Narrative

"Narrative Theory suggests that stories, in whatever media and whatever culture, share certain features."

Barthes

Barthes suggests that narrative works with five different codes which activate the reader to allow them to make sense of the narrative they are watching. This is an intricate theory as it goes into great depth with each type of code.

Action- The codes contain sequential elements of action in the text. In doing so can create suspense within the text.

Enigma- The code refers to mystery within the text.Clues have been put in place but no hard evidence is given to make the audience think and come to their own conclusion on what they are given.

Semic- This code refers to parts within a text that suggest or refer to different meanings within the text. The seme has a connotative function in the text. It has an extra layer of meaning in addition to it's literal meaning.

Symbolic- This code is about symbolism within the text. It exercises opposites to show contract and create greater meaning, creating tension, drama and character development.

Cultural- This code refers to anything in the text that references to an external body of knowledge such as scientific, historical and cultural knowledge.

EXAMPLE:
For an example of Barthes' theory I looked at The Ghost of You by My Chemical Romance, the narrative is really strong and has many different features to allow a good analysis of each code.

Action- This is seen when the chorus begins and the soldiers are charging onto the beach, this holds suspense as the camera focuses on an individual character and the audience automatically feels concerns towards this character.

Enigma- The ending of the video is representative of the enigma code as we are left wondering what has happened to the main character, as the lyrics sate 'never coming home', this could be about him or his friends he was losing around him. The question is still left unanswered even when the video has finishes.

Semic- Through the course of the narrative whilst the main characters friends are dying around him, the affect on his performance shots where it is as though he is fading could be a suggestion of him not coming back from war and this could be him singing about himself.

Symbolic- The affect of the narrative and live performance overlapping with the characters highlights the fact that they are the people whom the song is about and yet this represents everyone at war as though not one soldier has ever been given a name.

Cultural- An audience would need some understanding of the Second World War to fully understand the extend and meaning behind the song and it's narrative to feel for these young people and be more epithetic towards the characters and leads to a better connection with the audience.

Todorov

Todorov suggests that the idea of a narrative is that there is 5 stages; Equilibrium; Disruption; Recognition; Reperation and the New Equilibrium. He believes that the narrative of a music video will roughly follow these steps to be successful. Equilibrium meaning the good at the beginning, the disruption being something happens to change this, then recognition is realising what has happened or what is wrong, reparation is trying to make things better, the new equilibrium is now the problem solved and now the narrative is good again; yet not necessarily the same as before.

EXAMPLE:I felt like the narrative I gave an example of, should be that of Avicii so I was able to look at his style of narrative he used for his music. I therefore decided to look at Wake Me Up by Avicii. The song itself is totally consistent of narrative except the final drop in the music where the characters are represented at the live performance in that they are in the crowd, yet the shots of them are more vague.

Equilibrium: the two characters are in a small happy village, where there is peace and no trouble yet there is a sense of disruption from the start (something doesn't seem right).

Disruption: We find out from conversation in the music video apart from the text that the people in the town don't like this girl and her younger sister. As though they have done something wrong.

Recognition: We find out as an audience through the use of a flashback that the eldest character went to the city in search of something new and found Avicii's music. This changed how she behaved and because she went away and came back different, the people of the town shunned her because she was different and in their eyes not normal.

Reparation: due to the younger character raising concerns about the town not liking them, the eldest realises that they need to get away from the town so decides to take them to where she feels they belong; in the city with her friends she met there and with Avicii's music concert about to happen she takes her sister there.

New Equilibrium: they have found somewhere they fit in and aren't deemed as different, they have found a purpose in the city and feel as though they have found a new home; this is presented in the concert where their mode has changed from sad to being happy and feel like they belong.

New Equilibrium: they have found somewhere they fit in and aren't deemed as different, they have found a purpose in the city and feel as though they have found a new home; this is presented in the concert where their mode has changed from sad to being happy and feel like they belong.

