Sean Kingston - Beautiful Girls

Features to look for Genre Characteristic General Examples Setting: Expensive Cars Girls People dancing Detailed Example Throughout the video, there are people dancing along to the music, and as R&B is music that people commonly dance to, it is relevant to the genre to show people having fun and dancing. Expensive cars are common for pop stars to own and Sean Kingston himself is shown performing his song whilst sitting on a flashy car. E.g. 1.18-1.24, 2.40-2.44 What is the relationship between lyrics and visuals? In some R&B music videos, the visuals will match the lyrics to give an illustration of what the artist is saying. This is common here in the song Beautiful Girls. The chorus consists of the lyrics beautiful girls being repeated throughout There is a large amount of girls wearing revealing clothing throughout the video which relates to the lyrics well.

0.51-0.55: The lyric is When you took my heart At In many R&B songs, an this point in the video, the artist is shown artist will talk about looking across a room full of people, at a another person they are girl who is looking back and smiling at him. in a relationship with. An This is a common characteristic to have in actor maybe shown in an R&B music video as it shows the person the video to represent who the artist is singing about. the person they talk/sing about. This is the case here. What is the relationship between music and visuals? R&B music videos will usually carry a similar vibe to the lyrics and style of the music. For example, if the song itself is an upbeat, jolly track. This will be reflected in the video, it would not make sense having a video which is irrelevant to the song. The visuals and music match each other throughout the whole song however; a clear example is 2.19-2.30. At this point, the artist and others are shown around a table, dancing and laughing together, this is an happy scene which relates to the fast, upbeat song.

Are there close-ups of the artist and star image motifs?

Close-ups are often used to emphasise the artists emotions and to provide the viewer with a better

The opening scene is a close-up off the artist, he is shown smiling slightly. In my opinion this has only been used to let the viewer know who is performing the song

understanding of what is happening.

and as Sean Kingston is present throughout the video, a close-up early in the video at 0.00 onwards, allows viewers to understand he is the main performer and attraction of the video

Is there reference to the notion of looking?

Are there intertextual references?

Intertertextual references can be used in music videos when there is a link between the song and a film for example, Neyo Never knew I needed has clips of a Disney film in the video as the song was intended to be in the film itself. There is a slight intertextual link in Sean Kingstons song.

Half way through the song at approximately 2.10 There is a clip which shows an old school band on a black and white TV, performing the song which Sean Kingston is singing. At the same time the instrumental changes to what sounds like Ben E. Kings song Stand By Me, and the visuals for that song is himself performing the song on a black and white TV with a band behind him. This is a slight intertextual link between too songs from two very different periods.

Is it performancebased, narrativebased or conceptbased? How much of each

Depending on the artist and the song, R&B videos vary with the overall bases of the video. In this case, most of the visuals are performance, however there are parts of narrative-based and concept based clips.

The opening of the song is an acapella of Sean Kingston singing the song himself. This is clearly performance based and this theme is continued throughout. Even in clips where there is rooms full of dancing people, Sean Kingston will be shown lip syncing the track.

Jay-Z FT Mr Hudson - Young Forever Features to look for General Examples Detailed Example

Genre characteristic

This song has a particularly sad theme and vibe to it and so R&B songs that have this theme usually have a slower paced video.

This is the case here most of the video is various short clips which are in slow motion; this automatically provides a calmer vibe. An example of this is 0.18 when there are some young boys playing basketball in slow

motion.

What is the relationship between lyrics and visuals?

In a song like this, there would usually be a story line to match the lyrics, however, it would be difficult to do this here as the lyrics are talking about being young in general, and it does not follow a story. Despite this, all the short clips which are included in the video show younger people doing activities.

An example is 1.35 where a young man is shown to be skateboarding. A second example of many would be at 2.47 where a young girl is shown dancing. These two clips relate to the song lyrics of being forever young. This has been done to help narrate the song better. At 2.28 Jay-Z is talking about pretty girls driving cars and at this time in the video, there are a group of girls smiling and driving through a field, almost looking care free.

What is the relationship between music and visuals?

Due to the calm theme which the song takes. The visuals would also be calm and laid back. This can be done through the colours used.

The whole music video is black and white which helps provide the song with a calm vibe. The visuals also contain clips of people who do not look as if they are worried about life and are care free, such as the skateboarders, American football players and the fans at the concert etc. These all show people who are having fun, relating back to the song itself Forever Young.

Are there close-ups of the artist and star image motifs?

There are not many close-ups of the artists, but when there are, they show the artist with lack of emotion on their face, emphasising the somewhat depressing nature of the song as it is slow R&B. Jay-Z is more of a rap artist, and so a common motif of rap artists is an urban look. In this case, the artist is shown wearing sun glasses which are a commonly

An example of lack of facial emotion on an artists face is Mr Hudson at 1.19 He is performing the song with no smile or any sort of emotion, compared to Sean Kingstons smile throughout This shows the difference in song theme. This close-up helps maintain a laid back vibe. If Mr Hudson was shown smiling and joyful, it would go against the whole theme.

associated accessory which hip-hop artists wear. Is there reference to the notion of looking? Are there intertextual references? There are no intertextual references in this video. Direct intertextual links are not relevant and not needed in this video. Despite there being no intertextual links in the music video, there are various clips which look as if they have been recorded on a home camera, rather than a professional camera man, I believe this has been done to create a simplicity theme in the video and it looks as if the video contains memories from other peoples minds This relates to the young song lyrics.

Is it performancebased, narrative-base or concept-based? How much of each?

Mostly concept-based, but some performancebased. Not narrative-based as there was not a clear story line.

As I previously mentioned, the concept of the video is to show people who do not have worries and are having fun. The footballers, skateboarders, young children dancing and fans at the concert all share the same fact that they are having fun. The message of the song is effectively to enjoy life, and all these clips share the same concept of enjoyment, due to this, I conclude that it is mainly concept-based. There are some performance-based clips such as Jay-z on the top of a sky scraper and Mr Hudson performing alone in a dark room. The dark room and loneliness effectively tells us that Mr Hudson wants to be alone to reflect back on life and have personal thinking time. This works well with the theme of the song as it could indicate that the artist is thinking back to when they was young themselves.