Influential Music Videos

                      

The music video for Radiohead's "All I Need" has been a great inspiration to the planning of our own music video production. The video explores the contrast between everyday, American children and kids in other countries who have been trafficked and exploited for cheap labour; using the split-screen creates binary opposition between the two characters, positioning them side by side in order to highlight the extreme differences in life style. Additionally, the colour grade further enforces this; the left pane, exploring the everyday life of an American holds a light, brightly coloured mise-en-scene. On the other hand, the pane depicting the exploited child is dimly lit, and coloured with a green tint, connoting dystopia e.g. films like "The Matrix" follow a similar colour scheme. These techniques, therefore,  link with Claude Levis-Strauss' theory whereby the constant creation of conflict drives visual narrative.

Furthermore, when exploring the themes of our chosen track, "Mr President, We're in Trouble", me and another group member were focusing on the divide between the corporate or government "big shots" and the public; looking in to how corruption and greed has lead to the damage of our economy, but mainly the working class citizen has suffered the consequences. These ideas lead me to think back to how well binary opposition was conveyed in the above, and with further group discussions we decided that it would be a great format to base our music video around. However, instead of exploring exploitation and trafficking, we will instead be highlighting the opposition between the 99% i.e. the public, conveyed through the life of a protestor perhaps and the 1% i.e. the government officials and bankers, conveyed through the life of a wealthy business man. Additionally, we have decided that both characters will be played by the same person, in order to convey the idea that we lead a life of choices i.e. you can be consumed by greed and self indulgence or you can fight for what you actually believe in. Moreover, giving us the opportunity to amplify the lyrics of the track within our production.



On another note, when researching in to political music videos I found a track by UNKLE, "Money And Run (feat. Nick Cave)". This music video gives a rather exaggerated, but scarily literal representation of bankers and politicians behaviour, I thought it may be interesting to post as it's a more extreme version of the theme we are trying to portray; Tom Haines has very cleverly and rather interestingly showed us how bankers and politicians are the real "yobs" within society.

Contacting the band

Before getting in to groups, I decided to contact the band of a track that I found very interesting to find out if they were unsigned, and see if I had their permission to make a music video for them. After having a look at their website I found the contact details of the bands frontman and sent him an e-mail stating my request. Additionally, I decided to send him a link to a previous music video that I was a part of making, just to add as a reference point.

One of the band members (Seth) sent me a very prompt reply, making it clear that Fold were unsigned and also granting us permission to make a music video for them. However, the band sent me a few links to songs that they would prefer us making a music video for because it would be more coincided with the release of their new EP; the tracks were great, but I felt that they couldn't be best represented in a narrative structure (which is what we wanted to create). Whereas, "Mr President, We're in Trouble" offers a lot more possibilities in terms of narrative. Therefore, I responded to Seth's email stating the above and letting him know that the video wouldn't have to be an official video for that song, he then replied with the below response; further down the line sending me a mastered version of the track.