music video looks like it is set in a model village, because there is a model woman on the pavement.
• This must have been quite hard to make look realistic, because if there are lots of model people, who are small and small objects like cars it would have been hard to get the proportions right for the band.
• The band are playing in the back of a truck and throughout the music video, it cuts back and forth to them playing.
• Everything starts to build up through the video, likewise the song starts to build up as well and become more exciting with more sounds.
• The lighting is very dark and gloomy but the fire brings a bright spark to it, there is also other lighting add to most of the shots, to give certain effects and make certain objects stand out more than others.
• There is an eye-line match used in this video, where there is a shot of these televisions where smoke is surrounding them and then a few frames later there is the band walking off with Matt Bellamy trying to smash the window with his guitar. This is synced with a punch of the music.
• There are close ups of the band, and there is a birds eye shot of the drummer. In the birds eye shot of the drummer, the arrangement of his kit had changed. This could be due to the lack of space in the back of the truck.
• The editors of the video have made it that the instruments sync with the music track.
• Around the band, there are sparks flying everywhere, which I think adds depth to where they are playing.
• Panning, zooming and tilted shots are used all around the video which in some cases blurs other parts of the frame, but this is usually for effect or for the audience to focus on another part of the frame.
• There are some parts of the video where it is in slow motion. This does make the video look good but I'm not very keen on it, especially when it is off a band member playing their instrument and it doesn't really fit with the song.
• The model surroundings of the street come to life about half way through the video, and start to cause havoc. These consist of little toy bears and puppets.
• The big bonfire just after the halfway point is where plastic models are being melted, and acts well with the chorus because Muse are acting like becoming in control and are the fire which is more powerful than plastic people.
• There is a brief gap where the music fades out and then starts again, this builds up to a bridge or guitar solo part where doll-like soft toys come out from the ground.
• In slow motion they patrol through the streets and the chorus then begins to start again, more action starts to happen.
• There is a close up of Matt Bellamy's face, which focus's on his face while the background of the streets and flying sparks is moving very quickly.

Enter Shikari - No Sleep Tonight

(directed by Shane Davey)

• This song starts of quite light and then throughout becomes heavier, the same happens with the video.
• The video is where a man is cheating and then he is found out. Rou from Enter Shikari, is playing a man who is trying to stop him doing it. Throughout the video the man this comes known to the man and everyone becomes against him and locks him in his house.
• There is a contrast in clothing between Rou and the business man. Rou is wearing a plain black polo shirt and he looks quite determined, where as the business man is wearing a suit which he looks quite proud of, he also looks like he is trying to show off his money.
• The start of the video starts off in slow motion when the man is walking down the street.
• There are quick cuts to the band playing in a garden like place. They have a crowd of people around them which have been auditioned to be included in it.
• There is natural lighting used and this can be seen in the garden because the sun light is coming through the trees.
• When the chorus comes Rou starts shouting at the man, and then it cuts back to the band playing in the garden.
• When Rou is walking with the man, he seems to appear invisible to him because he is not noticed. This part where he is walking down the road is in slow motion and when the door is shut it is still in slow motion.
• In the second chorus everyone is shouting in the window the words to the song at the man, and the man is mouthing swear words at them.
• The house which is used is quite modern and the lighting looks like natural lighting.
• Where the band is playing outside, the contrast seems to be very high and there are lots of quick cuts and quick zooms in and out.
• I didn't see this the first time I viewed the video, but as I took more notice to the detail in the video I spotted that where the business man is in his house looking at the pictures on his wall, there is a quick cut to a flash off images of the pictures on his wall that are the frame on the screen, and then a zoom in and out of his last picture which he stops to look at. This makes him seem like a vain character and only care about himself.
• At the window scene the band form and start shouting at the man, this makes them much more powerful.
• Rou is the lead singer of the band, and also plays the synth amongst other electronic synthy instruments, but he seems to be the main character in this video, and he knows about everything that is going on.
• On the way to the end of the video, there is a key change and Enter Shikari are playing in the dark but there are lights behind them to emphasis their silhouettes.
• I think this video is really affective and fits the target audience they are trying to reach, which is teenagers. It shows that they are a very powerful band by the way they are playing and the way the video is set up.