Music Video Treatment

The song I will be doing as my music video is X You by Avicii, this could be seen as a fairly difficult song to create a music video without any lyrics it is totally down to the interpretation of the music to make the narrative of the music video and to create a affective piece. It allows me to use all my imagination in creating an exciting music video as I am not bound to the lyrics of the song like most songs are.

I want to create a narrative for the song and this means I will be following the narrative structure as said by Todorov in his theory on narrative structure. The problem I may find is creating something unique in that the music video is so open the only images I get is from pass experience as a an audience watching each music video.

First impressions in the form of a mood board:

1st Rough Plan 

I wrote this after first listening to the song just to get an idea of where my narrative would take me. This may not be the best portrayed treatment and yet it was just first impressions.

Scene 1: Guy stands looking out over water at a sea shore. Next to a bike. Then grabs bike and begins to peddle away fast and along the beach front.

Scene 2: Jumps off bike and into car. Speeds away and is listening to a track on the radio whilst tapping fingers on steering wheel as though listening to the track in the background.

Scene 3: Gets home where awaits him recoding dj equipment which he begins to use such as a keyboard, whilst scribbling down nots and creating notes on a mac laptop, whilst headphones on the whole time he moves to the beat of the music. Then switches to guitar and then bass using an amp.

Scene 4: Him travelling in a car on a laptop still making music on the journey to somewhere and he seems real happy with himself. Pulls up outside concert..

Scene 5: Inside concert with live music everyone dancing etc. Think he is the DJ at the front instead he is staring from the crowd looking up. This creates a twist in the story, the video then overlaps the previous story to show what built up to this moment.

I wanted to then look at other music videos to get an idea of any other interpretations I could use to alter my original rough plan and even to change my view completely on what i was going to do.

This is another song by Avicii as I wanted to see what his style was and allow me to incorporate some of that into my music video to make sure I kept within the House/Dance music genre.

From what I have seen from many of his music videos he uses a narrative in which it builds to a final live performance such as in Wake Me Up, where he uses the main character as the common feature throughout the video and this leads to her being at the final performance before that dies off and the narrative returns to its original equilibrium. Also the use of the two alternative lives is very affective and the the use of almost a movie type of action breaking up the song itself to highlight the importance of the video to the song as the the song plays of the video.

I used a mind map to get down some ideas of the genre, audience and the narrative just to get an idea of what I wanted or needed to include.

From looking at this I can create a final treatment of what I want to include in my video whilst staying in the genre and a strong narrative is important to the video and also a live performance will be important and yet this may be the most difficult section to film to get good quality and also to get the right shots. I wouldn't be able to control the live performance very well and could lead to me having to find an alternative to this section of the video, maybe create a plot twist where you think he's going to go to a live performance and instead he wakes up and realises it was what he wanted not what he had.

This treatment represents the narrative structure I wanted to give to the video, it is a very fast equilibrium with the boy stood at the start, yet this is always building to the creation of the music and this in turn creates the new equilibrium.

Postmodernism

Theory

A late 20th-century style and concept in the arts, architecture, and criticism that represents a departure from modernism and has at its heart a general distrust of grand theories and ideologies as well as a problematical relationship with any notion of “art. Post-modernism simply means a time after modernism.

It can be looked at differently from a number of different viewpoints, obviously Philosophy reviews it differently to History, and again with Media. But there is a certain someone who goes by the name of Strinati, a theorist who gave a structured approach to looking at post-modernism, and identified FIVE ways to define post-modernism within culture and media texts.

Intertextuality: 

• One Media text referring to another

An example of Intertextuality in a music video is 'You Know Me' by Robbie Williams where the video features the artist being taken to an 'Alice in Wonderland' style setting with Robbie William's dressed up as the rabbit from the film. This creates intertextuality between the film and the music video.

Also at the end of the video there is a shot of the artist in the Metro-Goldwyn - Mayer trademark Lion replaced with the rabbit character.

