Music Videos Like Most Things to Do with Pop Music, the Video Clip (Arguably) Begins with the Beatles

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Music videos Like most things to do with pop music, the video clip (arguably) begins with the Beatles. Tired of touring, the Fab Four came up with the brilliant idea of making short films to promote their new songs. Since then, the music video has become an art form in its own right. As we’re all locked up again in front of our screens, we’ve put together a collection of some all-time greats suitable for sharing with students or cabin-bound children.

Get animated Stephen R. Johnson who had previously much plundered, but was informed by the Music and animation used stop-motion lip-synching on the ready availability of Super-8 film cameras, have been entwined Talking Heads video for Road To Nowhere. allowing ordinary folk to make their own since the early days of Sledgehammer’s influence can be traced short films for the first time. cinema – Disney’s Silly to the present day – notably in Gotye’s 2011 Likewise, Queen’s Bohemian Symphonies shorts often clip for Somebody That I Used To Know Rhapsody and David Bowie’s Ashes to using an orchestra in place and the Lego-built clip for Fell In Love With Ashes employed new video technology of a narrator (The OId Mill A Girl by The White Stripes. and effects to create colourful TV-sized being a standout example). Norwegian group A-Ha’s 1985 hit Take spectacles – the latter remaining one of the The Beatles’ first forays into On Me sports an equally impressive mix most expensive video clips of all time, the cinema (A Hard Day’s Night of live action and rotoscoped animation (a former knocked off quickly in a trailer, mid- and Help!) set a template many technique in which animators trace over tour. A decade later, Weezer’s Buddy Holly bands would follow, but 1969’s movie footage, frame by frame). The comic blended cutting-edge tech with nostalgia animated Yellow Submarine book style drawings took four months to to put themselves inside 70s sitcom Happy established the inventiveness complete, but ensured the single became Days – a feat so impressive that many and dream-logic that would a worldwide smash – having failed to dent assumed director Spike Jonze had used characterise the genre. By the charts when it was first released a year nascent computer trickery, rather than the 1980s – a golden age earlier. Paula Abdul’s Opposites Attract – clever editing and body doubles. for music videos as high influenced in equal parts by Who Framed Controversial pop king Michael revenues collided with an Roger Rabbit and Gene Kelly’s Anchors Jackson had a long history of employing expanded cable TV market – Away – took a slightly different approach to new technology and clever effects in his artists were experimenting with a mix rotoscoping, with Disney animators drawing films – the 1991 clip for Black and White of animation and live action that would over dance moves performed in front of a being one of the first to employ the have astounded the early surrealists. blue screen. digital morphing technique used in big Peter Gabriel’s Sledgehammer is a screen blockbuster Terminator 2 just a few masterpiece of claymation, pixilation, Groundbreaking months later. But it was his earlier clips, and stop-motion animation. Painstakingly Music videos have consistently stolen most notably Thriller, that left the greatest assembled by a team including future from other art forms and influenced them impact on the zeitgeist. His tongue-in- Wallace and Gromit creator in turn. Bob Dylan’s simple Subterranean cheek zombie dance movie was such an Nick Park, the 1986 film Homesick Blues has been event that it earned its own release for the was was directed by fast-expanding video rental market.

N20v26i3_32-33.indd 32 14/8/20 4:39 pm Madonna’s Like A Prayer employed a similar alt-J’s narrative-in-reverse clip to jaunty cinematic approach, with added Jesus- Breezeblocks borrows heavily from baiting controversy. Christopher Nolan’s Memento, while By 2006, small was big again. OK Go’s Childish Gambino’s Telegraph Ave Here it Goes Again was impressive for (‘Oakland’ By Lloyd) has a twist ending its low-budget aesthetic, reflecting the worthy of David Cronenberg (not suitable And just for fun... increasing popularity of YouTube and its for younger kids). But the collision of Queen – I Want to Break Free homespun filmmaking (and plummeting arthouse and music video is probably best OutKast – Hey Ya music revenues). In a single take, the band expressed by the films made for Radiohead The Avalanches – Frontier perform an elaborately choreographed – Just, Karma Police and Paranoid Android Psychiatrist routine across several treadmills. all have stories so strange or engrossing Spice Girls – Wannabe that it’s easy to forget to listen to the music. Pulp – Bad Cover Version Storytelling Beastie Boys – Sabotage Given the constant exchange of ideas and Dance to this Cyndi Lauper – Girls Just inspiration, it’s unsurprising that music There’s a fun little tale to Sophie Ellis- Wanna Have Fun videos often ape the narrative conventions Bextor’s Murder on the Dancefloor, but TLC – Waterfalls of their cinematic counterparts by telling it’s equally memorable for its footwork Beyonce – Single three-minute stories often tenuously (Ellis-Bextor has been a lockdown star Ladies connected to the song. On the more literal for kids with her weekly kitchen discos). Blur – Coffee & TV side, there’s Taylor Swift’s sweet tale of Dancing is, unsurprisingly, a major B-52s – Rock star-crossed lovers separated by a garden feature of many a video – often inspiring Lobster fence (and his more popular girlfriend) in copycat performances on the disco floor You Belong With Me. At the other end of (Madonna’s Vogue leaps to mind). While romance, Gwen Stefani’s Cool takes an the pyrotechnic dancing of Beyonce’s uber-glamorous approach to its tale of love extraordinary Formation or Christopher lost and friendship won. Moving back a Walken in Fatboy Slim’s Weapon of Choice decade, Shakespears Sister’s Stay offers a might seem beyond the reach of mere camp if spooky spin on the love triangle, as mortals, there is something appealingly the duo (respectively dressed as mourning accessible about Robyn’s Call Your lover and Death herself) wrestle over the Girlfriend, a one-take effort that feels all prone body of a hunk on life support. Tragic the more heartfelt for its rough, improvised romance is also the story of U2’s All I Want aesthetic. The early promos for Kate Bush Is You, a moody sepia tale of unrequited tracks Wuthering Heights and Babooshka love at the circus, owing more than a little to have a similar, idiosyncratic quality, most Wim Wenders’ Wings of Desire. notably the former, in which Bush flounces The link between arthouse cinema around a lonely field. Halfway between and music video is a strong one. R.E.M.’s field flouncing and big-budget Beyonce is Everybody Hurts, which subtitles the Bjork’s iconic and colourful clip for It’s Oh innermost thoughts of drivers stuck in So Quiet, which fuses urban grime and a traffic jam, feels equally inspired by Hollywood musical fantasy in a way Wenders’ films and American indie that would make Jacques Demy directors such as Hal Hartley. proud.

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