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Path: utzoo!dciem!jeff
From: jeff@dciem.UUCP (Jeff Richardson)
Newsgroups: net.music
Subject: Videos, in general
Message-ID: <1584@dciem.UUCP>
Date: Fri, 21-Jun-85 10:32:52 EDT
Article-I.D.: dciem.1584
Posted: Fri Jun 21 10:32:52 1985
Date-Received: Fri, 21-Jun-85 12:24:22 EDT
Distribution: net
Organization: D.C.I.E.M., Toronto, Canada
Lines: 35

Music videos have caught on and are a strong factor in the music industry, but
I can do without them.  I think the concept is a good one; in fact, I thought
of the idea back in the 70's before anybody was doing them.  I would
probably have made a couple myself if I had all the resources at my
disposal, so when I heard a few years ago that people were doing videos,
I was thrilled and very anxious to see what they had come up with.  When
I finally did, I was very disappointed.  My idea of a video was to have
the picture tell the same story and create the same moods as the music,
in such a way that they compliment each other, i.e. the whole is greater
than the sum of the parts.  There have been some videos made this way;
I think Bronski Beat's "Smalltown Boy" does a pretty good job of it,
though I visualised it for more abstract songs like Pink Floyd's "Echoes",
which conjures up some great visual images in my mind.  The problem with
that is that "Echoes" may conjure up different images for somebody else, so
my concept is probably better for songs like "Smalltown Boy" that have
less room for interpretation, though I'm sure people would get much more
enjoyment out of a video for a song like "Echoes" if it doesn't conflict
with any of their pre-conceived visual images.  Anyway, what bugs me is
that videos like "Smalltown Boy" are few and far between.  More than 95%
of the videos around are, in my opinion, useless.  Most of them have
nothing to do with the song, and the overabundance of lip-synching really
annoys me.  (There's nothing wrong with having the artists appear in the
video, though even that isn't necessary, but lip-synching should be kept
to a minimum.)  But what annoys me most is that recording artists now feel
obligated to do a video for every hit song, otherwise they won't be
successful.  In addition to stacking the odds further against new artists
that can't afford to do videos, it means that there are a lot of bad videos
around.  As a result, I almost never watch video shows, so I miss all of the
good videos too.  Some songs just don't make good videos, and if you can't
do a good video, you shouldn't do one at all.  Videos are another good
idea ruined by excess.
-- 
Jeff Richardson, DCIEM, Toronto  (416) 635-2073
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