Michael Jackson

Michael Jackson was known as one of the best music artists of all time, he was known for his artistic videos, amazing dancing and perfect singing.

“Rock with You”  1979

After being in the The 'Jackson5' Michael went on to being solo and released his first song called 'Rock With You.' This video is very sophisticated and uses he has focused on costuming and lighting for this music video. In terms of the theory of Andrew Goodwin, Jackson's video includes numerous close ups of his face that can develop a motifs which can recur across his work.

"Billie Jean" 1982
After 'Rock with You', people began to want to hear more from him which led to 'Billie Jean' being released. First interesting Pop Video that tells a story and does more than just Lip Syncing and everyone loved the song and especially the music video. In terms of Goodwins theory, this video makes an intertextual reference to a film as the set up of the music video looks as if it was a film set and the whole story of the music video is exactly like a film it contained buildups, excitement and suspense.





"Beat it" 1983
After 'Billie Jean' everyone was amazed by Michael Jackson and wanted to hear more from him as he was making his way to the top of the podium and music charts. He then released 'Beat it' which is different from his past music videos and this one showcases his dance moves. In this music video there is a relationship between the visuals and lyrics which is known as as illustrate, this is when Music videos can use a set of images to illustrate the meaning of lyrics & genre, this is the most common.



"Thriller 1983"
This was Michaels biggest song,  he music video is considered the most famous music video of all time, at least by the Library of Congress, which added it to its National Film Registry in 2009, the first music video in their registry. he long version of "Thriller" runs nearly 14 minutes, but had remarkable longevity, easily racking up over 100 million views when it showed up on YouTube. MTV usually ran the short version, which ran a little under five minutes but still contained about a minute of non-song content in a storyline that omits most of the movie the couple is watching at the beginning. In this video there is an intertextual reference to films, at the start of the video they are watching a film and during the music video the film at the start is brought to life almost.

“Bad” 1987

Following “Thriller” he was the biggest pop star in the world. His videos made the news. The video of “Bad” was a major event. Shown for the first time on BBC. Many people were so excited and wanted to see his new image and new dance moves. The demands of the record label will include the need for lots of close-ups of the artist and the artist may develop motifs which recur across their work.

"The Way You Make Me Feel"  1987

Laura Mulvey’s theory relates to classical Hollywood cinema. However, we can apply some of her ideas to our work on the pop video.

The male gaze =

women viewed as the objects of male erotic desire – in film and audience

men active / women passive.

Women do not   have agency – they do not move the plot forward.

The audience is forced to identify with male gaze.

There is a relationship between lyrics and visuals which i believe is amplifying, the video does relate to the lyrics but not 100%.c

“Black or White” 1991 ($4,000,000 – Today $6,925,000).

• The pop video was very expensive and inventive.
• Used to try and resurrect his career (allegations of being ‘strange’)
• Problems with his image – white skin.
• Serious message.

the video is linked with the video which is known as illustration.

Scream  1995 Cost $7,000,000 (Today $10,834,000)

Jackson began to lose his streak of great videos and therefore led to him making a video with his sister Janet Jackson who was getting bigger at the time. this video has an intertextual reference to a film of some sort for example a sci-fi film.