Music Video

Analysis

Goodwin’s Theory - What to look for:1. Music videos demonstrate genre characteristics (e.g. Stage performances in metal videos, dance routines for boy/girl bands)

2. There is a relationship between the lyrics and the visuals (Either illustrative, amplifying or contradicting)

3. There is a relationship between the music and the visuals (Either illustrative, amplifying or contradicting)

4. The demands of the record label will include the need for lots of close-ups of the artist and the artist may develop motifs which recur across their work (e.g. A visual style)

5. There are frequent references to the notion of looking (screens within screens, telescopes, etc) and particularly voyeuristic (sexual) treatment of the female body

6. There is often intertextual references (to films, TV programmes, other music videos, etc)

7. Whether the video is primarily performance-based, narrative-based or concept-based and how element of each is used in it

Kasabian - Stevie Stevie is a song by Kasabian, a UK rock group which was formed in the year 1997. The song was released in November 7th 2014 as a part of their latest album “48:13”. The rock group have done numerous songs for the rock genre, other songs performed by the group are classics such as Fire, Underdog, Club Foot and Where did all the love go? They have been also heavily involved with the english Premiere League, and even the popular football game FIFA.

The Video/NarrativeThe video opens and ends with the same frame of a red light which appears to be emitting from an observation room, as we might see as we watch the video. Then the video really starts as we get the first sights of what we assume to be the character who is mentioned in the song ‘Stevie’. We first see him as a baby, this is of course establishing the narrative of the video and is showing us that Stevie has been here for his whole life. Before the lyrics kick in we get a very quick montage of Stevie growing up to the age we see him for most of the video which from an estimate appears to be around 10 years old, maybe a little bit older.

Most of the video is Stevie being tested on, with tense moments such as a gun being shot through him, and having a hammer hit hard at his knee cap while he feels nothing, being shown at the chorus of the song, which fits perfectly, as the chorus sounds very tense.

Throughout the video, however, we see Stevie growing more and more curious of his situation and what is beyond the walls of his living quarters. Towards the climax and even ending of the song Stevie becomes less obedient and eventually makes his escape, where we see the first minute or so of his first steps of the ‘real world’.

Genre Characteristics1. Music videos demonstrate genre characteristics (e.g. Stage performances in metal videos, dance routines for boy/girl bands).Rock songs I’ve found have a usual convention of not making a lot of sense, and are really out of context. You usually have to look quite deep to get their actual meaning, unlike most modern pop songs which follow a very typical setting and narrative. Stevie however has quite a simple narrative, and follows the lyrics closely. A typical rock music video trend, is the constant and consistent cuts to the band performing the song. Even in videos with a narrative such as this one, there is usually some sort of display of the band performing their song. Stevie, however does not conform to this usual characteristic, and focuses entirely on the story which the video is trying to tell. Which brings us to the narrative. Most rock songs have a narrative of some sorts, some even don’t make much sense to the lyrics, at least not at first glance. Stevie, however is very straightforward and sticks very closely to the lyrics. As the song progresses we can sense that ‘Stevie’, our character, is getting more and more frustrated at his surroundings and is getting “sick and tired of this”. Some other rock songs do however sometimes stick closely to the lyrics and have a very straight forward video, however I think Stevie is a very literal video.

2. There is a relationship between the lyrics and the visuals (Either illustrative, amplifying or contradicting).As I mentioned in the previous slide, Stevie is a very literal video, as it sticks very closely to the lyrics with the visuals. For example, as the band sing “I’m sick and tired of this”. We have a repeated number of shots of the routine we’ve been watching for almost the entire video so far to remind us of the boring and constant routine before Stevie disobeys the standard procedures as he grows more and more curious. Another example would be “Watching too much TV”, while the camera pans in onto what looks like a few CCTV cameras. This also makes a lot of sense to the narrative.Overall, the song sticks very close to the lyrics, and there doesn’t seem to be any obvious scenes which don’t relate to the lyrics in any way. Every scene has some sort of significance to what is being sung by the band, which helps to drive the narrative of the video forward.

Relationship Between Lyrics and Visuals

3. There is a relationship between the music and the visuals (Either illustrative, amplifying or contradicting).Stevie has some parts in which the music follows the visuals on the screen. Some barely noticeable ones might be the how the song starts of quite slow, with slower camera movements, pans and very long scenes before any sort of cuts. Towards the end of the song, and even the chorus the song picks up and the video tries to match this with more tense and somewhat more epic scenes.There are also some very more noticeable thought beats in the video. I managed to notice quite a few upon watching the video. One of the very noticeable thought beats in the video would be the large red observer box which overwatches all of the tests which occur in the room. One of the first time we notice the box, it is flickering on to the beat, matching the sound of the guitar almost perfectly. Another could be the first time the drums kick in the footsteps of the kid as he walks on the treadmill appear to match their beat for some time.

Relationship Between Music and Visuals

4. The demands of the record label will include the need for lots of close-ups of the artist and the artist may develop motifs which recur across their work (e.g. A visual style) As I’ve already mentioned, unlike most rock music videos and other videos in general, Stevie features no sign of the artist in the video. This is a somewhat unique touch to the video, as it allows us to focus solely on the story and the narrative which is being told through the visuals and in many cases the lyrics. Other Kasabian songs, I have noticed, do show the artist(s), mainly the lead singer and guitarist of the band, conforming to the usual and expected norms of a music video. Stevie however confronts those norms and instead focuses entirely on the narrative. This can often happen if a famous director was hired to shoot the video, as they often try to make their mark in the short amount of time they have. Ninian Doff, the director of Stevie, is a lesser known director though. Although, he has directed quite a few other music videos before.

Close Ups of the Artist(s)

5. There are frequent references to the notion of looking (screens within screens, telescopes, etc) and particularly voyeuristic (sexual) treatment of the female body.Though there are actually no females which appear in the video, we do still get the notion of looking within this video. The entire video is based on what appears to be a government project. We seem to be looking from the side, watching the life of the kid who appears in the video go by in three minutes. The entire thing almost feels like we’re watching CCTV footage of the experiments and various. Even at points we feel like we are one of the observers which are watching over and overseeing the various experiments which are conducted on the child presented in the video. The large observer box, various CCTV cameras and entire setting of the video suggests that we are looking in on ‘Stevie’, and he has no real idea of it.

The Notion of Looking

6. There is often intertextual references (to films, TV programmes, other music videos, etc).From what I can tell, Stevie doesn’t have any obvious intertextual references. From what I could gather the video doesn’t go out of its way to reference anything, and although parts might have been inspired from certain other media products I don’t think the video references anything in particular. The band had mentioned how the lyrics were inspired by the artist Carrie Reichardt, nothing in the video specifically references the artist, as far as I can tell.This is probably due to the director wanting to focus entirely on the story, and there really was no need for any references to anything at any point in the video. Since he felt the need to leave out the band it is quite plausible that any sort of references were left out, unintentional, or very well hidden to not distract the audience from the narrative.

Intertextual References

7. Whether the video is primarily performance-based, narrative-based or concept-based and how element of each is used in it.As I have mentioned multiple times before, this video was almost entirely narrative based. And although there was no performance of the band shown in any form, I feel like the narrative definitely centres around the concept of being told what to do every day of your life. The narrative and lyrics both suggest this, and eventually the kid in the video gets sick of being told what to do and sets out to escape and become his own person. I feel like what the video is trying to tell us is not to be told what to do, and to not be “stuck under someone’s thumb”. This concept I feel is what the narrative of the video is trying to tell us, therefore making the video equally based on a concept as it is around the narrative.

Performance, Narrative, or Concept