Studying a music video

1.Thought beats or seeing the sounds in your head.

2. Narrative and Performance.

3. The star image

4. Three ways to which music videos relate visuals to the song

5. Technical aspects of music video

Bruno Mars-The Lazy song

The music video I am going to study in detail is by Bruno Mars and is called “The Lazy Song”. I choose this song because I feel there is a large amount to say for each of the five areas that we must focus on when studying and analysing a video.

1.When watching the video and focusing on the first area which is thought beats or seeing the sounds in your head I began to pick out important parts of the video which abide by this area. For example the video uses synaesthesia in which the monkey characters in the video use certain facial expressions when the music is a certain way consistently throughout the video such as pretending to whistle when there are parts in the song which sound like a persons whistle. This could be used so that the audience maintain that image of the facial expression and in the future when hearing a similar sound will think of that image. Bruno becomes the storyteller to the audience and directly associates with them. As the song is mainly from the view of a male student Bruno takes up this role and both the background of what may be assumed as a dorm and the lyrics and actions made all fit this role of coming from the view of a male student. The guitar can be related to this scenario as it is a sound, which is very mellow and constant throughout the song which may remind the viewers of being at university and always being very chilled as well as the lyrics. The video targets its main target audience, which is male students with typical conventions which only they are familiar with and understand through the lyrics used. For example Bruno uses lyrics such as “turn the TV on, through my hand in my pants” which boys who are students may be familiar with and find funny however other audiences who are from different backgrounds and cultures won’t understand or be able to relate to the video or lyrics which won’t really make sense to them if they haven’t been in that similar situation. Bruno takes the typical aspects of a student and amplifies them in the video making them able to properly relate to the video.

2.Throughout the video there is only one shot of the singer and characters which I think is done intentionally for the narrative to illustrate that university life is

constant and the same. However, though throughout the video there is just one constant shot the video is still kept exciting and entertaining through the characters dance routines and actions made which at times relate to the lyrics and change to the beat. The storyline and video are both easy to watch and consistent so that as an audience we can watch repeatable times with ease. Though the shot is consistent there is still a range of close ups and long shots of Bruno and the monkey dancers. The video also shows conventions, which are consistent throughout such as lip syncing, the mimed playing of instruments and the dance routines shown throughout the video.

3.Brunos Meta narrative has been developed over time and is shown during each of his songs including this video. His image of a cool and confident individual is shown here which could be due to the creative and effectively different to any other video style he uses in each of his videos to grab the viewers’ attention rather than the similar style which is generally shown in music videos in this generation. The fact he uses backing dancers which have comic monkey faces will intrigue the viewer instead of the usual female dancers as its so different and has never really been done before. This being done and Bruno doing something unique for each of his videos can now be seen as his signature theme and gives him an image of a creative individual.

4.The video uses both illustrations and amplifications throughout the video. Generally the singer and his dancers do actions, which directly relate to the lyrics said. For example when Bruno talks about not answering the phone the dancers and him all show a classic phone movement known to our culture. Also when Bruno mentions he is going to “strut in my birthday suit” Both him and the backing dancers undo their trousers and have them around their ankles which is a literal meaning of the lyrics said in a interesting and comical way. These are all demonstrations of visualisations used in the video, which directly illustrate the lyrics used. The video also uses amplification as the dance moves and actions used by Bruno and his dance group are often done to the beat of the music. These are both common to be used in a music video and give links to relate the lyrics and video together.

5. The video is built up of very long shots rather than a lot at once which could be to emphasis the mellow genre of the song and the fact its about students and the way in which Bruno spends his days. Interesting techniques are used to give the impression that video is a home video by at the start Bruno’s hands are shown close to the screen giving the impression he is turning it on. To change the scenario he also does this again later on and the dancers are gone, changing it in a creative way, which relates to the narrative. The Meat shot of Bruno is shown several times throughout the video, as it’s a crucial part to be done in a music video. Bruno is also generally centrally focused with the dancers around him to show that he is the central focus of the video.