How to Analyse a Music Video

Andrew Goodwin writing in 'Dancing in the Distraction Factory' (Routledge 1992).

1. Music videos demonstrate genre characteristics (e.g. stage performance in metal video, dance routine for a boy/girl band).
2. There is a relationship between lyrics and visuals (either illustrative, amplifying, condtradicting).
3. There is a relationship between music and visuals (either illustrative, amplifying, condtradicting).
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 (a visual style).
5. There is frequently reference to notion of looking (screen within screens, telescopes etc.) and particularly voyeuristic treatment of the female body.
6. There is often intertextual reference (to films, television programmes, other music videos etc.)