I decided
to do a textual analysis of this music video, because I really enjoy it and
find it quite inspiring. It is a mixture of concept and performance, and the
music video really suits the song. The song 'Dirty Little Secret' was released
in 2005 by The All-American Rejects, they then went on to release the music
video later on in the year, it was directed by Marcos Siega, who is well known for music videos such as ‘Blink
182 - All The Small Things’, and ‘Papa Roach - Broken
Home’. Siega has a background in music which really helps his music video
career. The music video consists of the band performing in a room
with loads of photos pinned up in the backdrop behind them, it also features a
series of random people holding up cards sharing their "dirty little
secrets", (a montage). The secrets that are written on the cards were
posted on a website, anonymously, and when Siega typed in 'secrets' on Google,
the website came up. The band and Marcus Siega then paid the website to use the
cards, and all the funds went to 'The Kristin Brooks Hope Center', which is a non profit
organization which pays for a suicide hotlines.
The music video for ‘Dirty Little Secret’ conforms to Goodwin’s Seven in that it includes many of close ups of the artist, as demanded by the
record label. It also follows that it demonstrates certain genre
characteristics, for example stage performance for rock bands. In this music
video there is a slight relationship between lyrics and visuals, as in the
chorus when the band sing, ”I’ll keep you my dirty little secret” we see the
visuals as being the random people holding up the cards with their secrets on. However
their music video has no reference to looking, and there are no intertextual
references. This music video also shows no relationship between music and
visuals.
Throughout the music video there are many mid-shots that zoom
into close-ups, of the people holding their cards, this shows me that they are emphasizing
on the secrets that they have written, and it also makes us able to read them
clearly. Most of the shots of the band are group-shots, this is to show the
audience that the band members are together, and not part of the random people.
The close-ups of the lead singer are used to represents how he is the leader of
the band, and the main singer. There is a shot in the video which is a bird’s
eye view of the guitarist playing; this is stereotypical of rock bands. The
video opens with a montage of people holding their cards; it has been edited to
be fast-paced so that it fits in time with beat at the start of the song. The
people with the cards are firstly shown in a mid-shot, and then it quickly cuts
to a close-up of the card, I think that this has been done to accentuate on the
secrets. Most of the editing through this music video is fast paced, but still
allowing us enough time to read the cards. The lighting of the shots of the
band is kept very dark, and at times their faces are hidden, this is to create
mystery and to once again emphasize on the idea of ‘secrets’. The clothing of
the band are just plain, and dull, whereas the random people are wearing normal
bright coloured clothes because it is suggesting that everyone has secrets. The
settings of the random people are just normal places like on the streets; this
again notes how they are normal people. Where as the band are in a dark warehouse
which is creating an element of mystery.
The performance of the band of good as it is mixed in with
the concept, however, if the music video was just the concept it would still
make sense, but if it was just the performace I don’t not think that it would
be quite the same. The montage of images at the start of the music video may be
something which we would consider at part of our music video.
No comments:
Post a Comment