Parody:

• Mocking something in a particular way

'Vindaloo' by Fat Les is a direct parody of the music video Bittersweet Symphony by The Verve. It is a story of one man versus the world as he walks down the street not caring and everyone seems to avoid him or hate upon his ways, the Fat Les version however includes added characters whom interact differently in mocking this main character whom was previously ignored. He is instead directly mocked in the video and isn't given respect which is a flip of the original intention of the character. 

Bittersweet Symphony

Vindaloo

Homage:

• Imitation from a respectful standpoint

An example of a homage music video is Lone Wolf 'Keep your eyes on the road' this music video is a homage to the music video for Pete Gabriel's Sledgehammer. Here are the two music videos. It is clear that this is a homage as the music video for Lone Wolf uses similar themes, such as the stop motion animation, to that of Sledgehammer but also brings in different themes into the video but in the same style as sledgehammer. This is what shows the video to be a homage and not a parody. The fact that the music video doesn't make fun of the original video it uses the themes and adapts them to make the music video.

Sledgehammer

Keep Your Eyes on the Road

Pastiche:

• An artistic work in a style that imitates that of another work, artist or parody.

'Californication' by Red Hot Chilli Peppers is a great example of Pastiche, imitating the style of a video game such as GTA and the music video carries this through the whole song as though the band members are characters of a game and are trying to reach a goal; it doesn't relate as much to the lyrics of the song yet has incorporated moments where both song and video join as one. With the top left being a constant live performance of the band members there is this connection to the rock genre they are meant to conform too.

Bricolage:

• Mixing up and using different genres and styles.

The most strongest example of bricolage I found in music videos was Vanilla Ice's 'Ice Ice Baby' created as an adaptation of Queen's 'Under Pressure' Where both the tune and style of the music however one has been created as a rock song being Queen and then the other has altered the idea to be a version of  rap style music with a mix of other genre's creating this bricolage.

Ice Ice Baby

Under Pressure

Frame by Frame

This is a frame by frame reconstruction of  C O O L by Le Youth. This was to boost my knowledge of frames within a music video and to see where my music video is going to have difficulties and where I will need to edit more so or where I can look at different shots to create a different atmosphere such as the black and white for a more seductive video as well as a flashback or a movement into the past.

The difficulty came when I was unable to recreate very well some of the shots, such as the water and speaker shot and have had to use the original frame and has meant it seems slightly out of place because of the better quality and slightly different background, just the clearer appearance. It goes to how that the shot types should be taken as closely together to make sure there is a theme which runs well throughout the music video otherwise it can mean clips or scenes can look out of place.

The use of the silhouette was difficult to replicate with the lighting and the best way to achieve it was to white wash a white background behind the character but reflection back into the room led to you still being able to see the person and not create the full silhouette.

I have found that planning for the frame by frame wasn't in depth enough to not face planning time in the actual  shooting of the video it means that the video took a lot longer to film, and if I'm going to be filming outside in the winter filming quickly might be quickly if I want to use the good weather when it's there. Another thing I have found in concerns of planning is that the different shots were more difficult to film than what we planned as I would say we were too ambition with the shots for the fact we didn't have the correct lighting to film complete silhouettes of people, instead we found creating a bright as possible backdrop was affective yet caused some reflection into the studio and made the person less black and white to the camera.

I have learnt that the planning is important to then organise filming better and to be able to know what shots need to be done when. The problems we faced has led me to believe that when planning my video I am going to organise to the worst case scenarios to allow it to run smoothly, maybe have multiple dates to do outside shots to get the right weather or make sure each shot is filmed to the right length we is something I found was a problem in editing.

Shot List For Frame by Frame

These are the shot frames i will be using to determine the different shots I will need to include in my frame by frame remake of C O O L by Le Youth. It allows me to determine the setting and different types of edit i will need to be doing before creating the video. Some shots may not be possible and might need to be taken from the video, such as the water drop scene which would of been taken with a slow motion camera.

College 'Urban Tribes'

These are a collection of 'Urban Tribes' seen around Weston College. This was to show how the different tribes are found everywhere and gives an idea of the variety of people and audiences a producer has to meet the expectations of, especially when choosing a target audience.

