Tuesday 22 September 2015

Analysis of Music video and apply theories




The music video I shall be analysing and applying theory to is "Out of Touch" by Hall and Oates. The song is about the role of police in the 1980's  (The lyrics) and explores culture. This song is widely known and has featured on the game "Grand Theft Auto - Vice City" which is set in the 1980's and pays homage to this song. The music video for the song features actors Paul Spicer, Charlene Rena, Hayley-Marie Coppin and Sophie Lovell Anderson playing strip poker. The music itself is catchy and is seen (by me) to be one of the crowning jewels of music videos in the 80's.

The genre of the song is considered to be pop, as the artists of the music video are dressed in popular "80's" clothing and would have reached out to much of the young audience at the time of release. In my view, I'd consider this song to be in then range of pop. The theorist John Hartly says that "Genres are agents of ideological closure, they limit the meaning potential of the given text". I disagree with this theory as this piece does expand on the given point and the meaning the artists are trying to portray the correct themes for that time period. The genre for this song is solely Pop and has not been a victim in hybridisation as many songs now consist of this "Borrowing" (Rick Atman) different conventions of genre. However this is not true in this as

 The Music video does reflect the idea of the "Zeitgeist" of the 1980's. One of which is fashion as seen within the colourful and ridicules outfits worn

Looking at the video. I can apply Goodwin's convention theory to the video. The music video does reflect the time period through the artists choice of actions and lyrics within the song. There is a notion of the artist looking into the camera, which reflects on the feeling given of comfort as the artist is singing to the audience with close ups of the artist. This is used so the viewer can see how the artist portrays himself and shows the viewer his feelings.

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