Visualization of Music
“Music is personal … a song means different things to different people …when you put visuals to a song – the visuals over-power the personal meaning and everyone “sees” the same thing. This visualization of music also burns out songs much faster than just hearing them…it also de-personalizes the music.” ~ Bob Wilson – (founder of Radio & Records)
This is a very interesting take, especially in the context of music videos. I grew up in the era when MTV actually played videos and I can honestly say that while I still watch them occasionally, I don’t really miss them. I think what MTV found was that their popularity was due to newness of the format and the accessibility of “what was hot” in music. After the newness wore off and the internet made music more accessible, MTV turned into what we have now.
I’m not discounting that there were some pretty amazing music videos out there. Michael Jackson probably pushed the envelope the most by creating story lines around the songs, but very few others are memorable. It was a new medium and bands capitalized on the popularity and it ultimately resulted in a complete change in the way a generation of people listen to music. In my opinion.. it changed it in a very bad way. Music is no longer just music. Live events try to compete by adding light shows and trying to invade our other senses… most often times doing it wrong and completely screwing up the listening part of our brain and soul.
Visuals and context should enhance our experience of music. Notice I didn’t say “add to”. There a very important distinction to be made, and it’s up to the bands, promoters & producers to make sure it stays true to form. I’ve received nothing but praise on our recent launch of The Drop in how it combines a strong visual with the music. I don’t think it would have succeeded as well as it did if we just “added” a small image to go along with the music.
This whole concept has completely changed my thoughts on combining film and music. Moreover, it begs me to ask the question… “How is viewing music (youtube, vimeo, etc..) online changing the way we hear music?”
Bob Wilson’s comment is well made, but it seems to me we need to be clear about the sort of music we’re dealing with. I don’t mean musical style, I’m referring to purpose, why it was made.
Songwriters who want to breath life and perspective to others through their music, especially the performance of it, do well to heed Wilson’s comment.
Yet, I cant think of many films (short, long, feature, documentary etc) that are more powerful precisely because a choice song was set to it. Visual additions (not just enhancements) to music can be powerful in a good way.
It works both ways. Visual can be added to music for the better. Likewise, music can be added to visual for the better.
Perhaps the problem is we rarely see it ‘for the better’ and have plenty for the worse, dishonoring good songwriters at best and killing the message at worst.
I agree.
my main concern as I push more into film making is that if I’m filming a song about rain, it’s our natural thought process to show a scene with rain. This will force all viewers to hear this song and push the vision that I had of the rain into their minds.
The power of music is that their vision of rain is what should be in their head… not mine.
Mostly. Maybe. I don’t know.
there in lies my question.