Postmodernism in music video

Media Magazine Theory Drop - Postmodernism

Create a new blog post called 'Postmodernism in music video: blog tasks'. Read ‘The Theory Drop: Postmodernism’ in MM66  (p26). You'll find our Media Magazine archive here - remember you'll need your Greenford Google login to access. Answer the following questions:

1) How does the article define postmodernism in the first page of the article?

If modernism is beginning to question authority, then postmodernism is making fun of authority to its face. Postmodernism takes this concept of questioning traditional structures, representations and expectations and pushes things a step further.

2) What did media theorist and Semiotician Roland Barthes suggest in his essay 'The Death of the Author'?

The Death of the Author. In it, he challenged tradition when he said that a writer’s opinions, intentions or interpretation of their own work are no more valid than anyone else’s. just because Ridley Scott thinks Deckard is a replicant, doesn’t mean that you, the viewer, have to think this if you don’t want to. Readers are free to interpret a work however they choose, irrespective of what the creator thinks. The Death of the Author is the next step after Nietzsche’s ‘God is dead’ statement and with it comes a need to test the boundaries of what a text is.

3) What is metatextuality?

Metatextuality is where a text draws attention to the fact that it is a text. It points to the process of its own creation. Metatextuality forces the audience to examine, and in some cases question the very form of filmmaking and the assumptions it brings with it.

4) What is the repeated phrase on the cartoon on postmodernism on page 28?

'Postmodernism is a movement that distrusts all established philosophies and frequently experiments with the medium that it is presented within'

5) How does postmodernism link to media representations and reality?

The Nature of Reality This is a frequent preoccupation in the content of postmodern narratives. As stated earlier, postmodernism tends to reject most aspects of authority,‘ the grand narrative has lost its credibility’. It is easy to see how some institutions are being questioned. Religion, specifically ‘the church’, as an institution has lost followers over the last few centuries. Additionally, secular ideologies such as Marxism have been seen to fail when put into practice, while capitalism in the form of ‘The American Dream’ and its promise of a land of opportunity for everyone has been shown to let people down on countless occasions.

Music video CSPs and postmodernism

Now apply postmodern ideas to our music video CSPs by answering the following questions:

1) How does the music video for Ghost Town incorporate elements of postmodernism?

There are elements of pastiche that replicate the feel and atmosphere of 70s British hammer horror in the scenes where as the band is driving there is underlighting and very low key lighting that casts of shadows that is very reminiscent of the horror genre.

Bricolage can be applied as the song itself is a mix of reggae and British punk rock to create Ska 

2) What film genres are alluded to in the music video for Ghost Town? Which scenes in particular created these links?

Hammer horror, Road movie, Social realism

The first is presented through the lighting in the alley scene while the second is presented throughout the music video as the main band is travelling entirely via car but breaks the conventions of arriving to a place while the third can be seen through the lyrics such as 'Bands wont play no more' and 'This towns becoming like a ghost town' suggests there was liveliness before but now no longer does.

3) How does Old Town Road use postmodern elements in its music video?

Uses bricolage in its mix of country and rap music genres. Intertextuality can be seen through the reference of Lil nas X other songs within the music video when the girl is dancing on the horse. There are elements of pastiche in the opening scene as it faithfully recreates the atmosphere of western movies such as having black cowboys but can be seen to parody it a little with the bag with the dollar sign on it.

4) How does the Old Town Road music video reflect technological convergence and modern digital culture?  

It reflects technological convergence as the video is an official movie that can be split up in order to be consumed separately on platforms such as tiktok with short span videos and shows that the current modern digital culture is that of short span and highly editable pieces of a text are consumed to a much higher degree than that of the traditional format of watching the entire video for yourself and so now people rely on others to release these clips to consume rather than searching it out for themselves.

5) What do YOU think Lil Nas X was trying to say about reality and American culture in the music video for Old Town Road?

That even though there appears to be discrimination and omission of certain people from society due to their race that there actually is a place for everyone to get along and that what's on the surface is hardly how everyone feels playing greatly into Paul Gilroy's idea of cultural conviviality.