Andrew Goodwin's Theory

According to theorist Andrew Goodwin, all successful music videos must include six certain conventions. I will explore his theory, by analysing three music promos from the genre of metal. The videos I am analysing are ‘2 Minutes to Midnight’ by Iron Maiden, ‘Strong Arm of the Law’ by Saxon and Motörhead’s ‘One Track Mind’. I have chosen to look at these three cinematics because they will give me an insight into metal promotional videos. This will help me to gain understanding, which will support me in the creation of my own video.

The first convention Goodwin thinks Music video directors should observe, is that the music video demonstrates the particular genre characteristics. When watching my chosen videos, i noticed that all of them conformed to this ideology. An example present in all three videos is that each band member fits the stereotypical image to suit the metal genre.

Secondly, he believes that there should be a relationship between the lyrics and the visuals. Although both, ‘One Track Mind’ and ‘Strong Arm of the Law’ maintain performance footage from beginning to end, Iron Maiden’s 1984 release ‘2 Minutes to Midnight’ can be applied to Goodwin’s theory. An instance in this video is when the line “...Go to war again...” is sung by Bruce Dickinson the on screen visual is a gun, presenting a literal demonstration of the lyrics.

Goodwin goes on to suggest that the visuals must also relate to the music. Again all three videos match this theory. In particular Saxon’s ‘Strong Arm of the Law’ video, in which for each band member’s solo, the camera focuses on their skill. It is also noticeable that cuts and edits tend to be used in time with the song.

The fourth point Goodwin makes is that due to the high demand of the record label, lots of close ups of the artist will be used as well as frequent usage of band motifs. Once more each video I looked at observe at least one part of this suggestion. On Motörhead’s ‘One Track Mind’ video, the majority is filmed in a low close-up camera angle. Not only does this technique allow the audience to see more of the artist, but due to the fact that the camera is looking up at the band for most of the filmed sequences, it gives suggestion that the band is important. It’s almost as if you are watching the performance from the crowd. Although it does not appear in the ‘2 Minutes to Midnight’ video, I am aware that as Iron Maiden have grown in worldwide popularity, they include their mascot ‘Eddie’ in most of their more recent productions. This agrees with Goodwin’s usage of motifs idea.

The Next of Goodwin’s points are that there is a frequent reference to the notion of looking. In Iron Maiden’s video, this is shown in the narrative section, where one of the characters is watching workers through a monitor. Although the audience are not shown what is being looked at, in Saxon’s and Motörhead’s video both lead singers, Lemmy (Motörhead ) and Biff Byford (Saxon), stand on the edge of the stage and focus into where the crowd would be situated. On close inspection it appears that there may not have actually been a crowd present at the shooting of the videos, however by employing this technique, they have disguised this.

Finally, Goodwin suggests there should be intertextuality in the video. This features in the ‘2 Minutes to Midnight’ promo during the narrative, when an image of a goat flashes up on the screen. This goat references to the Goat of Mendes which is strongly associated with the devil. The Goat of Mendes, is thought to have originated back in the time of ancient Egypt and the theme for the artwork of the album ‘Powerslave’, which ‘2 Minutes to Midnight’ appears on is Ancient Egypt.

After analysing three music videos it would appear that Goodwin’s theory is upheld. There are elements of the theory that can be seen in all three videos. The Iron Maiden video features all six elements, while the other two feature five in each. The missing element in these two videos is intertextuality which would appear to be difficult to include in a live performance.






http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=GPbqQOf41Qc - '2 Minutes to Midnight'