Styles of Music Video

Narrative Based

Narrative based music videos emulate a storyline. The artist can feature in the story but that isn't always the case. This style of music video is often used in the pop genre to tell a romantic story, for example Sam Smith's 'I'm Not The Only One'. Sam Smith doesn't take part in the story and uses actors to perform instead.




On the other hand, there some artists that will feature in the narrative such as Taylor Swift in 'Wildest Dreams'

  


Cinematic

Cinematic music videos have high production values and feature a storyline liked the narrative based music videos. The main difference in that the cinematic music videos provide a 'film styled' quality to it. An example of this is Ed Sheeran's 'A Team'




Performance Based

Performance based videos focus mainly on filming a performance styled music video which normally include some sort of stage and crowd, An example of this would be the Red Hot Chili Peppers' 'Californication'.




Animation

Animation music videos use either digital or stop motion animation instead of real life footage. The Cribs' entire music video for mirror kissers uses animation as a background with use of a green screen. Although this method is time consuming it allows the artist to create effects that may not have been possible, especially on a small budget.




Pastiche

Pastiches are based on features from another genre/time frame. Unlike parodies, pastiches do not insult the texts. Madonna's 'Vogue' uses influence from the latter 20th century craze over fashion.





As live

The 'As live' styled music videos contain concert footage to make it seem as if the entire music video was filmed live. An example of this would be Muse's 'Follow Me' as it shows them walking on stage and performing.

   

Parody

Parody musc videos mock another artist's song. An example of a parody is Hot Chip's 'I Feel Better' which mocks the typical boy band whilst fan girls scream and cry over them in the video.

    

Intertextuality

Intertextuality music videos refer to other existing texts. An example of this is Katy Perry's 'Last Friday Night' as they include credits at the start and end to give it the film effect. Also the characters wear 80's clothes and they use 'friendplace' instead of 'facebook' to socialise.

 

 Concept

This is a style of music video that is based around a concept or an idea. They tend to be rather unique/utilise a particular editing or film technique. An example of a contextual music video is the Foo Fighters' 'Best of You'.