I like music. I like music videos. Usually. But people do some pretty screwed up things when writing or directing anything, and the music video arena is no exception.
Mostly this applies to music videos that take on a sort of short film style. Many music videos have no sort of plot or reason to the images at all, and that's fine. But when the music video does have a plot, that plot needs to have something to do with the song. For instance, Thriller had a plot, and it was relevant to the song, so it was good.
The example that set me off here is the film clip to "Telepone" by Lady Gaga. I'm no going to make any arguments about how good it was [Anyone who needs to be told it sucked is beyond being reasoned with]. But it did have a plot. That plot was about being put into prison, being in prison, breaking out of prison, and for some reason I'm not aware of, poisoning a bunch of random people people in a diner, just coz.
Now, in case you're stupid or don't listen to Lady Gaga, the song is about her not wanting to answer her phone so she can dance. In a club. But in the video, when she does answer a phone and sing the chorus, shes currently in a room. In the prison. It is stupid. It is nothing more than Lady Gaga wanting her own Thelma & Louise rip-off, not having a song that fits, and so forcing it upon a completely irrelevant song that could have had a good video.
And I remember the music video to "Lying Is The Most Fun A Girl Can Have Without Taking Her Clothes Off" [perhaps true, but unecessarily long] by Panic! At The Disco. The song is about teens having sex/ breaking up or something a bit along those lines. And the video is about a world of people with fishbowls full of water around their heads, and if they break the people die, and when they die they get put into the ocean.
Artistic, yes. Interesting, yes. On its own, very good. But when paired with a song about teens and sex?? FUCKING TERRIBLE. What the fuck does teen sex have to do with fishbowl-head-people?? NOTHING.
Seriously people, what the fuck??
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I agree, but not about the Panic! part. The fishbowl thing is weird, and I think that weird is good. because if there was nothing weird in the world, thought would never be provoked and things would be oh-so boring. It's much like art that makes no sense.
ReplyDeleteBut picture art [which I assume you're refering to] is allowed to make no sense as it has no context. Music videos are allowed to make no sense if they have no context. But a music video where the lyrics tell a story and the video tells a completely different and irrelevant story have two contexts which clash, and detract from each other.
ReplyDeleteIf the Panic! video had just some instrumental music playing, it would have been better. If the song about sex had had a different sort of video, it would have been better. They should have been seperate, they weren't as good as they could have been.
i get what your saying but i also think that some music videos that seem random are just abstract and using metaphors. however some videos i just dont understand what the directors and artists were thinking..
ReplyDeleteoh god yes please, make a music video with teens having sex in it, i would watch it so much. teens make me hard.
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