'LDN' by Lilly Allen
Above we have the music video for Lilly Allen's song 'LDN' and although this music video is actually very mundane itself, it is also very exciting and lively. The video starts with Allen on the phone to someone and then when the song starts, a shot of a very grey and dirty-looking street is shown on screen. However, when Allen steps out of the shop front, a burst of colour magically appears and everything suddenly becomes joyous and lively. This shot is shown in the GIF below:
This burst of colour catches the audience's attention and shows the music video as not just a boringly ordinary video as the original shot suggests, but instead shows it as something exciting and different, making it more extraordinary.
As well as this, throughout the music video there are smaller shots which focus on an object on the ground that Allen passes as she skips/walks along, including shots such as these:
Here you can see a key example of how this music video makes the ordinary extraordinary. As Allen walks along in the music video, she brings a bright wave of colour and excitement with her but as soon as she passes it, everything goes back to being its mundane, normal self. For instance, the top left photo shows a pink sweet on a bright pavement, but the next shot then reveals it just to be a cigarette butt on a boring, grey pavement. This subverts everyday normal life into something new and fun.
Above we have another GIF which shows a part of the music video in which Allen walks past some business-like men having lunch on a bed but as soon as she passes them, the shot returns to grey and reveals them to look like homeless people, providing a strong juxtaposition in the video as a whole. Once again, this is an example of making the ordinary extraordinary by essentially adding a layer of fantasy to everyday life, only for it then to be revealed that everything is still the same and still very mundane.
However, as well as this music video being an example of making the ordinary extraordinary, it also links to the lyrics of the song. For example, for the clip just above, as Allen walks through the park the lyrics say "There were people from the city having lunch in the park" and indeed, there are people sitting on the park bench having lunch. This is a very normal and ordinary thing to do but as Allen passes them, the vibrant colours disappear and the people turn to grey and look very dull and miserable, adding a touch of extraordinary to make it a more exciting watch for the audience.
Another example of a music video that succeeds in making the ordinary extraordinary is 'Hello' by Dragonette and Martin Solveig:
Above you can watch the music video for 'Hello'. The narrative of this video simply follows a tennis match between two opponents but despite its ordinariness, it is very fun and lively video that interests and intrigues the audience. One way in which it does this is by matching the mood of the song. The song itself falls into the category of electronic pop and is a very dance/club-like song which encourages people to dance and move to it. The video further encourages this by matching parts of the video to the changing beat of the song, for example:
This part comes at the beginning of the music video and during the start of this clip when Sinclair (playing the character of Solveig's tennis opponent) is preparing to start the match and bouncing the tennis ball on the ground, the song is gradually building up in the background, becoming faster and faster until the lyric 'hello' is sung, and as this lyric is sung and the beat of the song drops, Sinclair bats the tennis ball in the air. This matches the beat of the song to the actions of the characters within the music video itself, making it exciting for the audience to watch.
Another key part of the video which does this comes during the middle:
The clip above shows the most fast-pace and exciting part of the music video for this song. Here there is a variety of different shots which cut very quickly from one to the other, making it very fast-paced. Every shot follows the beat of the song and when every beat drops or ends, the next shot appears on screen. During this part of the video, all that is happening, however, is two men playing tennis. It is a rather ordinary thing and there does not originally seem to be anything very special about it. However, it is parts of the video like these that grab the audience's attention and make it a much more interesting thing for them to watch.
Additionally, this music video also succeeds in making the ordinary extraordinary through its use of characters. For instance, during the video different characters are shown on screen and their name/role appears beside them, e.g:
- Sinclair is the villain of the narrative
- Solveig is the hero.
- 'She' is the princess who later betrays the hero (Solveig).
These characters significantly add to the narrative of the video which, without this, would just simply be about a tennis match between two opponents. However, by using Propp's theory, the music video is much more interesting for the audience to watch and this adds to the effect of making something ordinary into extraordinary.
From this, what I have learnt is that our music video does not need to be hugely complex by having a heavily detailed narrative or lots of different things happening in lots of different places. It can be relatively simple but can do extra things that make it much more exciting and exhilarating. This can include editing tricks such as matching shots and their timings to the beat of the song, such as in 'Hello' or by having our artist in our music video do something rather simplistic and mundane, but have them do it in a certain style, such as with lots of colour like Lilly Allen's 'LDN' video. What this will do is give our music video an added layer to make it more exhilarating and fun for our audience to watch.
I hope you found my analysis and research interesting and thanks for reading! Come by again soon!
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