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Music Video Analysis: "Guns and Horses"
Music Video Analysis: "Guns and Horses"
Background Research
Guns and Horses is a song performed by Ellie Goulding by the English singer-songwriter Elena Jane and features on the album Lights. The date of release was March 1st 2010. The music video was filmed in the USA; Los Angeles in Griffin Park a remote forest and was directed by Petro. The song was nominated for numerous awards including the Brit nominations and Ellie Goulding album debuted at No.1 in the United Kingdom with 40,000 copies in its opening week. Ellie Goulding is signed to Polydor records founded in Germany 1946 and established ten years later. Initially Polydor records were for German artists however they realized that by popular demand that the Germans enjoyed the music of the British. Polydor also established their connections with the USA and link with the Interscope, Geffen and AnM labels. Currently the label continues to boast plenty of pop names including Daniel Bendingfield, Ms Dynamite and Scissor sisters.
Genre Characteristics
Guns and horses is an indie/alternative song and this is reflected within the video due to the genre characteristics. The use of establishing shots that occur within the first 6 seconds automatically associate the audience with the lyrics and the visuals. The use of a single artist is another code and convention that has come up frequently whilst I have been analyzing music videos. The majority of the camera shots of Ellie are close ups and medium shots, this is likely to emphasis the fact that she is the artist thus ensuring that the focus of the camera is predominantly on her. In addition to this there are a number of long shots, which allow far more to go on inside the frame, making the video
more interesting/vibrant for the audience members. Furthermore when the long shots are on screen it is usually to depict the d backing dancers behind Ellie Goulding. This helps to create a sense of ambiguity and quirkiness this is more likely to attract extraverts to the music video; which is the characteristic of a typical audience member that is into the indie genre of music.
Intertextual References
In the music video guns and horses there are no intertextual references to other songs or films. This could be due to the fact that the artist may want the audience to focus completely there song, visuals and the message that they try to deliver in their music rather than how it compares to other song. This could attract the target audience as indie culture strives on individuation and independence rather than being mainstream and relying on others.