Yoann Lemoine

As me and Kirsty plan on making a music video for a Lana Del Rey song, we decided to look much deeper into the work of director Yoann Lemoine who directed her videos for Born to Die, Blue Jeans and her new single National Anthem. We hope that by looking at the particular style of videos he creates for Lana Del Rey we can capture some of that in our video to be consistant with her work. Nowadays, music videos help build up an image for an artist and that is very prevelant with lots of Lana Del Rey's work.

Born to Die Video

 "It's a controversial video." is what Lana Del Rey said about the work; she came up with the concept for the video and worked with Lemoine in creating it. At the beginning of the videe, there is an American flag in the background which was an animated version of the flag on the cover of the Born to Die album. Leomoine studied animation and graphic design as well as being a photographer and that is obvious in the video with the shots he creates. When the video was leaked out, Lemoine commented "Generally, I'm a man of few words, but I will say that this video is the most beautiful thing I've ever done."


Ironically, unlike her video for Blue Jeans the video for Born to Die ends up with Lana and the man who plays her boyfriend in the video walking away alive. This helps keep up the unexpected nature of her videos. The video is very stylish and has very beautiful settings; it has a very good picture quality making it look almost cinematic.






Blue Jeans video
If you've seen my previous post you will see the Blue Jeans video and a break-down of the video. This video definatly has an old movie style to it shot in black & white with a crisp image. Unlike the video for Born to Die only one location is used and more of a narrative is used. However, the same male actor who played Del Rey's boyfrined in the Born to Die video also appears in Blue Jeans as if her songs tell stories about this relationship.
Both videos, and both songs, have a moody sense to them which Lemoine always captures in the video's he creates.




I'm going to be looking at more Yoann Lemoine music video's in future blogs and breaking them down - not just ones he has created for Lana Del Rey.

Blue Jeans by Lana Del Rey

This video was directed by Yoann Lemoine (who has worked with Lana Del Rey on numerous videos). The entire video is black and white giving it a old film-like quality adding to the old-style glamour of Lana Del Rey.

The video begins with rippling water with Lana's face also rippling in the water to the beat of the song. Immediately because the video is shot in black & white it gives it a classy look and reflects the serious and sombre mood of the song. 

The tropical setting of the video also helps make it look expensive and give it that old-style Hollywood style to the video. This all works with Lana's make-up and outfit in the video as well. There are shots into the palm trees showing light trying to get through which are really beautiful and reflect the beautiful side to the song. Also, the surrounding shows that this is a love song. There are also lots of close-up on Lana's face as she sings showing her emotions to the song which helps get the message of the song to the viewers. 

Even though the video is in black & white, the light and shade working together in the video makes the video more moody and interesting.

The video ends with Lana being drowned in the pool which does show the sombre tone to the song and to the video. It is very serious and not like usual cheesy pop videos you see more frequently. It is stylish and deeper than most videos destined to make an impact on the audience.

Artist & Director Research: Music Video Conventions

Me and Kirsty are working together in our project to create a music video. We haven’t yet decided on the song we are going to create the video for, however we do know we would like to do either a Lana Del Rey song or a Delilah song. Therefore, we have researched into some of their videos and then looked at the directors of their videos to gain inspiration and see the conventions of their music videos instead of looking at a specific genre. This is because the genre for these artists is varied in how it is classified, some calling it indie pop others chamber pop or pop, electronica or even ambient.

Lana Del Rey…

…is an American singer-songwriter known for the critical acclaim her debut album Born to Die received. She has released music videos for her tracks Born to Die, Video Games, Blue Jeans, Summertime Sadness, Carmen and is soon to be releasing the video for her new release National Anthem. She has described herself as "self-styled gangsta Nancy Sinatra".

Delilah…

…is a British singer-songwriter who is due to release her album From the Roots Up in the summer of 2012. She collaborated with Chase & Status for the track Time which had a very deep video showing domestic violence from the point-of-view of the teenage daughter of the couple. She has videos for songs Love You So, Go and Breathe.

Yoann Lemoine…

…is a French director who has directed many music videos, as well as being a musician himself. We discovered him by beginning looking at the Lana Del Rey video Born to Die which he directed. He also directed music videos for:

• Take Care – Drake ft Rihanna
• Blue Jeans – Lana Del Rey
• Mistake  – Moby
• National Anthem – Lana Del Rey
• Iron – Woodkind (the band he is a member of)

We will be analysing some of his videos in later blog entries to look at the codes & conventions of our music video and gaining inspiration.

Emil Nava…

...is also a music video director. While looking at interesting videos, we looked at Paloma Faith’s video for her new song Picking Up the Pieces which was directed by Nava. Also by Nava:

• Love You So – Delilah
• Do It Like A Dude – Jesse J
• Nobody’s Perfect – Jesse J
• Yeah Right – Dionne Bromfield
• Lego House – Ed Sheeran
• Finish Line – Yasmin
• Who’s Laughing Now – Jesse J
• You Need Me I Don’t Need You – Ed Sheeran

We will be analysing some of Nava’s music videos in later blog entries also.

These are going to be the two directors we focus on to gain the codes and conventions for our music video as well as looking at the style of the videos they create and gaining inspiration.

