Video Killed the Radio Star" is a song by the British synthpop/New Wave group The Buggles, released as their debut single on 7 September 1979, on Island Records. The song topped the music chart in several countries and has been covered by many recording artists. It was the first music video shown on MTV in the U.S. at 12:01am on 1 August 1981.
MTV, formerly an initialism of Music Television, is an American network based in New York City that launched on August 1, 1981. The original purpose of the channel was to play music videos guided by on-air hosts known as VJs. the concept of the VJ was popularized, the idea of a dedicated video-based outlet for music was introduced, and both artists and fans found a central location for concert music events, news, and promotion. MTV has also been referenced countless times in popular culture by musicians, other TV channels and television program, films, and books.
The video begins with a juxtaposed image of lead singer, Trevor Horn in black and white and a young girl in colour tuning into a radio in the back ground. Irony is used here as the lyrics ‘tuning in on you’ are in equal timing to the girl tuning into the radio. It isn’t until 45 seconds into the video that the girl finally tunes into her radio station. Where with a TV the audience has instant viewing of what’s on instead of having to find the right wave length to find signal, which shows how T.V’s are more sophisticated than radios. The mise en scene of the radio is mostly being focused on at the beginning of the video, as by the end, the mise en scen is of numerous TV’s, which is being dedicated as the new technology. The diegetic sound of the chorus is ‘video killed the radio star’ and on the word ‘killed’, the young girls radio blows up. The explosion of the radio shows the beginning of a new ear, and the end of the previous one.
In the second chorus the lyrics ‘in my mind and in my car, we can't rewind we've gone too far’ relates to the audience not being able to rewind or listen to the song again until it is next played, so if part of the lyrics were missed, they were unable to listen to them, whereas on television the song was going to be played more frequent and if certain lyrics were missed, the audience could rewind the TV and listen again.
The editing technique where the contrast between the black and white overlapping the colour images are used to show, the audience the different quality of which Is expected on TV and how like TV was the future, colour was the future.
T.V was seen as indicative of post modern society and it was often the wealthier citizens whom had the privilege off owning a T.V.
For the middle of the music video between 1 minute 10 seconds and 1 minute 57 I find there is no real relationship between the video and the lyrics of the song. As, the scene cuts to a science lab, where the lead singer is wearing a lab coat, and there is a woman dressed as some form of space creature floating in a cylinder tube, whilst the pianist is playing in the back ground. The only real significance I can find in this is, just like man has visited the moon, and space is now known as the way forward in there are many unanswered questions, that like space, T.V is the way forward and is being taken over.
A low angle shot is then used looking up at the young girl sitting on a pile of radios. Another explosion takes place where smoke is used to create a sense of danger and radios aren’t wanted anymore, and then the chorus ‘Video killed the radio star’ kicks in to rephrase the fact, that T.V’s are now coming into power.
A zoomed in shot is then used, to view a number of televisions, growing out of the floor and replacing the radios.
In conclusion of after analysing the video, I feel the main objective of the video is to inform the audience that radio’s are becoming out dated, and that TVs are coming into power. They have reiterated this by exploding the radios and replacing them with TVs.
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