Michael Jackson !!

Michael Jackson

Michael Jackson was the King of Pop; but he was arguably the King of the Pop Video too. Many could identify an object, image, or piece of clothing from a Michael Jackson video, as his videos are all memorable in one way or another! In this post I will analyse Michael Jackson's videos, and show the difference and development in his career and his videos.

In his early career, alongside his brothers, they made basic music videos, merely just to promote the song and the band. The video for the song "Rockin' Robin" in 1971, lacked sophistication, compared with videos later in Jackson's career. However, the video does have lip synching! Despite the plain video, Goodwin could identify key features of a music video, in the "Rockin' Robin" video. In the video there are small dance routines performed by some members of the band, as other members are playing instruments. However, the music video is not illustrative of the lyrics, but a disjuncture, as the video has no connection with birds!

.At aged 21 he released "Rock With You", a music video significantly different to earlier work. The video appears very simplistic, it includes Michael Jackson performing the song, in front some lighting. The costume worn in the video, is a very big statement. I believe that wearing the sparkly outfit, from head to toe, says that he is the star now, and no longer needs the support of his brothers in the Jackson 5. The whole video focuses on Jackson himself, as there are no distractions to lessen the attention on him, which again means that the video is a disjuncture of the lyrics, as there is no depiction of the lyrics.

Then in1982, Jackson brought out "Billy Jean", a song of similar style to that "Rock With You". In the video we start to see the theatrical elements linked with Michael Jackson, and his videos. Michael Jackson has always been an icon when it comes to dancing, and his influential moves really began in this video. All over the world men, women, boys, girls, were copying Michael's dance moves, and soon the fire spread for the icon and his iconic dance moves. All these things be identified as symbols of Michael Jackson, and therefor applies to Andrew Goodwin's theories, of a recurrence of images associated with an artist. Also, the Billy Jean video was really the first video to tell an interesting story rather than just dance routines and lip synching.

In 1995, Michael collaborated with his sister, Janet, for 'Scream'. At the time the video cost $7,000,000, which at the time was the most expensive music video of all time. The cost of video is evident throughout the video, as we can see the special effects, that would have been an extremely costly part of the video in 1995! The clothing in the video worn by Michael and Janet, very much contradict the mise-en-scene of the video. The mise-en-scene suggests purity or innocence, or possibly insanity, as the padded walls could represent an asylum of some kind. The dark, black clothes they wear suggest they won't be part of the system, or aren't insane.

Throughout his career Michael Jackson did many memorable things, that cement him today as an icon. He made music videos that could make the world stop, he influenced many musicians, and introduced ideas that were grounding breaking then, and is everyday practice now in the music industry.  Michael Jackson will forever be the King of Pop AND the King of the Pop Video.