History Of The Music Video

In the 30-40’s TV was introduced to the masses, and quickly became one of the most popular forms of entertainment. An idea was put forward to combine music and moving images, and as a result the ‘Soundie’ was invented, a simple machine that displayed the Artist miming the music on-screen. It was also around this time that the ‘rise of the teenager’ was taking place, as the youth were becoming increasingly rebellious and defiant. Elvis began to perform music in feature films, which combined music and narrative. The concoction was an instant hit, and spawned an influx of ‘Music video’ style films, such as The Beatles’ ‘Hard Days Night) in 1964 and The Monkees fictional TV band.



As the 1970’s began, concert films began to replace the youth orientated movies. Concert films followed a structure of sequencing between performances and interviews, such as The Rolling Stones’ ‘Gimme Shelter’ in 1971. Then, suddenly, the genre hit a turning point with the release of ‘Bohemian Rhapsody’ by Queen.



One of the first ‘proper’ music videos, it used a theme of floating, miming heads, intertwined with clips of Queen performing. Music video popularity snowballed, and the release of MTV in 1981 concreted its place in modern media and established the conventions of pop promo’s. MTV was released in the UK in 1984, and by 1985 had 18 million viewers. The genre peaked with the release of Michael Jackson’s ‘Thriller’ video, which lasted for 14 minutes, making it as much a short film as it is a music video.

Music Video Analysis:

The Prodigy (Feat Pendulum) - Voodoo People



The images are cut to the beat of the song, and contain a huge amount of perfomance. The plot is more to the theme of a film than a music video, as it does not contain the band or anything along the lines of lip syncing. The shots are fast and furious, and contribute to the reckless reputation of the band. It is 3 minutes in length, and does not use gender roles or sexual identity (unless you count the higher proportion of male observers).

By Daniel Barrell