Tinie Tempah - Written In The Stars (Feat. Eric Turner) on MUZU.
I am analyzing the music video for 'Written In The Stars' by the artist 'Tinie Tempah'. The video was directed by Alex Herron and was shot in New York City. The single belongs to the British Hip Hop/Rap genre and was produced by 'Ishi'.
Throught the video, we can see many examples of the images on screen working with and amplifying the lyrics. For example, Tinie Tempah points at the sky when the lyric 'written in the stars' can be heard, and he mimes the action of hitting a ball with a bat during the lyric 'work with a racket and bat'.
The flashbacks show what we can assume to be the artist as a child. They always show him alone and writing some distance from other children; and at one point we see another child take his papers and throw them on the ground. These images help portray what the lyrics are saying about a journey and a dream, and they amplify the message through showing the contrast between his past and present. The flashbacks show a child who is appears weak and is always sitting and not speaking, and the present day shots show low angle shots of Tinie Tempah on a tall building in New York City. These then-and-now images amplify the lyric's messgae of the huge change he has undergone as an individual.
Aside from the relationship between the narative of the video and the music. There is a relationship between the music itself and the pace and style of the editing. For example when the music begins, the beat has not yet entered, each clip lasts around 3-5 seconds. However as the beat enters and the rapping begins, the music's pace changes and the video changes with it. The cuts are now only just over a second apart and are always in time with a certain drum pattern. When the music returns the the chorus, (which contains slower paced singing, piano and unlike in the first chorus, a beat) the editing is of a similar pace but the shots are different. During the verses the shots were static and other than a couple of the flashback shots, didn't really move; the chorus shots however show fast tracking shots combined with pans to help amplify the euphoric effect the music trys to create.Other than the flash backs and the footage of him on the roof top, most shots of Tinie Tempah are close up to medium shots. This I belive is not a 'notion of looking' but it is to make the video more personal and allow the audience to see the face of the artist in detail enough to read the expressions. This allows them to feel a personal connection with the artist and better understand the journey described by the lyrics.
In the shots of Tinie Tempah however, it is not only an emotional conection the producers want to build but also an image. He is wearing modern clothing and sunglasses, this tells the audience that he is in-tune with modern culture and presents the image of a person the audience will look up and relate to.The overall video is neither prerformance nor narative based. A video that is highly performance based would be something like 'Single Ladies' by 'Beyoncé' and on the other hand, there are highly narative-based videos like 'Bedshaped' by 'keane'. This vidieo however shows elements of narative in the flashbacks but there is no real story other than the contrast between past and present. The rest of the video is the artist rapping to the camera of moving around on a roof. The clips that feature Eric turner (who sings the chorus) simply show him playing the piano, but it is not really 'performing', but more watching the artists make the music, and feeling part of it. I think this type of music video is typical of the genre and follows convention in that sense.
