Nirvana - In Bloom textual analysis

2. Introduction
• Nirvana was an American rock band that was formed by singer and guitarist Kurt
Cobain and bassist Krist Novoselic in Aberdeen, Washington, in 1987.
• Despite releasing only three full-length studio albums in their seven-year career,
Nirvana has come to be regarded as one of the most influential and important rock
bands of the modern era. Though the band split in 1994, they are still considered a
huge influence on modern rock music, and influences on alternative rock as a whole.
• In the late 1980s, Nirvana established itself as part of the Seattle grunge scene,
releasing its first album Bleach for the independent record label Sub Pop in 1989. The
band eventually came to develop a sound that relied on dynamic contrasts, often
between quiet verses and loud, heavy choruses.

3. The music video begins with a presenter introducing to
the crowd to the band, as they later on perform the song
live to an audience. Music videos like this were very
common in the 1900’s because of the limited budget. This
video is like their other videos in the sense that all of their
videos have a performance based plot with a narrative as
well. The video for ‘In Bloom’ has been shot with a 1960’s
feel and in black and white, which none of their other
videos have. Their video for the song ‘Smells like teen
spirit’ also has a crowd but in that video, the crowd seem
livelier because they jump up from their seats while in
this video they just cheer throughout the video.
In the 1970’s music videos became as important as the
music itself; people began to see themselves as video
artists as well as musical artists, however despite this,
Nirvana kept their music videos simple and remained
using live performances as their video for ‘In Bloom’
similar to its other music videos.

4. This video is split into two parts. The majority of the
video is the band being shown dressed in suits and
playing their instruments normally while the second is
them dressed in dresses, tearing apart the stage
causing havoc; the second part of the video, they’re
shown as how they are majority of the time to the
public. This video shows them acting differently to how
they normally would, which could suggest they’re
putting on a front while dressing in suits when they
actually feel like being reckless and tearing the stage
apart. Artists were usually known for adapting a
persona and acting like a different person whilst
performing since the 1970’s, similar to David Bowie
who started this trend. Since this video is set in the
1960’s it could be referring to how even though their
songs are just becoming popular and they’re just being
noticed on the radio they’ve been around for a long
time, obviously not as long as the 1960’s but I feel
that’s what they’re trying to show.

5. Andrew Goodwin identifies 5 key aspects of music videos that
we the audience should look out for which are:
• Thought beats – Seeing the sound.
• Narrative and Performance.
• The Star Image.
• Relation of Visuals to Song.
• Technical Aspects of Music Video.
Narrative & Performance:
There is a relationship between the lyrics and the video made for this song. The title of the song ‘In Bloom’ is also
featured in the song lyrics. These lyrics may suggest they are the most presentable they have been in their music
career and showing their true selves. This song is about the fame they’ve received after their breakthrough single
‘Smells like teen spirit’ in 1991 and how people like them because other people do, yet they don’t understand what
their music is really about. This is where the lyric ‘He’s the one who likes all our pretty songs’ comes from.
Additionally, Nirvana are shown described as ‘thoroughly all right and decent fells’ which is completely different to
how they actually are shown.
(Andrew) Goodwin’s Theory

6. Star Image (protagonist):
The whole of the music video shows lots of camera
shots making the band the centre of attention.
Goodwin referred to the star image a as a very vital
aspect of a music video, they making the music
video look more appealing to the audiences and
bring a unique style to the video in the way he is
portrayed. The start image is always very unique in
the way he presents himself, the costume, moves
and appearance, in this term, Nirvana are
presented in suits for the majority of the video.
This help to promote the artist/star’s image in
public and also helps to promote the video and
helps to build a public reputation.
Technical aspect of a music video:
Andrew says that the technical aspect helps to hold the
music video together through the use of mis-en-scene,
special effects sound and editing . Lighting and colour helps
to set the mood for the music video and create emphasis on
significant parts of the song to create a dramatic effect and
thrill the audience. ‘In Bloom’ has an early 1960’s feel as it’s
filmed on an old camera and is continuously in black and
white. The B+W effect creates a mysterious feel to the song
which was likely to be intended whilst meeting the
expectations of an rock/grunge genre of music. Mis-en-
scene is also very vital to the production of the music video,
it can help the artist gain authentication and in this
particular music video the band shows a fake ‘persona’ of
themselves (showing how artists may act to gain publicity)
followed by them acting realistically and being themselves,
which is very rare in a music video and creates originality.
The beats of the song are also very useful as they can help
to create effective cuts that go with the rhythm of the song
to make the music video look more entertaining.