Blink 182- All

The Small

Things: Textual

Analysis.

This song is a perfect example of the rock genre of music being seen as 'rebellious' and 'mischievous'. This video basically revolves around making fun of other music videos mostly ones of the pop genre.

There is no particular narrative in this music video. It is mainly a performance video. However it breaks the performance clip conventions. Usually when a music video is a performance clip (Sven Carrison 1999) there is only one or two locations used because it is obviously focussing more on the performance aspect. Whereas this video is a performance but has a wide range of locations that it uses. This is because the reason of the video is to mock pop music. This could suggest that the mocking aspect of the video is a narrative because they are playing particular characters in order to portray themselves as pop musicians.

Blink 182- All The Small Things

Backstreet Boys- I Want It That Way

CinematographyThe cinematography that is used in this music video is a lot of long shots or medium close ups. There are rarely any close ups. The long shots are always of the band so you can identify them and see all of them. It is also making it easier for the audience to see their locations they are in, making it easier for the audience to understand the ‘jokes’ in their videos. There is mainly the use of long shots when it is the ‘joke’ performance this is so the audience will be able to identify the locations. Then close ups and medium close ups when the band are performing as themselves. This is to let the audience know when they are in the video as themselves or the pop singers who they are mocking. There are also not many camera movements involved in this video, except for a very slow pan that is shown during a long shot. There is no particular narrative included in this video, therefore there isn’t any framing, angles and movements that are purposely used to help tell the narrative.

EditingFor the genre of music the editing in this video is actually quite slow paced. This could also be a representation of them being rebellious and not conforming because they have not used the typical conventions that you would usually expect to see.

Twelve edits are used in the chorus, which seems like quite a lot of edits however what needs to be considered is the length of the chorus which was 0:43- 1:03, making it twenty seconds long so twelve edits in twenty seconds is quite slow paced for a rock song.

There are quite a lot of zooms used during this music video, quite often during the chorus this could be to add to the jokey aspect of the video because usually you wouldn’t see zooms used during a performance music video.

Example of a zoom

SoundThere is no other sound in this music video except for the

lyrics. There is diegetic sound right at the beginning but

all you can hear is sounds you would usually hear outside

such as traffic, or just noise.

This is because there doesn’t need to be any other ‘acting’

involved in this music video for the audience to

understand what the purpose or narrative of this video is.

Usually in music videos if there is a narrative the story

will match what is portrayed in the lyrics. This music

video does not do that, the lyrics have no meaning to the

video therefore making it an abstract narrative. This could

also show the anti-conforming behaviour of the band

because they are once again not using the typical

conventions.

Conventions

Many rock music videos do not follow the typical conventions of a music video because they are trying to be seen as ‘rebellious’ and different to other artists.

However because it has become such a common thing for rock artists to show this non-conforming and rebellious behaviour in their music videos, they have become typical conventions of the rock genre and therefore are not that different from each other anymore.

Mise-en-sceneThere are many costume changes during this music video.

These are mainly used for comedy purposes as the main

focus of this music video is to mock pop music and pop

artists. The silly costumes are used to amuse the audience

and to dramatize how pop artists actually dress in their

music videos.

There’s one clip in the video when the lead singer is wearing

goofy teeth hinting that is how pop artists usually look. This

is once again to make the video funny, showing there isn’t

really a proper meaning for the video.

The locations that have been used have purposely been

selected to look like the same locations that are used in the

pop videos they are mocking. For example at the start of the

video they are wearing white suits and are in an airport, this

is very similar to the setting included in Backstreet Boys ‘I

want it that way’, they have done this because it straight

away shows the audience what they are trying to portray in

their music video. So the audience will be able to enjoy it

and find it funny instead of wondering what they are doing.

InstitutionOne of the labels that Blink 182 are signed

to are ‘Interscope’ this institution has also

signed similar bands such as ‘All Time

Low’ and ‘The 1975’.

All Time Low are very similar to Blink 182

which suggests why Interscope would have

signed them. This means that All Time Low

will be able to promote Blink 182 and vice

versa.

Interscope would have purposely signed All

Time Low and Blink 182 because they are

such similar bands. So it means that if

Blink 182 promoted All Time Low to their

fans or the other way around, the majority

of the fan base would enjoy their music as

well and would start consuming it, Which

then will create a bigger fan base for the

band and will make them and the institution

more money, and will also give them more

publicity.