Andrew Goodwin

In his work 'Dancing in the Distraction Factory', published in 1992, Andrew Goodwin identified 5 key aspects of music videos that we as an audience should look out for, these are:

• Thought Beats
• Narrative and Performance
• Star Image
• Relation of Visuals to Song
• Technical Aspects of Music Video

Thought Beats
The first step of Andrew Goodwin's theory on thought beats is looking at the music itself, we must take into account the structure of the song for example, taking notice of chorus and verses. Secondly, we must look at the singer's voice, an artist's voice is extremely unique and can form identity. Most people can recognise an artist by their tone and grain of voice, this relates to Roland Barthes theory of grain of voice. He sees the singing voices an expressive instrument and therefore able to make associations of it's own. Goodwin also points out the artist's mode of address, if a song can be seen as story then that makes the artist the story teller, as such a music video is a form of two way communication, with the artist telling us a story and us listening.

Narrative and Performance
Songs themselves fail to give us the complete narrative, we get a gist of what the artist means and then we each make our own meaning for a song. Goodwin believes that music video's should ignore common narrative, it is important because music videos are a form of advertising, instead narrative and performance should work hand in hand, because this makes it easier for an audience to watch the same video repeatedly without losing interest. If the artist acts as both as the narrator and the subject of the video/song it makes the video seem more authentic and original. Goodwin believes though that miming is still the most popular thing done in music videos today, however it is in the artist's best interests to make it look as real as possible to the audience.

Star Image
Star image is vital aspect of any music video, artists obviously want to look unique in order to stay current and for audiences to remember them. This star image tends to develop overtime and plays a big role in the production process of music videos.

Relation of Visuals to Song
There are three ways in which videos are used to promote a song:

• Illustrate - The visuals on screen directly link the words sang, for example, 'I wanna read American Psycho again' could be illustrated by a copy of the book on screen.
• Amplify - The visuals add meaning to the words sang, for example, a red tint could be use when romance is sung about.
• Contradict- The visuals completely go against the lyrics being sung, for example 'Stop crying, you're an adult' could be contradicted by a child smiling.

Technical Aspects of Music Videos

Technical aspects such as mine-en-scene, camera movement or angles, hold the music video together. Lighting and colour can help set the mood and adds emphasis on key/dramatic moments adds extra effect. Miss-en-scene is also vital, it needs to look realistic in order to look professional therefore appealing to a larger target audience. The editing is also a key part when incomes to technical aspects, editing to the beat/rhythm of the song is a simple task that makes the video seem so much more professional and enjoyable.


Goodwin, Andrew. 1993. Dancing in the Distraction Factory: Music, Television and Popular Culture. Routledge.