The music video for "Why'd You Only Call Me When You're High?" by Arctic Monkeys uses several cinematic techniques. It contains long sustained shots rather than quick cuts, and many close-ups of Alex Turner's face to capture his emotional expressions. The sound starts as one song and transforms as the effects of being high intensify. Editing shows both Turner's attempts to contact someone and the hallucinations he experiences when intoxicated, reflecting the lyrics. Mise-en-scene presents a realistic bar setting through the characters' clothing and surroundings. Overall, the video enhances the song's themes through visual and auditory elements according to theories about how music videos can amplify and authenticate the musical content.

1. Music video analysis.
By Guy Nicholson

2. Arctic Monkeys Why’d You Only Call
Me When Your High?

3. Camera
• In the music video there are not that
many straight cuts and have longer
sustained shots instead, this is
different from most other songs of
this genre as they mostly have lots of
straight cuts throughout. The camera
does many close ups of Alex Turner’s
face, this is typical of music videos
from this genre as it features a lot in
videos for The killers and The Kooks,
this close up is also used in the music
video as there is a lot of emotion
going through his face due to being
high and the camera focuses on his
face to capture the emotion and add
to the authenticity of the shots.

4. Sound
• The sound in the music video is a mix of
two different songs, it first starts off with
‘Do I Wanna Know’ and then it finishes
with the main song. The sound has an
effect on what is happening in the music
video as at around 1:30 the sound
begins to change and Alex Turner starts
to get bad hallucinations, the sound gets
deeper and the beats become longer
and warped and this sound can
represent the feeling of being drowsy
which is one of the symptoms of being
high. This can be backed up by Pete
Fraser’s theory of amplification where
the song is linked to the song but the
ideas are developed further as the music
video goes on to show his symptoms.

5. Mise-en-scene
• The mise-en-scene of this video shows
similarities and differences between
itself and other music videos from
that genre. In the video it shows
similarities to others as the main
character and many others are
wearing dark, relaxing clothing which
reflects the personality of the band
and also reflects the situation they are
in as the main character is in a bar
with his friends enjoying himself. This
aspect is part of Pete Fraser’s theory
that the mise-en-scene makes the
video more authentic so location is
key and I believe that it is shown in
this clip as the mise-en-scene shows a
level of authenticity

6. Editing
• Throughout the video there is a lot of editing,
some of it to show you what Alex Turner is
trying to do and some of it is to show you what
he sees when he is high. According to Andrew
Goodwin’s theories it states that the lyrics can
have an influence on what the music video is
about, the Arctic Monkeys song here shows
this as it is saying ‘Why’d you only call me
when your high?’ and in the music video Alex
Turner can be seen to try and contact a
woman when he is high as shown through the
text message animation and the hallucinations
he gets.