History of Music Videos

History of Music Videos

A music video is produced for promotional purposes. It is a short film integrating a song and imagery. Music videos became big in the 1980’s and were created by MTV. Music videos usually include a narrative, performance or an abstract film. Music videos often blend together these different styles. Some music videos include animation, for example ‘Gorillas’.  

December 2^nd 1983 – Michael Jackson, Thriller.

This video is 14 minutes long and promotes Michael Jacksons Album and song ‘Thriller’. It was directed by John Landis and produced by George Folsey, Jr, Michael Jackson and John Landis. This music video uses a blend of narrative and performance and has been voted the most influential music video of all time. This video uses all the codes and conventions of a typical horror film. For example a young man and his girlfriend walking through the woods, the girl is very vulnerable. The couple are walking home by themselves through a graveyard. The mis-en-scene is dark and gloomy. You can tell that the video is promoting his song as the film the couple are going to see is called ‘Thriller’. You can tell the genre is horror as there are undead zombies coming to life. This is when the video becomes a performance as Michael and the zombies perform one of the most famous and influential dances of all time. The girl runs to a rundown house which looks as though it should be in a horror film as it looks haunted and this is were the story of the video ends. This music video won 2 Grammy awards and 3 MTV awards in 1984-1985 and in 1999 it won another MTV award for the greatest 100 music videos of all time. This video has sold over 9 million copies.

February 19^th 1991 – REM, Loosing My Religion.

This music video is 4:46 minutes long and is used to promote the band REM and their single ‘Loosing My Religion’. This music video was directed by Tarsem Singh and REM front man Michael Stipe. The video begins with a dark room were class is collecting rain from the window yet when the glass smashes on the floor the audience see that it is milk, this could symbolise purity as it is white. This is when the song begins. This music video is a mixture of narrative and performance is it shows the band playing the instruments and the singer lip syncing to the soundtrack. Angels are a key element to this music video and play a big part in showing that the narrator is loosing his belief in religion. You can clearly see that the angels’ wings are very fake, which could be seen to symbolise that religion is fake. At one point an angel has his wig pulled off his head this again symbolises that religion isn’t real. This video is filled with religious imagery such as Saint Sebastian and Hindu deities and is created in the style of a type of Indian filmmaking. This video won 6 MTV music video awards including video of the year in 1991.

August 10^th 2011 – Jessie J, Who’s Laughing Now.

This music video is 4:06 minutes long and has a very strong narrative. The song is about how Jessie got bullied when she was younger. A young actress is made to look like Jessie and the music video uses the codes and conventions of a high school film. For example at the beginning of the video the young Jessie is walking down a school corridor and all the other girls are pointing and staring at her and also shows a class of kids working in a classroom with an unrealistic teacher played by Jessie. Jessie also plays a stereotypical nasty dinner lady and a dirty janitor. The young Jessie gets her own back on all of the people at the school that has been nasty to her, and the lyrics relate to the video on screen. At the end of the video we see how the young girl has become happy and is laughing at the bully’s which is what the lyrics are about. This is very different to the other 2 videos as it has a very strong narrative and not much performance from the artist. This shows that this song has a deep meaning and that the music video isn’t just created to promote the artist.

Music videos often use CGI as in the ‘Thriller’ video. Every popular band and artist releases a music video to promote themselves and the single that they are releasing. Websites such as Youtube and VEVO make it easier for a global audience to watch the music video as soon as they are released and have made artists such as Jessie J very famous worldwide. Before these types of websites it was difficult for the audience to watch music videos without buying them. In the 80’s not all artists had to make music videos to promote themselves like they do today.