1. Textual Analysis of Music Videos
The video I’m analysing is Lost Ones by J Cole. The video was directed by
Bergman and Bohichik. J Coles music fits into the Hip Hop and R&B genre and
the video follows the typical codes and conventions of this genre.
http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=y-vQ_VsTkn0&ob=av2e
2. In the video the lyrics are very much represented by the visuals. The narrative
in the video is played out by J Cole and a female who are in an apartment; the
story is a conversation between the two of them which is also the narrative in
the lyrics. The video starts with a medium shot of J Cole and a girl stood in
front of the window, the lyrics are represented by J Cole miming them and
using body language and hand movements. For example he places his finger
over the girl’s mouth when the lyrics say ‘hold up now let me finish’.
3. There is then a split screen where there is a
close up of J Cole on one side saying the lyrics,
on the other side another close up of the girl
and her facial expressions reacting to what he
is saying.
As the second verse starts a birds eye track
shot of the girl moving from the kitchen into
the living room is used. The girl is pointing and
using her hands to illustrate the emotion in the
lyrics ‘She said nigga you got the nerve to
come up to me talking’ bout abortion’.
4. It then cuts to a medium close up of J Cole
lying in a bed and then cuts to a close up of
hands grasping each other on top of a duvet.
This represents the lyrics ‘who be claiming that
they love you just to get up in them draws
knowing all the right things to say I let you hit
it raw motherfucker’.
5. The lyric ‘this is a new life up in my stomach’ is illustrated
by the girl pointing and placing her hands on her stomach.
The video then cuts to shots of a little boy (J
Cole lookalike) playing in a playground and a
man looking through the gates at the boy
before walking away. This is signifying the lyrics
‘bout your father and you told me that you
hate that nigga talking bout he a coward and
you so glad that you aint that nigga’.
6. The music and visuals in the video very much work
together. During the verse the video uses faster cutting
and has lots of different shots being cut to throughout.
However as the beat slows down in the chorus so does
the editing and there is less shots being cut to. At the
end of the video there is an instrumental with just the
lyrics ‘what about your seed nigga’ being repeated. The
music is slower here and it is illustrated by a medium
shot of J Cole looking into a playground and at the same
pace of the music zooms in to a close up.
7. There are many shots of the artist. For his
performance shots he is wearing: black
jeans, trainers, a green t shirt and a black
jacket and is rapping on top of a roof which
has graffiti on the wall behind him this
conforms to the conventions of hip hop. A
mixture of different shot are used but
particularly medium close ups. Often the shots
were worms eye showing J Coles higher status.
During the narrative he is wearing the same
style of clothing as in the performance shots.
Through the video he is represented as a
typical Hip Hop, rapper ‘tough man’.
8. The video uses a mixture of both narrative and
performance based. Most of the video follows the narrative
of a conversation between J Cole and a woman discussing
her unwanted pregnancy.
The performance shots are on the top of a
building with many buildings behind and a wall
covered in graffiti . This is typical of this genre.