Maffesoli's 'Urban Tribe'

According to Maffesoli 'Urban Tribes' are micro groups of people who share common interests in urban areas. These small groups of people tend to have similar views on the world, dress sense and behaviour patterns. They also share a common interest in urban areas.

An example of Urban Tribes is 'Indie Scenesters' as shown below. These are famous for wanting to get the new music before it becomes popular and this becomes their life. Being in the leading edge group this is a very influential group right now and are affecting our cultural choices and are those types of people who want to get involved whether that be through music or another form of media.

The whole idea of personal classification into 5 main groups then splitting into sub-groups has been used by many producers to target a particular audiences taste and readings of media.

Main Groups:

• Mainstream
• alternative
• Leading edge
• Urban
• Aspirant

Sub-Group examples:

• Chavs
• Boy Racers
• Nerds
• Skaters
• Hipsters (the list goes on...)

I would think myself as a 'Boy Racer' because my life revolves around my car and everything to do with cars. Modding, Red-lining and bursting ear drums. As a boy racer I'm highly influenced with my attraction to Dubstep and electronic music. The whole culture is brought about over a love of cars and speed, its almost like a private club for fast car owners and yet is similar to that of a gang such as chavs or townies. This group isn't very apparent within society and yet people who follow this tribe are either loved or loathed by people outside of the group.

Different groups incorporate music in different ways. For 'Boy Racers' we tend to listen to our music through our cars either on a CD or through our USB sticks in our stereos. The louder the music the better and therefore it isn't necessarily the tune that is the centre of attention but where the sound is coming from i.e. the massive sub-woofer. 

Different music genres are linked to Urban Tribes and this is normally recognised within society. For example the 'Chavs' - Council house and are known for wearing tracksuits and consuming lots of alcohol. They would listen to rap/grime music. You will normally see them consuming this media by playing the music out loud on their mobile phones or loud while driving around in their cars. For example "Bassline Junkie" is a song by British rapper Dizzee Rascal the artist in the video represent the same 'Urban Tribe' by holding large speakers and rapping about the drugs culture in Britain.

An example of another Urban Tribe is the Metal Heads. Similar to Punks but a lot darker and violent in their manner. They are known for dressing mainly in black leather and Doc Martin boots and wearing lots of silver metal on their clothes.They would listen to heavy metal rock bands like Slipknot.Consuming their favourite music would probably be through using their headphones or at a Concert. A song associated with them would be "Psychosocial" which is a song by American metal band Slipknot and incorporates lots of guitar, screaming and pounding metal sounds. 

Another Urban Tribe is that of Goths, whom have traits within their very nature to act similar to eachother in that they have obsessions over death, violence and depressive moods and also an interest in Old Victorian attire and literature. They are very much associated with dark hair, dark make-up and dark clothes, usually with some kind of symbolic looking artefact either on their clothes or as an accessory. Tending to wear a lot of lace and victorian style attire. Often listenign to very dark music where it can either be high tempo such as screamo or a very slow and suicidal themed song in which usually involves death or something similar. Marilyn Manson is a big influence to this group and also an influence in fashion as well as music taste.

Stuart Hall's Audience Response Theory

Stuart Hall's Reception Theory says that media texts are encoded by the producer, meaning that there is lots of hidden messages that the producer has deliberately decided to incorporate into their work. However the text is then decoded by an audience and they will see the piece of media in a different way, not necessarily in the intended way it was meant to be seen.

According to Stuart Hall their are three different ways the audience will decode a text.

• Preferred Reading - How the producer wants the audience to view the media text.
• Oppositional Reading - When the audience thinks the opposite of the preferred reading and creates their own meaning of the text.
• Negotiated Reading - A middle ground between the two readings in which the audience accepts the producer's views, but incorporates their own views on parts as well.

He says that there are lots of different reasons why an audience will see a text differently and it is up to the producer to target the right people if they wish to gain one of these readings either for publicity or the fact they create an enjoyable piece of media. The different reasons could be because of age, culture, gender and even the mood in which the audience are in the time of watching the clip.