Owl City - Fireflies

(directed by Steve Hoover)

• The video starts off with everything being quite until the singer turns his keyboard on. He presses a 'Start Stop' button which makes the introduction music begin playing. It looks like he is playing it on the keyboard, but really he isn't as there are so many layers of electronics in this song he can't play them all.
• The introduction music is very calm and simple, and this reflects on what is going on in the surroundings which is the same.
• The camera swoops around the room, and the room has been made to look like a child's room with toys cluttered everywhere.
• The singer is placed on the far right hand side of the room, which puts him out of the way for later footage in the video.
• There is a window on the same side as where the singer is. What looks like natural sunlight is coming into the room and shines on the opposite wall and floor.
• There is a close up shot of the singer and it zooms in to him playing and then cuts to a button being pressed called 'Magic'.
• The sound that starts keeps the video calm and adds a bit of a magical effect to it.
• Lights are turned on, when the 'Magic' effect starts, and the lights synchronize to the music. This adds extra lighting in the room and makes the song come alive more.
• There is a short little zooming sound where a record goes round and speeds up and then the singer begins to sing and this is the start of the verse.
• There are lots of fairly quick cuts between him singing and playing the keyboard and other objects movement around the room.
• There is a child's 'Speak and Spell' toy which is first introduced in the introduction when it says "Hello" as it is turned on and then later it synchronizes with the words "Fireflies".
• The buttons that he presses to change the pattern of the song, make the video very colourful, although the video looks old fashioned. It has a retro theme to the song, and all works really well with the words.
• A line in the song is 'Lit up the world as I fell asleep.' The music video works well with this because the room starts dark at the beginning and as this line is said the more lights come on in the room.
• All the toys around the room are in their own little world, and the room resembles that world, so the video works perfectly with this line.
• Throughout the video there are a few zoom, pan and tilt shots of the singer on his keyboard, which make it look effective and keeps the audience watching. They are fairly quick to keep the video exciting.
• Moving on to the second verse, there are a lot more lights which add to the brightness of the song and the camera shot are quick cuts. The camera stays still in these shots, but this doesn't reduce the movement and action of the shots.
• A disco ball drops just as the start of the chorus starts and has a great impact on it. All the movement of the toys begins now and makes everything feel faster, when it isn't. That is what I like about it.
• The speak to spell is used a lot more once the video starts to get more exciting.
• The camera becomes more shakey and this makes the song become more visual, and just as everything starts to move a lot more the song stops all the heavy electronic music and become calmer.
• There is a zoom out shot at the end of the singer where as it zooms out he become blurred and the lights which are still on on the keyboard become bigger.
• As he starts off the video with turning his keyboard on, he ends it with turning it off.

Red Hot Chili Peppers - Can't Stop

(directed by Mark Romanek)

