Music Videos genres Performance, narrative, concept, hybrids

Music videos have different genres that many artists use in their respective these beings Performance, Narrative and Concept and sometimes these get mixed up in some videos creating a hybrid. A performance is the band or singer playing their song on their video. A narrative is the telling of a story on the video. A concept is a symbol on a video. A hybrid is the mixture of the above in one video.

Performance example : skillet- Hero In the music video for Skillet on their song Hero it’s a prime example of performance which means just the singer and band playing their instruments and singing and dancing around like they would in concerts, the performance also reflects on the bands ability to impress their audiences.

Narrative example : Arctic monkeys – Fluorescent adolescence In the music video for Fluorescent adolescence for arctic monkeys it’s a good example for narrative since it tells a story; of two gangs (one of clowns) who are fighting each other and we get some insight on the leaders who apparently were good friends as children and are now on a gang warfare.

Concept example : Vampire Weekend - Diane Young The music video for vampire weekend is a good example for concept since it doesn’t really make sense to be a narrative and symbols are mostly used on this video.

Hybrid : Linkin Park- Numb In the music video of numb from linkin park, you can clearly see it’s a hybrid of Narrative and Performance since it tell a story of a girl who struggles to be accepted on school and the band is seen playing when it cuts to them.