Steve Neale's Music Video Theory

Steve Neale's theory on genre. He believes that genres are instances of repition and difference, but difference is critical because repition would not create a large audience. He believes that the tradition in music videos are heterosexual. He says that females are only the subjects that can be viewed erotically and that women are often viewed as the erotic figure. Steve Neale also states that males have been viewed as more of a sexual icon since the 1980s both in film and music videos. However Neale says this is down to the genre and even saying that it is women who tend to have less clothes on than men in music videos to portray their sexual nature.

Music Video Comparison - Alternative Rock Genre

Alternative rock is a genre of rock music that came about from the independent music underground of the 1980s and became widely popular by the 1990s. Most commonly associated with distorted guitar sound, transgressive lyrics and nonchalant attitude. It's main descendant is from punk rock being this "out-there" style of rock.

Demons By Imagine Dragons

I really enjoyed this music video as it is so different from many other music videos created. It was designed to be a powerful thought provoking video of the stories of people who have suffered and the song is their relief from this suffering. The video released in May 2013 was dedicated to a young lad called Tyler who was fighting cancer at the time. It portrays multiple stories of the members of the crowd at a gig listening to the song, it shows how personal the song is to every individual and how it means something for everyone. The use close ups on the crowd members then to the flashbacks of their lives during each verse a new crowd member is shown which shows how widespread the message the song is portraying is.

The use of a crowd at a gig and the band all playing is classic of the rock genre and shows exactly what the bands genre is; and yet the song being so different changes the genre to that of an indie-rock as the normal genre conventions are too different to be just of the rock genre.

Not necessarily the beats of the music but the lyrics themselves are in time with when the shots change and it shows how the lyrics relate to whats being shown. For example the lyrics "I can't escape this now" is in the flashback of the soldier where he can't escape the moment and he must fight on and yet as the lyric finishes he is stood back in the audience as though the song has let him escape from the situation. 

I feel like a music video like this touches everyones heart. With making it personal and generic at the same time by choosing certain members of the crowds stories and situation it allows the audience to become personally affected by the lyrics as well as what is happening. It creates a powerful message which with the final scene of the lead singer looking into the camera emphasises the connection to the audience as though he is looking into you.

Sex on Fire by Kings of Leon

The video released in October 2009 was a big success with record sells for the alternative rock genre, I really like this video and song as it is different from many songs released at the time. It became really iconic of alternative rock at the time. 

The story follows that of the lead singer as he tries to deal with mental visions as he begins to wake from what looks like a nightmare. So when the music begins he is led down as it says in the lyrics "here where your laying" as though he is the person he is talking about. Whilst the guitar follows the transitions of shots and the drum beat follows the guitar so unlike most music videos it doesn't follow the beat but that of the change of guitar.

The use of many band shots and focus on the band members makes this video iconically rock based and this leads to an audience knowing that the genre is rock and yet the difference from the original genre conventions and how the song sounds leads to it being a alternative rock and this leads to the music video being changed in many ways and doesn't mean the video has to lead by any specific conventions.

The location of both the story and the live performance of the band is in the same place and this leads to a connection between the band and the song for the audience as the lyrics relate to whats happening in the story of this nightmare possessing him and the music is obviously played by the band but this being in the same place is as the the characters in the story are reacting to the song being played by the band. The similar lighting makes the connection obvious. 

Biblical By Biffy Clyro

This music video was released in March 2013. The song itself is a story of how the two sides of a person can always lead to destruction of himself. As he replays he life over and over again the same moment he still comes to the last conclusion of getting beaten up even though the first time he was being a rebel and breaking things then he was the caring person giving money to the receptionist etc. This is why the song was called biblical as though it is the two sides of Jesus, The disruptive rebel king who dissed authority and then the healing Jesus who gave money to the poor; either way he still got crucified. Such are the lyrics "baby if you could would you go back to the start".

