So I've decided to just bulk out the research portion of this blog, as I didn't feel like I did enough music video analysis when I was researching the different forms of music videos. So I'm going to do a few posts on different music videos, just to get my head around some of the genres and styles of music video that I didn't research well enough. The first example of this is 'Jeremy' by Pearl Jam as it's a metal song, and I didn't analyse a metal video, so have no idea what they looked like before analysing this video!
So, firstly the camerawork. The camerawork overall is very steady, and tends to be very snappy shots of just a few seconds. However, there are a lot of tilted shots, implying that reality is off balance and the tilt represents the break in normality. This is particularly evident when there are close-up shots of the lead singer performing, which is inter-cut with conceptual shots of the story being played out in the song. When there are shots of the lead singer, he is sitting down and performing directly to the camera.
However, his shots are always tilted, leading the audience to believe that he is not in 'reality' but in some other world. Overall, a lot of the shots are tilted, as the story is quite shocking, so the shots are tilted and at extreme angles to reflect that.
Also a lot of the shots have extreme colour editing. The majority of shots that have the narrative played out in them and involving the boy in the story, (Jeremy), have extreme reds or blues, showing that it is hyperreality and that the boy is being very effected by the entire situation and that we are being shown this. At the beginning, there are a lot of shots of newspapers displaying quick headlines and shots that are displaying messages etc. This is to show the audience the different points of the story and to relate the hectic narrative to the audience.
Next the lighting. As I mentioned, a lot of the colour editing is very extreme, and there are a lot of reds and blues being shown through the shots. This doesn't really save a lot of room for lighting, however, when the shots of the narrative are being played out, a lot of the shots are very washed out, giving the shots a very white look and making the shots very bright. This is very contrasting to the shots of the lead singer performing, as they are very dark with a dark red background. This gives connotations of hell and satanic references, as the facial expressions that the singer is doing along with the lack of light, gives an overall impression of hell and the devil. I think that the two lighting states contrast because they wanted to show a clear difference between the two 'worlds' and that the story world where the Jeremy story is being acted is a binary opposite of that to the 'performance world'.
Editing. The editing is extremely fast throughout, only slowing to focus on the lead singer when he performs which is one of Goodwin's six theories in music videoes. It allows lots of shots of the lead singer in the video to keep up the hype and to promote the actual band through the video. There are lots and lots of jump cuts throughout the video, and because the Jeremy story is being told through a series of flashing bright images, we are slightly unsure of the story and become increasingly unsettled at times. The jump cuts are very evident at the beginning of the video when there are lots of shots of newspaper headlines and bible verse nunmbers etc. These are very VERY fast, and are shown two or three times, so that the audience remembers certain phrases that also set up the beginning of the narrative. This is extremely helpful for the audience as it sets the story and the background, but also sets the mood and the feeling of the music video.
Mise-en-scene: Costume. The lead singer is wearing distinctly normal clothes and we are made to focus more on his face and his expressions rather than his clothes, and I am not entirely sure what he is wearing! However, the Jeremy character flits between two states of costume. The first being in a white shirt and black trousers which we associate with being a school uniform, implying that he is a schoolchild. This is particularly evident when he is in a room full of boys and girls that are wearing very similar to him, and we immediately associate them to being in a classroom. The second, and more prominent of his costume is when he wears grey trousers and no top. This implies that he is in a frantic state and is so stressed that he is not even dressing properly. This is evident when he enters the classroom wearing his second costume, as we know that he is having bizarre thoughts etc.
Another point on costume that I thought was particularly prominent was the end shots of the shoolchildren when they are wearing bland school costumes that are spattered with blood as the Jeremy character has shot himself. This is implied as the characters are shielding their hands to keep the blood away from them, but also it is shown through the bright red blood stains on their very bland white and grey costumes. The red sticks out very prominently to the audience and is very poignant, as it is the image that the audience is left with.
Setting and props. There are three main locations that were recurring throughout the video. The first of these is that of the performance space where the lead singer is performing directly the to camera. This setting is incredibly dark and quite dark and eerie. This puts the audience at unease as they are used to the singer being in light spaces and being seen, however, the themes of this song are not exactly light so the space is reflected as this and is incredibly dark. The second of these poignant locations, is that of the forest. It is one of the first shots that we see the Jeremy character and we can clearly see that is the outlet for all of his frustration.
This is shown through the paintings that we see and the paintings that he is making. These are frantic and have shocking images on them, which is quite scary as the editing is very quick, so we only get flashing images of the pictures. This setting is also quite creepy as a lot of horror films are set in forests, and so we immediately associate being alone in a forest with a horror film and start to feel at unease and spooked!
This is a contrast to the third setting which is the one in the classroom. We are shown that this is a classroom by the monotonous desk environment and the school uniforms. However, the only thing that is out of place in the classroom is the frantic acting of Jeremy as he draws his pictures etc. This classroom is easily recognisable throughout and offers some kind of comfort for the audience as it is a location that we keep coming back to throughout the video. It also uses another of goodwin's six, the fact that music is going along with lyrics. 'Jeremy spoke in class today', and there are frequent shots of him being in class, and the end shot is of course him speaking in class.
One of the particular moments in this video that has stuck with me after watching this video was that of the shot where all the schoolkids are doing the 'heil hitler' sign. This was after seeing them doing a shot of them all doing the pledge of Allegiance, which is veery patriotic. I was very shocked by this shot as I wasn't expecting it, and it was a load of children!! However, it made me pause the video and go back to that section several times, which meant that I had shown interest in the video and wanted to see it more.
I thoroughly enjoyed this video and thought that it was very interesting. There were a lot of references to other cultures and worlds which made it very good to watch as I was trying to make a lot of connections throughout. I really liked the way that the story was told because it was all very choppy and hard to follow to the story so you have to be attentive when you're watching, which is challenging the audience to actually crtically view the video and think about it rather than passively viewing it. Overall, I was very impressed with this video! :)
Here's the video:
Thank you! More to follow :)
