Applying Goodwin to a music video

In this essay I’m going to be analysing the music video for Noisia Ft Foreign Beggars-Shellshock, directed by Tony T, using many of Goodwin’s theories. The genre of the song is drum and bass which would normally mean in most of music videos of the same genre that there is a very high pace to the video. The characteristics of most other drum and bass song consist of half-naked women dancing provocatively, and with the use of strobe lighting and quick edits it can increase the speed of the video dramatically.

  The video begins with 40seconds of narrative or scene setting for the rest of the video to be based on. In these 40seconds we see a young African boy being interviewed as to why he keeps being called for crisis meetings. As the music begins we see a very well built tall man dressed in the same outfit as the young boy with the same hat on. The video then cuts to see a swat team with guns walking through a darkened corridor with the singer in this group. The singer performs while he and the other actors look around for something in the blackness of the corridor. As the beat begins to speed up we see the swat team getting more agitated as they see the tall man stood over what appears to be dead bodies of other swat team members, when the bass of the music drops the swat team begin to open fire on the man, the flashes of the guns are in time with the music along with the flashing of lights going out due to being hit by bullets, this builds a strong relationship between the visuals and the music, this is also increased by the ambient sounds of bullet shells hitting the floor.

As the music slows down, so does the visuals. When the music begins to lose its pace halfway through the video at 1:48 there is a small piece of narrative in which the tall man punches a member of the swat team which in turn starts the music again.

Although there isn’t much connection between the lyrics and the visuals, there is however a line which mentions a Minotaur, we can see a lot of similarities between the myth of the Minotaur and the visuals as there are a group of people in dark corridors trying to avoid a beast or a monster which is after them.

In this video we can see at many different points that the visual and the audio are very well matched which the director has planned, at 41seconds into the video we see a double door open which leads the music and singer to being performing, this shows us that the singer is an important member of the band and of the video as he was framed in a shot within a shot by the director placing him inside a doorway our focus is on him. As the tone and speed of the music changes along with the singer, there is a smoke grenade which has been used to obscure the vision of the monster, this however blocks our view of the singer as well as the monsters’.

In this video there is an element of voyeurism as the monster has noticeable human features such as the torso and the arms and legs, this is considered voyeurism as he still looks human although we know that he isn’t. The area of his body which have human features are well toned, this could mean this video is aimed more toward the female perspective, however the use of guns and fighting and dying could mean it is for both men and women.

As we watch the video there are very little close up on people, yet there are many on filler shots such as shooting guns and areas of the body such as the biceps and peck muscles. This is unconventional for a music video as these are normally the shots which are used the most, although in this video we see mainly medium shots or long shots, the only times close ups have been used are to limit the space the audience think there is between beast and soldiers.

Looking at the monster, although he is not the star he takes much of the limelight in the video as he is the antagonist. On the back of the monsters’ neck we see a tattoo of an eyeball; this is also the one of the many logos which the band uses regularly in most of their videos. However in other videos by the same brand they have gone in a different route as to how they should shoot their videos. In this music video it is made to be more of a narrative rather than showing the band’s performance, this video feels more like watching a 5 minute film instead of anything else. As with the band’s other videos they use much more of a performance by including members playing instruments, this is something the video lacks heavily in, performance value. As most of the music in the song is electronic, there was no way of incorporating it into the video without linking the music to the visuals by using lighting and shells hitting the floor.

Using Goodwin’s theories on music videos concerning the 3 types of music video, illustrative, amplifying or contradictory we can tell that it is illustrative as there is much more elements of a narrative rather than a performance. The video is neither of the other two as to be called contradictory there would need to be an obvious disregard of the lyrics and only think about telling a story that the director and band want to show, this music video in a way could be called contradictory however, much of the audio and visual does match up together, this would destroy the illusion of it being contradictory. The music video is not amplification as it is not trying to raise knowledge of anything or raise the bands status. Although there are many ways in which the video tries to raise the status of the band, the video does this by suggesting they are strong mentally and physically by placing them alongside soldiers fighting an unkillable beast. The band members have also had make up done which the makeup artists have placed scars along the faces of some of the members of the band.

In conclusion this video by Tony T has thoroughly applied Goodwins theories towards a music video during this piece as he has applied all the concepts necessary to be classed as a Goodwin like video