There isn't any portrayal of the band itself and this means that it isn't obvious as part of the rock genre just by looking at the music video except the use of the chorus coming in with relation to what is happening in the music video such as when he rips open the curtains and the moment where he smashes the window are all in time with the chorus and the drumbeat so the audience automatically relates this to the video.

Analysed Music Video

I will be analysing a music video based on Andrew Goodwin's theory on music videos, from his book 'Dancing in the Distraction Factory' (1992). He identifies a number of key features which distinguish the music video as a form:

-There is a relationship between the lyrics and the visuals (with visuals either illustrating, amplifying or contradicting the lyrics)

-There is a relationship between the music and the visuals (again visuals either illustrate, amplify or contradict the music)

 -Particular genres may have their own music video style and iconography

-There will be a demand on the part of the record company for a lot of close-ups of the main artist or vocalist.

-There is likely to be reference to voyeurism including systems of looking (screens within screens,binoculars,cameras etc.)

-There are likely to be intertextual references, either to other music videos or to films and TV texts.

I have looked at the music video Counting Stars by OneRepublic (C) 2013 and compared the music video in terms of Andrew Goodwin's theories on music videos.

The music video being of an indie/rock genre won't completely compare with the theories of Goodwin as they are usually out of the norm of other genres. For example the narrative itself doesn't follow the lyrics themselves except the actions of the characters do follow the beat of the music by stamping there feet and clapping at the same beat of the music. Ryan Tedder the lead singer's dance moves during the video relates to the lyrics as well, where it says "I feel the love and I feel it burn, down this river every time", he makes the action of a running river towards the camera.

The band members themselves are a key focus during the music video being a separate narrative to the storyline. Especially when the main acoustic part is played the guitarist himself is important in a number of closeups and panning shots.

There aren't many signs of voyeurism within this music video as this is usually associated with a pop genre whom tend to portray stereotypical visuals and compare better to Goodwin's theory than the indie genre. However the clothing they are wearing is a typical aspect of their genre which has replaced voyeurism which is instead typical to the pop culture. With bracelets and chains and grunge clothing they are of an obvious genre matched up with their instruments.

Many of the camera shots are similar to other music videos of OneRepublic especially that of when Ryan Tedder is sat on his own in an abandoned room singer the lyrics of the song. The pose is used in many of their music videos such as Stop and Stare (C) 2008 

Researching the Theorists

Andrew Goodwin's Theory

The visual aspects of the music video either amplifies, illustrates or contradicts the lyrics of said music video.

Each genre often has their own music style for the audience to remember and relate to the music also known as iconography. An example of this is certain types of clothes the characters in the music video are wearing, such as a rock band would wear clothes associating to their genre.

The singer/band sometimes design their own identity through iconography such as LMFAO with the introduction of box man whom appears in all their music videos. So an audience will see this and instantly be able to relate to that genre and artist.

The use of shots to create important objects/people for certain symbolism and Goodwin believed this was important to a good music video and the use of close ups in particular should be used.

The Concept of Voyeurism 

Voyeurism is the act of watching people with/without their knowledge. Its usually shown in music videos with intimate behaviour, undressing or sexual activity.

Carol Vernallis Theory

The theory focuses on the 4 main concepts that gives an account to the way a music video is constructed. This consists of: camera, movement and framing, diegesis, editing and narrative.

She states for camera movement and framing that extreme shots are the most common to use. The style of framing and movement can constantly run through and the video is distinctive to that video. The motion of the camera might be in time with the music and also with the lyrics.

She says diegesis may be revealed quite slowly. Actions are not necessarily finished. The motion of character or object might be in time with the music. Some of the frames may be more important to the audience than others in understanding of the narrative or events. There may be lots of repetition to highlight specific important ideas or key events.

She explains that the narrative of a video is a visual response to the music. There is not really a balance between narrative and performance. The narrative may not always be complete and an audience led to fill in the gaps of the unknown. More often than not it is the music which pushes the narrative forward and there may not be a noticeable closure because of this and the music itself may look for answers or pose questions for the audience and this leads to a disjointed narrative within the video.