100 greatest music videos: My top 5

So Solid Crew are an English UK garage, grime and hip hop group originating from Battersea, London who achieved wide success in the early 2000s. The group consisted of a large number of members, the most notable being Lisa Maffia, Romeo and Harvey. They are generally credited with having paved the way for the current generation of crossover UK hip hop stars."21 Seconds" i It is included on their debut album They Don't Know. The song was released as a single on Relentless Records in 2001. It charted at a peak position of number one in the UK Singles Chart in August 2001, while it peaked just outside the top 40 in the Netherlands. It achieved first week sales of 118,135 units in the United Kingdom. 

The video starts with the title "Michael Jacksons' Thriller" which is in big bold red writing to make the title stand out, using the colour red means danger. The video then cuts to Michael and his girlfriend in a car which runs out of petrol in a dark wooded area, this represents a horror as something like this scenario would happen in a horror movie. Michael announces that he is "different" and scary like music starts to play as the camera cuts to a full moon appearing in the sky. A full moon can be related to werewolves which then Michael turns into. Michael then chases his girlfriend as he is now a werewolf then it cuts to the cinema which turns out that Michael and his girlfriend are sat watching the film. Michael's actual song doesn't start until over 4 minutes. Michael then starts singing to his girlfriend whilst walking down a dark                                                                                             alley which is very misty which represents that                                                                                                something scary may happen.

The music video for the song The Scientist by Coldplay is all in reverse showing him doing everything backwards to show a story. The song itself is a story so the music video suits the song really nicely. Chris Martin had to learn the song backwards which took him a month! The genre of the song fits Coldplay overall as the song is heavily piano based with an indie rock flare. Within the song 'The Scientist' a piano is used as the main instrument with majority of minor key's used. This stereotypically fits in with the pessimistic and depressing genre as it links in with the lyrics as well as the narrative of the video, by wanting to go back to stop the heartbreak of his loved one who was recently killed in the car crash. The narrative of the video demonstrates the lead singer going backwards in time to an incident involving a car crash with his assumed girlfriend at the time, hence linking to the lyrics 'I'm going back to the start'. Chris Martin had to learn the words to the song backwards in order to maintain the continuity, so when it was reversed the synchronisation of the video was appropriate in accordance to him singing the lyrics. This could show that he is still in the present but wishes he could go back to stop what happened.

This song was released in 2001 and sang by Elton John. It was directed by Sam Tyler Wood. It was actually lip synced in the music video as Elton John disliked making music videos. He chose Robert Downey Junior to lip sync as at the time he was in rehabilitation of having drug problems and so the song seemed right for him. He was allowed out of rehabilitation to film the video which he lip synced well. I think it was a good choice to use him as you can see the feeling behind the meaning of the song. 

The music video for “Stan” follows the theory of Andrew Goodwin in many different ways. One-way being that there is a clear relationship between the lyrics and the visuals of the video. The opening of the video appears to be very theatrical (movie-like) in a way as the camera zooms in to a window, showing the miserable weather of rain and thunder – to relate to the harsh feelings portrayed in the song and video, to a pregnant woman in which we then see fades to closer camera shots of the woman rubbing her stomach to show she is pregnant, this is also emphasized by the camera zooming towards her. It isn't until after an argument between the woman and the central male character of the video in the bathroom where the man argues that he doesn’t want his girlfriend to call him Stanley, presumably because he’s trying to look like Eminem. The chorus is played first in which we see Dido (who plays the female character) sitting on the toilet singing her lyrics in the song. “My tea’s gone cold I’m wondering why, got out of bed all. Morning rain clouds up my window, and I can’t see at all. And even if I could it would all be grey…” These lyrics show a clear relationship between the way Dido feels about her life in the video. She feels like her relationship with Stan is falling apart because of his obsession with Eminem (heighten by the argument in the bathroom) and that even though she is pregnant, her life at this point seems to have no meaning. The idea of “It would all be grey” reflects the previous horrible weather we saw at first in the video.