What’s Your Favorite Music Video Type?

YouTube is my “go-to” source when I want to listen to a song—either before I purchase the song or when I’m trying to recall an older song. Of course I can listen to the song snippet on iTunes or Amazon.com, but YouTube is so much faster. As I have perused a number of music videos on YouTube, I have discovered that most of the videos fall into one of four categories: Band Playing, Story, Slideshow, or Still Pictures.

Music Video Classifications

Band Playing – Whether video from concerts, recording studio clips, or professional footage of band members playing a song, this type of video is entertaining to watch. This type of music video allows musicians to connect with their fans and potential venue schedulers on an ‘on demand’ timeframe. Fans and schedulers are able to see what the members of a band look like with the added bonus of hearing the musicians perform. Eclectic Verve’s music video for “Through the Eyes of God” falls into this category.

Story – The “story” video concept was originally created on VH1 and MTV. This is still widely used by musicians to share their song inspiration or music concept. “Story” videos are either performed by band members or sometimes actors/actresses act out the lyrics being sung or portray the song’s theme. Our video for “Am I Crazy?” is an example of a story music video. Kent and I portrayed the theme of the song through imagery.

Slideshow – A “slideshow” allows the singer/songwriter or band to provide something visually interesting as a backdrop to the music the listener is hearing. Sometimes the slideshow might be similar to the “story” category, in that it explains the music. In other examples of this type of music video, the videographer may just display a series of pretty or interesting pictures or slides. Our video for “Going to Colorado” employs this format.

Still Pictures – This category is similar to a slideshow, but does not include any movement. This type seems to be utilized most often when a music video is made for an old song. One or more still pictures are used. Eclectic Verve has not utilized this type of music video to date.

Video Platform Conundrums

When you troll through the music videos on YouTube, what type of video stands out as your favorite? I have an affinity for all of the above types—depending on my mood and the goal of the ‘research project’ that brought me to the video in the first place.

I feel YouTube (or Vimeo or any other video platform) is another important way to share our music. My only concern is how frequently I am thwarted from finding the “official video” for a song. It seems it is much easier and more common to find videos that are obvious copyright infringements of the original work. With the vast number of videos being uploaded, I’m sure it is a difficult task to protect the rights of musicians without unduly censoring all of the users of the video platform, but as a musician, I wish copyright infringement weren’t so prolific.