Research - Goodwin's Theory

Goodwin’s Theory

Andrew Goodwin believed that most conventional music videos do 8 conventional things which will appeal to an audience. These 8 things are seen in every music video, however not all 8 will be seen every music video, only some. This is because some music videos are quite controversial. 

1)      Genre Characteristics – that music videos often reflect their genre through the use of specific characteristics which makes them conventional. For example, in a hip hop music video you would usually come across a glamorised set and look for the artist, with promiscuous women who may be half naked or wearing tight clothing, and typically have the black race as artists or actors in the music video. Another example is jazz music would have an old fashioned theme (sometimes set in black and white to represent old fashioned music videos), men and women would dress formal and would usually be set on a stage with instruments everywhere (saxophone, piano, etc.) Every genre has its own unique style in music videos.

2)      Relationship between lyrics and visuals – Illustrative: Explaining the lyrics visually, for example, in Selena Gomez’s music video ‘Good for you’, the lyric says “gonna wear that dress you like, skin tight” and you see a close up of her dress. Amplifying: Exaggeration of the lyrics linking to the video, for example, throughout J Cole’s music video ‘Wet Dreamz’ the whole video shows the lyrics but with two dogs, which is exaggerate from human’s behaviour to the lyrics. Contradicting: Being the opposite visual to the lyrics, for example, Rihanna’s music video ‘We found love’ is very upbeat and as Calvin Harris featured in the song, elements of the dance genre was strongly recognised. This didn’t match the video as it included drugs, aggressive arguments, rough sexual activity and rebellious behaviour from a young couple.

3)      Relationship between music and visuals – Visuals show a clear connection to the actual music, For example, if the music is upbeat then the visuals will consists of large movements and quick edits, whereas if the music is monotone, the visuals will be slow and edits will be much slower too.

4)      Star Image Motifs – The music video mainly focuses on the artists with many close up shots, demanded by the record label so they can become more popular and identifiable in the industry

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5)      Notion of looking – Particularly voyeuristic treatment of the female body (women that are seen as a sexual object.) There are a huge amount of music videos that could fit into this section nowadays as most female artists promote themselves mainly on camera in very sexual ways to gain publicity.

6)      Intertextual Reference – In many music videos you will find there are often links to other films, TV programmes, celebrity’s lives, other music videos, etc. Eminem does this a lot in his music videos, especially in his music video ‘Without me’ as he makes intertextual references to superheroes, Elvis’ death and many other events the public may recognise.

7)      Performance, Narrative or Concept-Based – Performance: Solidly focused on the artist/band, for example, Beyoncé’s music video ‘Single ladies’ is performance throughout with her and two females dancing the whole time. Narrative: Story attached to video, for example, Naughty Boy’s music video ‘LaLa’ showed a story throughout when the boy is on a journey. Concept: Obscure/surreal for the audience and doesn’t really make sense, for example, FKA Twigs music video ‘Glass and Patron’ doesn’t make any sense for the audience due to the random images of dancing and then the birth of cloths from a human and then skin everywhere.

8)      Technical elements – Micro elements compliment the genre (Cinematography, Editing, Mise en scene, Sound), for example, Beyoncé’s music video ‘7/11’ relied purely on editing and cinematography to make it go to the many unique beats you can hear in the song.

As a group in class, we analysed Will Smith’s music video ‘Miami’ and made a grid to analyse the 8 different points that Andrew Goodwin made in his theory. This is an image of the grid the class wrote individually:

The class then separated into pairs to analyse a music video of our choice. I chose FKA Twigs ‘Glass and Patron’ because this was a very complex video which I found a challenge to analyse. This is an image of the grid we made:

This information shows me that my music video should contain the majority of these 8 points that Andrew Goodwin made in his theory of music videos because they are conventional and make music videos interesting and filled with unique styles and have always worked with successful music videos from the past. The most interesting point goodwin made that i would like to include in my music video is intertextual reference. I think that this idea is very clever and can also attract audiences depending on how much the interetextual reference has an impact on the target audience. Also, Star image motifs and notion of looking will be needed for my music video as i want there to be a lot of focus on the artist.