Lily Allen- Smile

Goodwin stated that each genre of music has conventions that are displayed in it’s music videos. Pop music videos are typically performance based, and often involve dance routines, and shots of the singer walking in an interesting location, and singing.

Lily Allen’s video has performance elements, such as when she sits on her bed and sings, but mostly the video is narrative.

The story of the lyrics is interpreted by the video. Mostly the lyrics are not directly illustrated by the video, but at points such as, ‘when I see you cry, it makes me smile’, we see him crying and her smiling.

Each shot is very short, or if a shot is longer, the camera is constantly moving. This keeps in time with the beat of the song. As the main character in the video, she sings at points, but during most of the narrative, doesn’t. Although there are instruments in the song, there are no mentions of the instruments or the people playing them at all in the video. This is as Lily Allen is sold as a solo artist, and the focus is meant to be on her singing and lyrics.

The video contains many close ups of the artist. This is for recognition, so a person catching even a small part of the video would be able to identify the artist if they saw them again. This is useful for exposure of the artist. Music videos are also another way to draw in fans and encourage people to like the song. By having lots of close ups of the artist, it can add another dimension of interest to the song- if they find the singer attractive, the song is likely to become more appealing.

Many of Lily Allen’s videos, including ‘LDN’, have themes of Lily Allen being a ‘normal’ person, with her in normal situations, rather then some pop videos which focus on the artist showing off their money and fame. She is trying to appeal to her audience by appearing down to earth and relatable.

4.The demands of the record label will include the need for lots of close ups of the artist and the artists may develop a motif that reoccurs throughout their work

Many pop artists display themselves in sexual outfits, possibly in order to gain audience. However, Lily Allen has a unique style, which there was much intrigue in when she first arrived on the music scene. She was known for wearing dresses with Nike air trainers. This outfit is used to make her attractive, to appeal to audiences, but not in an overly sexual way. She is also not objectified at all by the video. As we can see from the YouTube statistics, her main fan base is females, so this would mostly not appeal to them.

5.There is frequently reference to the notion of looking and particularly voyeuristic treatment of the female body

Nike trainers

Long, leg covering, dress, but flattering.

Low cut, but doesn’t emphasis or draw attention to cleavage

There doesn’t appear to be any inter-textual references in this video.

6.There are often inter-textual references

This video contains mostly narrative, as the story of her relationship with a man unfolds, but also incorporating performance aspects as she sings during parts of the narrative. This helps the focus of the video be on her, and remind the audience that she is the artist, whilst fitting in with her image- that of a ‘normal, down to earth’ person, who people can relate to. This image would not have been helped by a big performance with her on stage looking dressed up, as that would put her apart from ‘normal’, non famous people.

7.Is the video primarily performance based, narrative based or concept based and how

elements of each are used