In this week of reading, “telling and not telling”, written by Varnallis, talks over about the different aspects of music storytelling. As she mentions about the different styles, there are narrative and non-narrative music videos in the current music video industry. According to Varnallis(2004), ‘A short form with few words, a music video must fill competing demands of showcasing the star, reflecting the lyrics, and underscoring the music.’ She reckons that the reason of music videos can not be like the style of film production is the initial propose of music video is to catch the audience’s attention effectively within a few minutes. Hence, music videos focuses more on emphasising the color, exaggerated acting and the interaction with the music.
In some ways, we can say films are mainly constructed with “story“ lines and the music soundtracks are just like playing a role of “assisting” the movie. Conversely, music video’s main story line is about the “music” itself, visual motions are being the role of “assistant”. As a result, the music video producers are expected to find the balance between the music and video, so that the story does not overtake the music itself.
The music video “Yellow”, written by Rich Brian, video directed by Dave Meyers, is an amazing example of the balance between narrative and non-narrative music video. The video has become to a higher level of combination between the sense of art movie and expression of the song. Also, the scene and music both bring a several of implications to audience. With the ups and downs of melody and lyrics, video is interacting with the character’s acting. By this way, it has successfully impressed the audience through emphasising the expression of actor and unique melody. In term of the technique in the music video, the director use montage naturally with non-linear editing in this video to make the scene does not look strange or out of tone. At the same time, the audience can piece their own understanding with fragmentary motion pictures. Hence, people will not be judging the story line is incomplete story.
References:
Varnallis, C 2004, “Experiencing Music Video: Aesthetics and Cultural Context”, Columbia university press, pp 3-26