We all know the traditional music video is dead — MTV took care of that a long time ago. But there’s always room for innovation. And so it appears with The Black Keys’ latest video for the song, “Howlin’ For You.” Could this be the next evolution of the music video?
The video (below) plays out like a movie trailer — interesting enough — but with the song itself providing just background music. The video is a full narrative and there’s even a full cast; including Corbin Bernsen, former Playboy model Tricia Helfer and “Sir” Todd Bridges of Diff’rent Strokes. The Black Keys’ stuffed dinosaur even makes an appearance.
This is the first time I’ve seen a music video that actually puts the music in the background, instead focusing much more on the narrative. But it’s not the first time The Keys have experimented with video. The aforementioned dinosaur starred in “Next Girl” and an early music video release of “Tighten Up,” both of which took a decidedly less-than-traditional approach to the music video.
It’s an interesting concept and, really, it makes sense. Thanks to YouTube and the Flip handheld video camera, fans can watch countless hours of live footage of their favorite bands. And that’s great. But it also means that the standard music video needs to offer more than just stylized re-creations of a performance (I’m looking at you, Pearl Jam). They need to tell a story. Well, mission accomplished with “Howlin’ For You.”
So, while the music video is no longer a factor on television, it could be that we are entering the next golden era of the music video … online. Are The Black Keys onto something here?
Watch the video, and you tell me.
Watching music videos and listening to music on YouTube is about to change. A flurry of analysis and projection has YouTube losing upwards of $470 million this year. And overwhelmingly, the most watched videos on YouTube are entertainment. That includes music videos, and the record labels are none to happy about it.
Turns out, they are losing (or just not earning) millions because artists’ music videos are getting millions of views and generating zero revenue. So lately Warner has pulled music video from YouTube. Germany and the UK saw all major label video get pulled as well. So, is the same thing going to happen in the US?
At this point, probably not likely. However, the more record labels that pull out of YouTube, the worse off we’re all going to be. Fans, that is. When official videos start disappearing, YouTube will be forced to pull other videos of the same artists. It also could turn out that when labels cut deals with Google and YouTube for “official” music video content, the “unauthorized” ones will start to disappear. And that could include concert footage – bad news for Sound Citizens everywhere.
Of course, this all speculation. But here’s hoping the labels strike deals with someone like Hulu instead.
For good measure, here’s a video from AC/DC. An “official” video from a Warner artist. I guess they haven’t removed everything yet. Let’s hope YouTube and fans keep rocking.
This is one incredible use of YouTube. Kutiman, an Israeli musician who started playing piano at age 6, then drums and guitar, has taken numerous clips from YouTube and mashed them all up to create an entire album of songs. Some of the clips aren’t even musical in nature. But added together, mixed and remixed, it turns into a symphony of sound and vision. Clicking on the “more info” link on his YouTube videos will show you all of the videos used to compose each song.
Kutiman becamed influenced by the likes of James Brown and Fela Kuti while listening to a college radio station at his convenience store job. He then traveled to Jamaica, eventually working with Stephen and Damien Marley to perfect his funk/afro beat sound.
Below is one of the songs and video. Also, check out Thru-You.com to see and hear the rest of the album, and Kutiman’s MySpace page to hear some of his other music.
(Video after the jump) YouTube is a great way to find concert recordings of your favorite artists. Unfortunately, many times the recordings are just plain bad (I’m guilty of the same.) So, take a look at kurt654. This 20-year-old (he sure looks older than that) has more than 660 subscribers to his channel, as well as 268 video uploads. And just about all of them are of very high sound and video quality.
Some of the artists included in kurt654′s catalog include Tegan and Sara, John Mayer, Beck, Vampire Weekend and one of my personal favorites, The Raconteurs. A sample is below, but there’s plenty more where that came from.
If you’re reading this blog, you probably already know about last.fm and pandora.com. Soundflavor borrows a little from each but adds in some interesting extras, beginning with the home page.
Start browsing by entering an artist or song, or browse by genre, lyrics, decade or free downloads. I started with Rock, narrowed it down to Indie Rock, then set “Flavor Filters” (parameters) of Mellow and Medium Slow. My results included songs by Modest Mouse, Blur, Cake, Beck, Gomez, Belle & Sebastian, Spoon and a host of others, including some I’ve never heard before. If you click “one-click” next to any of the results, you’ll get a new list that closely resembles the sound of that artist/song. If you click on any of the songs, you’ll see a listing of other videos, and some of the “Flavors” associated with that song – useful for future searches. Similarly, click on the artist name and get more videos by them and the “Artist Flavors.” Hit the “Play This Page” button and a small pop-out window appears where videos of the songs play from the generated playlist in a small widget that you can also embed on your blog or website.
The videos are all from YouTube and, as such, you get a mixed bag. You’ll find the real videos from the artists, but you might also find some recordings from Conan O’Brien or other live recordings – not a bad thing, in my opinion. That said, everything I saw (with few exceptions) was of a very high quality, unlike many other sites out there. On the down side, the volume from one video to the next would sometimes change. You can choose to skip the ones you don’t like.
Search by lyrics by choosing from emotions, such as loneliness. My search for Loneliness and a genre of Blues included Clapton, Elmore James, Muddy Waters and … Indigo Girls. Too bad there’s not a sub-genre of “my baby left me and took the dog too,” but hey, nobody’s perfect.
One of my favorite search options is by decade. I chose 1970s with Flavor Filters of “Folk” and “Contemporary” and got a list with James Taylor, Kansas, Cat Stevens, Bob Dylan and Neil Young.
A really cool feature of Soundflavor lets you upload any of your iTunes playlists, then get back a corresponding video playlist.
Finally, like most sites these days, there are social features. You can build a profile (where you can alter and save playlists), search for and make friends and share playlists.
After using Soundflavor, I have to say it’s fun. I think it’s a good tool for music discovery – there’s seemingly no end to the filters and options. But I’m still partial to Pandora, for no other reason than it’s ease-of-use. I can open my browser and start listening without a click. If I get bored, a couple clicks starts a new station and I’m back to doing other things. But if you have the time and feel like exploring, Soundflavor delivers the goods.
