alt- J - Every Other Freckle (Official Video - Girl) Analysis
alt-J - Every Other Freckle
The music video I have decided to analyse is Every Other Freckle by alt-J. For this particular song, two versions were made. They shared the same concepts, but one was centered around a girl and the other, a boy. Viewed separately, both videos are very conceptual, featuring the same clips of stampeding buffaloes but where one focuses on a woman, the other focuses on a man . In a review by Gabriel Diego Valdez, he says that the videos 'seem like a celebration of sex and the human body, no matter the gender.' However, 'when paired together...the message becomes wholly different.'
1. Thought beats - where you 'see' in the sound.
As soon as the vocals begin in this song, I think it's easy to identify the voice of Joe Newman, lead singer of alt-J, as he has a very unique voice and style. It's clear through this music video, alt-J's mode of address is to connect the audience with the story behind the words. In this instance, they are the storyteller and the audience are the listeners to their story. The fact there is both a female and a male version expands the target audience and makes it more relatable for the viewer.
2. Narrative and performance
It is evident that we never get the full narrative by watching the music video. Although most clips are slow-motion, the video is essentially a collection of short clips. With equal focus on the narrative and conceptual elements, which both work just as effectively in relaying the lyrics of the song. In fact, to pair with alt-J's unique sound, they are particularly good at ignoring common narratives. The music video for Every Other Freckle is no exception. As the song celebrates the beauty of the human form, themes of nature features heavily in the video - from the shots of the exploding volcano at the beginning of the video, to the end where the woman is shown naked. The series of different clips that combined, make sense, offer a unique music video. Indeed, the fact so much is going on within this music video makes the repeatability more likely. Audiences would want to re-watch the video to pick up things they didn't before, identify more of the abstract shots and to get a clearer understanding of the video/lyrics.
3. The Star Image
Characteristically of alt-J's music videos, no members of the band ever feature in the videos. Although normally this may have an effect on the repeatability of the video, alt-J decide to focus on the quality, originality and story of their music videos. The fact alt-J aren't in the videos but they still succeed to engage audiences, show the power of their concepts and narratives.
4. Relation of visuals to song
In some instances during this song, the visuals directly illustrate the words of the song. This can be exemplified by the lyrics 'I'm gonna bed into you like a cat prance into a beanbag', as with these lyrics a cat is actually shown prancing into a beanbag.
It could be that the visuals matching the lyrics would make the video disjointed, but the shots seem to work together successfully to express the meaning behind alt-J's words.
5. Technical aspects of a music video
A large majority of the shots used in this music video are slow motion. This is effective in making the visuals more dramatic and engaging to the audience. It also allows the audience to focus more on the words of the song. This is helped with the fact the visuals match with the beats of the music. This is best exemplified when they say 'hey' and the dog barks, making it appear as if the dog was the one who said it.
Lighting and colour play an important part in this music video. Three contrasting locations are used when the visuals focus solely on the woman. The difference in location is solidified by the colour grading of blue for one, green for another, and the black and white shots in a studio. This not only makes the video more cinematic, but creates different layers to the same narrative which keeps the audience interested. The locations are also significant because they reflect and contrast the theme of nature. Two of the locations show connections to the land and sea, and then this is directly contrasted by the idea of the cave man in a studio, someone visualised in the video as being 'the first and last of [their] kind' is being shown in an artificial environment.
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