Music Video Regulation

Music video regulation is controlled by the BBFC (The British Board of Film Classification). Their job is to provide controversial music videos, films and any other forms of media that the public can access with age limitations if they are deemed unsuitable for the younger generation.

YouTube work closely with this system and have began to regulate videos that are being posted to their site. This means that it can refuse the audience access to the video if it categorised as inappropriate for viewing, only individuals of the age 18 and over will be able to access this content. However, videos as such can be uploaded from unofficial YouTube pages and provide audience with the content that they are unable to access firstly.

An issue with regulation is that is not always secure in protecting audiences from being exposed to controversial media as it difficult to maintain full control and on what is being shown and what isn't. Due to independent journalism, people can create a wide range of different platforms for their media, and post the content that is unavailable to other types of audiences. If it is continuously removed, then they can simply upload it to a different platform for other people to access. Age restrictions have been put in place on social media to prevent younger generation gaining access to unsuitable media, however this never always protects them. Many children that use the internet these days are very smart at figuring out how computers work, and many can fake their own age to access particular media. Without ID'ing every single person that uses the internet (which is a lot!) then organisations such as the BBFC, cannot regulate media too thoroughly.

To put it into context, the BBFC regulated the controversial music video by Robin Thicke 'Blurred Lines'. The 'dirty' video which contained a lot of explicit images in it, was age restricted and in many cases banned from the internet, and therefore they had to create a much cleaner version of the video which was suitable enough to be posed for all audiences to view.

Music Video Directors: Ben Winston

Ben Winston is a director and a producer from London, that is best known for working specifically with One Direction. He has directed both the One Direction movies; A Year in the Making and This Is Us. He has also directed a selection of their well known songs, such as, Best Song Ever, Story of My Life, Midnight Memories, You & I and Night Changes.

One thing that I have noticed about the style of Winston's videos, is that the camera is hardly ever in a stationary position. It is always moving, either doing a tracking shot, sometimes just the zooming in and out of the camera or just moving whilst the boys dance idiotically to the music. Winston also likes to do close ups of each member of the band, which conforms with Andrew Goodwin's conventions of music videos that states, 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.

Winston built up a good relationship with the One Direction boys and has gone on to direct their two films (which I thought were absolutely amazing!!). From working regularly with the boys, I think Winston has grasped the correct idea on how to film the boys in their music videos and he does this very well. One of his signature visuals is having a wide shot of all 5 (now 4) boys at a low angle. I have noticed this regularly when watching music videos he has directed.

This is an example of this^ taken from the music video 'Story of My Life'.

Music Video Song Choice and Ideas

For the project we will creating this year, my partner and I that are working together, decided to choose Ella Henderson's song, Beautifully Unfinished. We decided to choose this song, because after completing the preliminary task, where we used Dusty Springfield's 'Spooky', we wanted to do something more up date and a bit different.

The song is slow and it is about love and heart break, which sounds miserable! But the lyrics in the song gives us good ideas as to how we can piece together a narrative for the video. Both my partner and I will star in the video, and we may need to recruit another actor but this is still not confirmed. We want to the video to be in black and white, to relate to the mood of the song, and make something so simple, look really effective.

Since the song does not have its own music video, which for us is a bonus, we have had to do extra research to create ideas that will go best with the song. Without copying anything Ella has already done, we are taking inspiration from her song Yours and the music video that goes with it. It is a similar idea that we wish to achieve.

I feel like this song and the music video we will create, will appeal more to girls of the younger generation, but hopefully it will always be of interest to anybody that likes Ella Henderson songs. Being a big fan of her myself, I am excited to use her song and get planning ideas for the video. Hopefully, we can pull off the ideas we have in mind, and if we do, I will (hopefully!!) be very proud of the outcome.

Controversial Music Videos

Controversy has taken over the music video industry over recent years, where artists have become braver in what content they use and the narrative of the video. Many artists have pushed boundaries to the limit and some even exceed the boundary and present inappropriate content to an audience. The more recent example of controversy is the Rihanna ‘Bitch Better Have My Money’ video. In the video, Rihanna is seen to be plotting revenge against an accountant for stealing money from her, she kidnaps a woman and ties her upside down whilst naked. She gets her drunk, partially drowns her and then stabs the accountant. The video is very explicit and at one point in the video, Rihanna is seen with blood covering her face.