NOTE: you can type either directors name into Vimeo.com to gain access to their work if you would like to see any of these videos.

Record Breaking Music Video's

These music videos have been recognised for their record breaking status. You can watch them all on YouTube (although some have age requirements to watch!)

The most expensive music video to create cost $7,000,000 to make! It was for Michael Jackson and Janet Jackson’s video Scream released in 1995. The second most expensive video to make was made by Madonna for her James Bond track, Die Another Day, costing $6,000,000 to make in 2002.

Also winning longest running music video is Michael Jackson with Ghost which is a sort of mini-movie which is 38 minutes and 52 seconds long. However, Thriller is the second longest running music video.

Justin Bieber’s music video for Baby is still the most popular and most viewed music video on YouTube. However, in less than a year Jennifer Lopez ft Pitbull’s song On the Floor has risen to 500 million views!

Group Eytan and The Embassy broke a record for having 18 costume changes in their video Everything Changes without any editing.

Some music videos have got recognition because of the restriction put on them. These music videos were banned from MTV before the watershed due to their content! Madonna’s Like a Prayer, Justify Your Love, Erotica and What It Feels Like For A Girl were all banned from MTV. Enrique Inglesias’ video for his 2000 song Sad Eyes was banned due to it showing sexual content. In 2012, M.I.A’s song Born Free was banned due to the violence shown in the video; this video was even temporarily removed from YouTube. More recently, Rihanna’s S&M required people to be over 18 to watch it on YouTube and most of the video cut and censored to be shown.

Music Video Inspiration: Madonna VS Monroe

The video for Madonna’s Material Girl was inspired by the song Diamonds Are a Girl’s Best Friend from the Marilyn Monroe film Gentlemen Prefer Blondes. Madonna herself said in a 1987 interview about the video, "Well, my favourite scene in all of Monroe's movies is when she does that dance sequence for 'Diamonds Are a Girl's Best Friend'. And when it came time to do the video for the song [Material Girl], I said, I can just redo that whole scene?”

The video combines acting as well as a dance routine similar to that in Diamonds Are a Girl’s Best Friend showing the story of a man trying to impress Madonna with flowers instead of diamonds. This combination of acting and dancing to create an overall performance is common in many pop videos even today and Material Girl was recorded in 1985.

Not only was Material Girl inspired by a film, it has also been in used in films such as the musical Moulin Rouge. Continuing the theme of being inspired by Marilyn Monroe, in 1991 Madonna copied Monroe’s poses for a Vanity Fair magazine shoot.

The song created a legacy for Madonna, helping her brand herself. Years after the songs release, Madonna was still nicknamed the ‘material girl’. Debates sparked off across the world about whether the song and video empowered women or did not.

This shows how videos can be inspired by other videos and then pass that inspiration on to things such as films. However, Material Girl also shows how a video can contribute towards the overall brand of an artist.

History of Music Video's: the 1960's

In 1961, a Canadian programme began called Singalong Jubilee which pre-recorded music then added film footage to it. This helped provide bands and musicians with coverage of their music and gain attention. For example, Jan & Dean’s song Surf City was one of the first music video’s in the Top 40 in 1963 and then reached number 1. Following this was the UK’s first music television programme called Ready Steady Go on ITV in 1963. Then, in 1964 Top of the Pops began on the BBC.

However, in 1964 the Beatles released their film A Hard Day’s Night which coincided with their album of the same name. It was shot in black-and-white as a documentary which included comedy, dialogue and of course music. Also, in 1965 the Beatles filmed Help! This has a story to it with the band being followed through different countries along with their songs included in it. The Beatles would in 1967 release TV promos for Penny Lane and also Strawberry Fields Forever. However, in 1966 the Monkees’ TV show began on NBC in America which also had dialogue along with songs by the Monkees.

To watch the trailer for A Hard Day's Night  http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=q0eJEX5c1sM 

In December 1967, the Beatles made an hour long TV film broadcasted on Boxing Day on the BBC called Magical Mystery Tour. The band wrote and directed it and the sequences for songs Your Mother Should Know and I am the Walrus were then used as actual music videos in their own right. A year before that, Bob Dylan’s music video for Subterranean Homesick Blues which has Bob Dylan going through large cards with writing on was released. Then in 1968, the Kink’s made one of the first music video’s with a plot for their single Dead End Street which was like a miniature, comic film.

History of Music Video's: Origins

In the 1920's, Fischinger experimented with a mixture of sound and visuals. Then in 1927, the first sound film The Jazz Singer came out. Followed by, in the 1930's, with the soundies...

1927, The Jazz Singer film

Music was played by popular artists inbetween cartoons being shown on television. Warner Brothers and Disney produced short cartoons with music such as The Looney Tunes and Disney's Fantasia which visually interprets classical music.

Walt Disney's Fantasia
The animation was released in 1940 containing music from Leopold Stokowski. The film was originally designed to proivde a 'comeback' for Mickey mouse who had declined in popularity. To produce the sound, Disney used Fantasound. Although it initially didn't make a profit, it has been re-released numerous times and in 2012 grossed $76.4 million!
The idea of Fantasia is to visual show music and interpret music to make classical music more accsesible.