Andrew Goodwin's Theory

Andrew Goodwin feels that traditional narrative analyses don’t apply to pop videos.  There are many reasons for this; one reason is that they approach narrative from a different angle to novels and films.  One reason for the different narrative structures are that pop videos are built around songs and often songs do not pose traditional narrative structures.  Another reason is that the pop video uses the singer both as narrator and a character.  The last reason, the singer often looks directly at the camera; this type of performance tries to involve the viewer at home with the performance.

Often the video repeats images in the way the song repeats choruses and lines. The video would be played on TV, the song would be played on the radio and there might be an advertising film making the song very familiar through repetition.

Videos might be promoting other merchandises such as films. Therefore it can be said that there are three types of associations between songs and videos.  These are illustration, amplification and disjuncture.

Illustration is where the video tells the story of the lyric.  Dance is often used to express the feelings and moods of the song.   Katy Perry literally tells the story of her lyrics through her video, being very illustrative and giving the viewers a clear idea of what she is trying to express with the audience.

Amplification occurs when the videos present new meanings that do not oppose with the lyrics but add layers of meaning. Eminem adds layers of meaning to this video, contradicting with the lyrics, and still narrating a story.

Disjuncture is where there is little association between lyric and video or where the video opposes the lyric,

The video below is a disjuncture video, I’m Not Alone by Calvin Harris as a storyline which has no resemblance to the lyrics within the song at all, and is based around a choreographed dance typical of the electro/pop genre of Calvin Harris.

Pop videos usually have very familiar features.  An example of this is when Michael Jackson used to give a noticeable twirl in his videos. Another feature is the way woman are presented as objects and male desire.  This is mostly true in hip hop videos. Such artists such as Beyoncé and Rihanna deliberately present themselves for males to look at but what is different in their videos is that they directly look back at the viewers through the camera and they cease to be passive.