In an article in Q-Magazine written by Dorian Lynskey, it speaks about infamous ‘mini-movies’ becoming music videos and how more and more artists are creating a whole story just for one song. It goes on to speak about how negative these types of music videos are and says ‘when a musician starts to use the phrase ‘mini-movie’ to describe a video- it’s time to quit’ this shows that not an effective way to present their music.

However, ‘mini-movie’ music videos are becoming more and more popular and more and more artists are deciding to use this as a way to promote a new song. This is because controversial music videos are becoming popular as they strive off attention as it gets people talking. Videos such as ‘Bitch Better Have My Money’ and Robin Thicke’s ‘Blurred Lines’ are considered controversial as many people were offended by the content in these videos. Regardless of this, both have been very successful and popular as people are always talking about them, and just how shocking they are. This then makes other people interested to watch them and the cycle keeps on going.

Controversial videos like ‘Bitch Better Have My Money’ work in the favour of people like Rihanna and other artists of a similar idea, this is because when people talk about music videos and they get shared, retweeted and constantly spoken about on social media and on music channels. The article states that ‘whether you hate Rihanna’s video or consider it the Citizen Kane of the Vevo era, if you watched it at all, she wins’. This means that people can argue about controversy all they like, but by watching them and making a fuss about them, gets the artists hits on YouTube, and sales on iTunes, then you are getting them money, they are receiving a big wage for you moaning about content they are posting. It will be very difficult to stop controversial music videos being created, especially when they are the ones with the money and power.

Textual Analysis of 'U Can't Touch This' By MC Hammer

Stanley Kirk Burrell formally known as 'MC Hammer' is an American hip-hop recording artist. He received the most commercial success in the late 1980's and the 1990's. He is widely remembered for his infamous  'U Can't Touch This' and '2 Legit 2 Quit'. His music videos included flashy dancing, full choreographed dances and the recognisable Hammer pants. He has become a hip-hop icon, selling more than 50 million records worldwide.



'U Can't Touch This' was released in 1990, at the time that the dance genre began to become popular in the music charts. The mise-en-scene of a 1990's dance film is stereotypically, bright clothing with pops of colour, big hair and jewellery. Throughout the music video there is full reference to these music video characteristics.

John Hartley's theory is the first that I will apply to this music video. He states that 'genres are agents of ideological closure- they limit the meaning-potential of a given text'. He suggests that genre acts as a straightjacket, limiting creative potential. MC Hammer can apply to this theory as it includes what you would associate with dance pop music video, which is the genre that you would say the artist uses. Hammer never strays from what is typical of the genre he is recognised with, this limits the potential of Hammer as he sticks to his area of the music industry.

John Fiske's theory says that 'generic conventions embody the crucial ideological concerns of the time in which they are popular'. It suggests that the genre tells us something about the 'way of the world' in the time in which they are popular (the zeitgeist). Applying this to MC Hammer's music video, and the time that it was popular in the music industry, shows that MC Hammer created videos to suit the dance mania phase, music lovers were going through during the 90's. Showing that, the world was seen as care free during that time and the evolution of new music genre was emerging.

Robert Hodge and Gunther Kress's theory argues genre 'controls the behaviour of producers of such texts, and the expectations of potential consumers'. This again, suggest that genres can limit creativity and often merely conform to the audiences expectations. This is similar to Hartley's theory, by saying that genre can influence artists to conform to audience expectations, which limits creativity. MC Hammer's video conforms to the tradition 'dance' record and I am sure that it was expected from him, as it was the specific genre he has decided to go with. The video includes, dancers, bright clothing, lots of jewellery. Many artists 'lack creativity' as they conform to what is expected by them by the audience, however, you could argue that controversial artists, such as Rihanna and Nicki Minaj, do not conform to these rules and completely create music videos that are not what you would normally see in society.

There is a lot of different camera angles and editing techniques that make this video stand out. The quick jump from shot to shot throughout makes the video flow and what you would expect to see from a dance video. It doesn't drag out over one long clip.