Hype Williams is a very famous and established music video director. Most of his videos feature of the idea of artificiality and a very much like to exemplify the artist as of something fantasy. Mainly his music videos primarily convey wealth, power and showcase the artist as someone with a lot of that. The emphasis on fantasy in his videos is showcased in such videos as Missy Elliott's work it and the hit from Busta Rhymes and Janet Jackson in 1999. Most people may not know exactly what music videos Hype William has produced in the industry but most people will have seen a Hype Williams music video if they have watched MTV in the last 10 years. I will be using Goodwin’s Analysis to analyse his music videos and referencing auteur theory as well.
For example in Kanye West “All of the Lights” there is a great example of this as the artist name is in florescent highlighted lights which remains important to emphasise their star name. Also in “All of the Lights” you can clearly see that that the text being bold conveys the idea of star theory and having the bold flashing text makes it clear to the audience that they are the stars of the video.
Also buys into the notion of being very extravagant which a lot of rappers like showcasing their videos as a showpiece of their worth. Also the text that appears on screen in the video is not dissimilar to the text the audience hears. Which in turn creates a stronger link between video and lyrics.
In most modern music videos you can see a flamboyant car and beautiful women. All of the Lights is the epitome of a Hype Williams video. It references gaze theory, star theory and auteur theory. It’s bold and exaggerates the power of the artist.It could be that the music industry has copied the idea of Hype Williams’ music videos rather than vice versa.
The way the stars names appear like names on a cinema listing showcases how much of a brand their name is. Almost as if they are the ones selling the music video rather than the lyrics themselves. They is also featured Kanye West “Can't tell me nothing” music video on a West is alone in the desert with key lighting ahead of him with the sun shining down on him contouring every part of his body almost illuminating him. This is another showcase of Williams’ hyping up artists to a super human status. As with most of his videos most of the video is performance based rather than conceptual.
In terms of the song relating to the lyrics to song was a one are because of the lights itself is as strong feature in this music video downloads a bright flashing lights and the lyrics reflect that. “All of the Lights” could be a metaphor itself for the fact that most stars have to deal with the pressure of being in the spotlight constantly and the video reflects this by including many conventions of the star theory. Using a plethora of lights is one example of this.
And when Rihanna says “extra bright, I wish y’all could see this” the camera starts flashing on Rihanna and she becomes and everything around there becomes brighter than she becomes the subject of the music video whereas Kanye West was before.
This is another showcase of Hype Williams’ ideologies and Auteur theory. In addition the demands of the He knows that Rihanna and Kanye West are two of the biggest names in the music industry today so Williams knows that he has to give adequate time to Rihanna even though she is only featuring. This is done by the demands of the record label time as they both have a wealth of fans and in fact Rihanna will probably have more within the demographic that watches MTV.
Which leads me onto my next point which is about gaze theory and how Hype Williams likes to have the audiences focus on the sexual parts of Rihanna’s anatomy. This is because sexual imagery is proven to excite the brain and used in conjunction with a music video it can make the video better received overall.
This is because most people's mind have now been conditioned to such thing through many films and music videos in the past showcasing the same gaze theory. Gaze theory was coined by Laura Mulvey in the 1990s.There's also the reoccurring angle of the fisheye lens which is a feature of many Hype Williams’ videos where her likes to exaggerate the dominance the artist has over the audience it again shows how hype Williams likes to make the artist the subject of the video.
In Kanye West “Homecoming” Hype Williams likes to highlight Kanye West as one of Chicago's main musical influences. To do this you has car near West control in the city when this moving vehicle with mirrors reflecting are directly around him. This conveys the idea that West basically controls a city and its influences and my basically everything revolves around him.
Further emphasised by the numerous are clips of little children or children ,privileged neighbourhoods/neglected neighbourhoods which shows that Kanye West is able to touch each and every corner of Chicago and his musical influences know no bounds.
In terms of inter-textual references in the video it does bear some resemblance to Jay-Z's 2004 hit “99 problems”. In that video the director wanted to portray Jay-Z's Brooklyn as an art piece rather than the clichéd typical rundown rap music video that would be set in the same location and the same ideology and concept is used in Kanye West “Homecoming” by Hype Williams.
In fact this is a contest contrary to most of Hype Williams’ videos the majority of them are bold and simply about showing off wealth rather than actually trying to be an art piece. But this again relates to Auteur Theory as no matter what type of video Hype Williams produces its concepts and ideologies are always clear and very prominent.
The definition of the star is not a real person brand image disrupted by many materials such as advertising and television tonight. Hype Williams plays heavily on this definition in all of his music videos to exemplify the artist as a brand name rather than a musical artist. This creates divergence between the audience and the singer which in turn makes the audience more likely to idolise them as idolization bears.
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