Andrew Goodwin's Theory

In a previous blog post called 'Student Video Analysis'  I analysed videos based upon the theory of Andrew Goodwin however, I did not really go into detail upon what his theory actually was; therefore, this post will discuss his theory for a better understanding upon it.

Overall, Goodwin implies that music videos have a set structure that ALL artists follow.

1. Music videos normally show stereotypes of the particular genre, for example, a girl band would feature outfits to match each girls 'personality' and dance routines whereas, a rap video would be based around the main artist (typically one of high wealth and status), surrounded by women in revealing clothes. Our song, 'Without You' by Lana Del Rey is in the Alternative genre; so far out planning is rather stereotypical as we want to have a 'Vintage/Retro' vibe and look to our video and our artist - this fits in with Goodwin's Theory

2. Voyeurism - This is the act of looking, especially secretively, at a male or female that is being portrayed in a seductive manor for their own pleasure. Andrew Goodwin says that the act of Voyeurism is mainly used to sell the artist's music or gain popularity through sex appeal - 'Sex Sells'. This can be also shown through props; a good example of this is Miley Cyrus' 'Wrecking Ball' - her actions with the sledge hammer automatically make the video more sexual as it implies that Miley wants to indulge in sexual activities.

When it comes to our music video we have decided to try and keep Voyeurism to a minimum as we would like to break some typical conventions of the music industry so that our video stands out against all other videos; also, as our artist is a female we would like to try and stay away from voyeurism as it is fairly biased - it tends to objectify women, as our artist is fairly young we want to make her a good role model for any younger fans, and this is not the best way of doing this. 7

An aspect of Voyeurism that we would like to use is direct eye contact with the audience as it creates a bond between the artist an the audience; we would also like to have the video in the point of view od the 'boyfriend' therefore, any eye contact with the camera will show a form of connection within this 'relationship' - this then breaks the '4th Wall' as it gets rid of the divide between the audience and the artist. We may use some form of sexual elements just to make our artist sell however, this is yet to be discussed.

 

3. A relationship between the music and the visuals is something that Goodwin has mentioned in his theory; meaning that the lyrics match what's going on in the shot. We would like our music video to have this convention as we agree that the lyrics and the visuals should be matched in some way - this will make the video more successful as people can relate to it more however we do not want to have this take over our video as it gives us room to experiment with different ideas and themes. We understand that by not having the lyrics and the videos match, you can create an extremely successful video as a huge contrast is made, which will make the video successful due to people talking about the contrast.

4. The demands of the record label - most record labels have certain demands that their artist should be represented as. For example, female artists are made to be 'sexy' in order to draw in a male audience. We would like to keep the sexual elements in our video to a minimum - our inspiration is Lana Del Rey and her videos aren't mainly focused on sex but the quality of her videos; if we focus on this too it will make the quality of our video a lot better as well as make our artist appear to be focused on her work more than her sex appeal.

5.Intertextual References - These are references to existing forms of media such as television or books. Generally, the audience like being 'in' on the reference, this will make the video more likeable due to the audience feeling like they're part of the 'joke'. We have decided not to use intertextual references in our video as we do not feel that it is necessary for out song - the lyrics make no reference to any other media texts.

 

Lana Del Rey uses intertextual references in 'National Anthem' due to her referencing JFK and Marylin Monroe.

 

 

6. Performance Based, Narrative based or concept based? - A narrative based video is about telling a story, There is also a fragmented narrative, which is when the story has not got a set order, showing flash backs and flash forwards - the audience would have to piece the story together themselves; we decided to go for a linear narrative as we plan to tell our story in some form of an order however, as we want to incorporate a break up into the video, we may have to change this to a fragmented narrative, this is something we will discuss in the editing process.

A concept based video puts forward a specific theme or idea, we are planning for our video to be similar to this but due to the storyline being so obvious, we do not really class our  video as a concept based one.

Finally, performance based videos show the artist in action - there is a lot less camera work as the focus is that someone is performing so the video tends to be fairly simple; mainly close ups and wide shots are used to showcase the artist/band. Personally, I think that these types of videos are good to show people what it would be like to see the act in concert however, I think that to draw the audience in, you need to have a story line involved. Circa Waves' 'So Long' music video shows the band in action in different locations, making it feel more like a music video then a soul performance.

 

 

 

Overall, I would say that my group is influenced by Andrew Goodwin's theory and we aim to stick to most of his findings however, we do like to be unique and break the status quo so it is inevitable that we are going to break some of the rules to make our video more personal.