• The video starts off with a yellow tube. The camera goes into that tube, it appears to be a long and windy tunnel. The music builds up and as it does the camera gets quicker and windier through the tunnel.
• It stops when it approaches the lead singers face and shoulders.
• There is a quick cut, which cuts to the band jogging around a corridor with lights on their back. They are jogging to the beat of the song.
• During this scene there a some more quick cuts which show the expressions on the band's faces as they are running.
• Another cut and it is focused on the drummer who starts playing. He has a bright orange background behind him. Then another cut back to the lead singer, with his head down a yellow tube.
• So far it seems that this music video is very random, but with abstract effect given by the bright colours used.
• Throughout the verse of the song, there are a lot of fast pace cuts of each band member. Some are with the band member on their own playing their instrument or doing a random activity and others are the band playing together or doing a random activity with their band member.
• For example, the guitarist is playing his guitar in a white room with a load of plastic blue chairs. Or, the bass player picks up empty water bottles and tries to balance them between the legs and arms of the lead singer, he isn't singing he is standing still like a statue.
• There are some shots which have either been taken with a fish eye lens on the camera, or the camera has been focused on a convexed mirror which has been mounted on a white wall.
• The beat of the song and the way the song is played and sung, makes the video make sense in a way. The beat isn't random but with the guitars over the top it is quite recognisable which makes it different from other songs. This is why the music video has been made different to fit with the funky style of the song.
• The guitarist's guitar changes. In the scene where he is on his own, playing in the room with the blue plastic chairs, he has a orange guitar and when he is with the band he has a white guitar. This fits well because, orange on white looks good, but orange on orange doesn't. It was simply the background and guitar which were switched around.
• The lead singer has used direct address in the shots where either convexed mirror or fish eye lens has been used.
• When the song changes to the chorus, there is a cut to the the band playing. It cuts on the beat and the drummer strikes his cymbals when it cuts. The colours used for the chorus are orange, white and black. The guitar, bass and drums have been picked with the correct colour, the background is orange and the band members are wearing clothing which is any shade between white and black.
• There are lights on the floor where they are playing. These look like the lights which the band were carrying at the beginning of the video. Surprisingly there are no shadows in this section, so the lighting had to be picked out very carefully.
• There are cuts between the band members and them playing together during the chorus. This makes the song seem more fast pace.
• In the second verse, the bassist now appears with his instrument. He was not in the last verse with his instrument, but he was doing various random activities. He is has an orange bass on a white background, a bit like the guitarist did.
• The drummer now has started to do various activities.
• This video isn't taken too seriously as the lead singer dresses up as a silver tent in the second verse and uses direct address to lip sync along with the song.
• The guitarist is has been made to appear three times in one shot he is singing harmonies in this and with three of him it makes the harmonies seem more powerful and more of them.
• Three cameras have been used to create this scene, the guitarist was filmed three times in different bins and they have had to all film from the same place and angle. They are then put together during editing.
• The basses also is doing random activities in this second verse and one of things he does it tries juggle yellow balls between his legs. It seems like a circus act and fits really well into the video.
• In the next chorus, some new colours are brought in. They are still bright colours, but are darker than the ones being used. The guitarist wears a purple hippo mask and the lead singer has a green plant in front of his face. There isn't much of the band playing in this chorus, more abstract.
• In the third verse, the randomness of the activities going on are much the same. There is one scene that really caught my eye which was when the guitarist was playing in a room full of lamps which were switching on and off with the beat. Again in this scene, the guitarist has a different guitar, a silver one. This is a good colour, because it would reflect all the light from the lamps.
• Before the guitar solo, some of the cuts have been put in slow motion, for example, the shot of the guitarist and the bassist playing together.
• At the guitar solo, colourful lights come in and the lead singer holds some light up lamps and they are different colours. The ceiling around him also changes colour. Other than this lighting, there isn't much lighting.
• The guitarist is standing under a white tube, with his orange guitar again, and pink foam pieces come out of it and go all over him. This is while he is playing his solo, although when they actually recorded him he probably wasn't playing it.
• Now it is near-ish the end of the song, so there are lots of quick cuts between all the band members and all the previous activities that have taken place. The colourful lights continue through this part of the song.
• More close ups are used in this part of the video, as it is coming to an end previous activities are still going on, but the camera has moved closer into the action of it.
• The quick cuts stop and there is a long close up of the bass players face, which then cuts to more long cuts of the band members and the environments used for filming activities.
• The camera rewinds back through the yellow tube and then cuts to the lead singer, who is singing in a grey wall. This had been used before in the video, but an additional shot was used, it was more of a wide angle shot.
• Another final cut to a quote to say who the video was inspired by. It says, 'Inspired by the 'One-Minute Sculptures' by Erwin Wurm'. That means that this video has used intertextuality with Erwin Wurm, who was an Austrian artist.

Coldplay - Yellow

(directed by James & Alex of The Artists Company)

• This video starts off with a fade from black as the music starts. The shot is focused on the sea which is early in the morning.
• The guitars come in in the song, and a few seconds later the camera pans round to the beach, where a faint silhouette of a man is standing.
• The camera stops panning and the man starts walking towards the camera. The man is wearing a raincoat which he takes the hood down. He starts singing and then it is made clear that this is the lead singer of the band.
• His hair is wet, which means that not long ago it had been raining.
• As the song progresses and the lead singer walks, the sky becomes lighter and his face is easier to see.
• There is a mixture of indirect and direct address from the lead singer, because sometimes he looks at the camera and sometimes he looks down or towards the sea. This is because it makes it look more natural if he is looking around.
• As he is walking, it looks like he is walking very slowly, but in fact he was walking normal speed but in slow motion. This is where two cameras were used. One focuses on him walking and the other on his mouth, otherwise his mouth would be in slow motion as well. You can also see that it is in slow motion, because the tide is very slow and calm, if it had been raining and stormy, then the sea would be quite rough. - I found that two cameras weren't used but the lead singer had to sing in double time instead.
• The lead singer isn't always walking in a straight line, he drifts from side to side, this gives a more natural look to the video.
• At the end of the first chorus, the singing stops and the lead singer stops walking with the camera. He turns towards the sea and drifts that way a bit, whilst looking behind him, he then stops and walks back the way the camera is going. He then does a quick jog to get back in time to start singing the next verse. This must have been quite hard to film, to make sure that he got back in time.
• Near to the middle of the song, which is during the second chorus, the surroundings begin to brighten up and his face is easier to see.
• Also throughout the video, he gets further away from the sea.
• As the end of the song approaches the sky has shades of red in and this is during the transfer process called Telecine. It is when the amount of light is adjusted in the video, this makes the video look darker or lighter. So even though the surroundings are brightening up during the song, it doesn't mean that the sky has been sped up.
• He slows down the speed of his walking in the last few seconds of the song while he is still singing and he comes to a stand still. The camera keeps on moving backwards.
• Then he walks off, out of the shot and the camera pans back round to the sea, where the sun is directed straight into the lens. Then the video fades to black.