The 100 greatest pop videos

Yesterday we began looking at "The 100 greatest pop videos" to look out for such things as, the purpose of the video e.g. is it the message they send out, is it just for entertainment (e.g. containing humour visually and lyrically), does it have a plot or is it in an art form? etc... and we also looked out for the conventions which will give us ideas for our own music video.

With the videos we had time to watch, I selected the ones i believed had the most importance. These were:

Musical Youth- "Pass the Dutchie" (1982)


Musical Youth was the first black band to appear on MTV. "Pass the Dutchie" explores the issue of race and is basically telling a story about smoking drugs. The young people in the video had the difficulty of illustrating this in a way which wouldn't seem offensive or controversial howevery they made it into a humorous play on words song to bring out a message of them being "happy users".

Bronski Beats- "Small Town Boy"


Bronski Beats was an openly gay band and used their sexuality to produce "Small Town Boy" in which they tell a story about a boy who is finding it difficult being openly gay himself because of his homophobic community. However he cannot seem to escape temptation with all men around him. The video goes deeper with exploring the prejudice and abuse the boy suffers for his sexuality however Bronski Beats demonstrates that being gay doesn't make you any different than if you were hetrosexual!!

Cornershop- "Brimful of Asha" (1988)

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Cornershop cleverly advertised themselves in the video with their band name and it's song branded on all the records shown in different fonts, styles, colours (primary to be more effective and noticable) and angles so they wouldn't be easily forgotten.

Pet Shop Boys- "Go West"


Director Paul Greenhalgh commented it as "a form of commercial art" and also said it allowed directors like himself alot of freedom to experiment in their videos.

Talking Heads- "Once in a lifetime" (1981)

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The lead vocal singer became a inspiration to art form after this video was shot. He used abstract ideas and put these into his movements. The video is all about not being in control of your life and is now exhibited in art galleries.