This document discusses several common conventions in music videos including: 1) Different types of performances such as lip-synced, live, and dance. 2) Featuring the artist to sell their brand and image. 3) Using different types of narratives like clear stories, clay animation, and abstract ideas. 4) Including close-ups of the artist performing. 5) Varying the mise-en-scene with costumes, locations, props, and lighting. 6) Having either only the non-diegetic music track or including additional sound elements.

1. Convention: performance
Here we have examples of the different types of performance within music videos – lip-synced
in Ugly Heart by G.R.L., live in Teenage Dirtbag by Weezer, and dance
performance in Runaway by Kanye West and Islands by The XX.

2. Convention: artist feature
In the majority of music videos the
band or artist feature because
essentially the purpose of videos is to
sell them as a brand and create a
certain image with which they can be
marketed. Here are two examples
from different genres – Rihanna in
Diamonds and Alex Turner in Arctic
Monkeys’ song Cornerstone.

3. Convention: narrative
I have collected examples of different types of narrative here. Videos like Telephone by
Lady Gaga and Beyonce have a very clear narrative. Similarly the video for the song
Aberdeen by Cage The Elephant uses narrative, this time through clay animation. Other
videos have more abstract narratives like Avalanches by A Fine Frenzy. And some have
no narrative at all, like Lonely Boy by The Black Keys which simply features one man
dancing alone to the song.

4. Convention: close-ups
Close-ups are almost guaranteed to feature in music videos, usually to show the artist
performing. The examples below include Jessie J in her song Bang Bang, Meghan
Trainor in All About That Bass and Childish Gambino in Sweatpants ft. Problem.

5. Convention: varying mise-en-scene
A variety of mise-en-scene is what
defines a video’s aesthetic and makes it
interesting, therefore most videos use a
range of different costumes, locations,
props, lighting etc. The example from
Budapest by George Ezra here shows
how costume can vary even just in one
shot. The other images, all taken from
The Boys by Nicki Minaj ft. Cassie,
demonstrate just how many different
variations of mise-en-scene can be
included in one video.

6. Convention: sound
Usually music videos only have the non-diegetic track playing and mute all other sound.
The Wombats’ Techno Fan video is an example of this. However other videos may also
follow a different convention of having sound breaks for dialogue, usually used to
progress narrative like with Sam Smith’s I’m Not The Only One.