Music video cliches - let us count them all

* A street battle, conducted in dance

* Humans as exotic animals or birds in the Amazon or somewhere rainforest. That they are hunters by nature is indicated by their sharp gazes, sudden head movements with stationary body, etc

* For entire clip, camera pans along a string or lead, in and out of amusing vignettes and structures.

* Is the band glam? Hip hop? Doo wop? Hair metal? Who knows, but they do have all the outfits, and they are trying out all the options. (PS: they are actually indie rock)

* Scenes of guy writing piano ballad interspersed with faux home movie footage of happier times with his former woman.

Hen fap

* Wacky storyline featuring the band intercut with footage of them playing in a studio for the chorus just to prove that they are proper musicians as well as being wacky

^^^ That's known as "The Foo Fighters Manoeuvre" btw

* Band is rocking inside an abandoned warehouse

* Assorted people in cafes, on the street, at a theme park, etc, are mouthing along to the lyrics. EVERYONE is the singer.

* Torrential rainstorm erupts during chorus

* boobs everywhere

* Stuff falling down some stairs in slow motion

* Drummer only shown when playing 8th grade fills

*country band playing song on the farm, intercut with idealized signifiers of small town American life, nod to veterans or patriotism

*drinking crystal in the club w/ requisite homies and bitches

* Putting 'em on the glass

* Band is rocking in the middle of a field to no one

*the female pop star plays both the cheated on girlfriend and the girl he's cheating on her with (usually w/ a redhead wig)

*indie band's video is a mini remake of an obscure art film

*entire video performer on an entirely white background

* dude walking down rainy city street, lonely, searching for love and answers

* chicks in cages

*entire video performer on an entirely white background

Used by large performers to slim their silhouette out

*the band is portrayed by cute little kids

*crappy early 90's video effects processing near black & white footage of the band playing in an abandoned building. See all the shouty songs that made up 90% of the videos shown on Beavis & Butthead

* frolicking on beach

* Black Metal dudes stood halfway up a bleak, snow-covered mountain

* wacky indie band play song while lounging around a freakily decorated apartment

* All dance videos ever - T&A

* performing 'warmup' in empty stadium
* full stage performance but on a soundstage w/ no audience

* band from Texas, etc., playing song in the desert. Bonus points for a petrol station in the background.

*montage of grainy life-on-the-road vignettes, hair metal guys strumming acoustic guitar

* Bands called Texas, etc., lots of footage of hot lead singer at expense of anonymous spot-welders playing behind her

* water on drumkit, and floor, in warehouse/airplane hangar

* live footage of band shot from mosh pit level intercut with singer miming the song alone in a darkened room lit by a dim light bulb that is gently swinging = sure sign band is about to split due to "creative differences"

*2 minute intro that everyone hates before the music begins.

* has your early 90's dance/rave act unexpectedly had a hit single, but you don't have a video? Just stick together some 3D fractal animations intercut with anonymous dancers jumping around in dayglow tracksuits.

*pretending the band is playing the ed sullivan show

* a scene where an actor playing the singer's father and a younger actor playing the singer as a boy recreate a humiliating scene from the singer's childhood, while the now adult singer looks on sadly.

* singer lives in scumbag apartment and spys on all his neighbours through holes in the walls. The neighbours are acting out lyrics from the song.

* Singer remonstrates to self in mirror - it's the singer's dark side in the mirror, you see. The evil twin mirror knows all the lyrics and may have even written the song.

* a scene where an actor playing the singer's father and a younger actor playing the singer as a boy recreate a humiliating scene from the singer's childhood, while the now adult singer looks on sadly.

aaaahahahaha, so true, so true

* Band which is playing to no one at the beginning of the video gradually attracts listeners over the course of the song. At the end there is a fistpumping wild mob that wants to S the bandmembers' D's, and a crowd surfer.

*performing in the back of a moving pickup truck! for no apparent reason!

*Waitaminnit that fellow is playing a guitar solo on something that isn't a real guitar at all WHAT THE!!!

*Drummer's hand motions do not line up with the music, leading to questions about the director's competency.

*band playing a HS pep rally

* Macaulay Culkin

*the video is about the making of the video! the one you're watching now!

* lead guitarist plays guitar solo while literally miles from any amplification equipment

* singer reaches forward and turns off your TV from the inside

* band audition for school concert, freaking out parents and teachers

* early 90's video with T2 style morphing effects that just look like complete crap now

* Morrisey is flailing around in the desert with silly hair and an open shirt

* this are serious business video ends with a clip of everyone breaking out laughing, cuz you see even serious business musicians are really just good eggs who like having a chuckle just like you and me.

^^^ has to involve everything trailing off, with audio not featured on the album...maybe voices and conversation and ambient noises of the filming of the video creep in during the last solo/fadeout and then are all that's left

* appears to take place in a spaceship whose interior is constructed out of neon tubing and disco lights; wide-angle lenses the only ones apparently available that day

"for no apparent reason!"

The universal motto of music video making. They should translate it to latin and scroll it across MTV's intro credits.

lead singer walking down the street somewhere, looking contemplative

I could have sworn we had a thread like this, but can't find it.

In any case, the one I hate most:

-Guy/Girl walks over to record player, drops needle on record, scratchy noise... well hey, it's the song that this video is for!

Also, why are music videos the only moving visual medium where it is not only acceptable but actively encouraged to do lots of looking straight at the camera?

>> lead singer walking down the street somewhere, looking contemplative

Can also be biking down the street. In both cases this one is amplified by having him/her walk facing the camera. Perhaps he/she passes various things that would seem to be of interest but notices them not.

^^or driving. usually ends with the lead singer arriving at wherever the rest of the band is playing to sing the final chorus.

Rapper throwing cash/bling towards the camera in slow motion.

Matrix style slow motion during the most emotional moments of the video, to emphasize how full with emotion they are.

a day in the life of the singer - waking up, getting dressed, going to work, some interesting things happen, go home and go back to bed.

bonus points if it's a day in the life of a celebrity - includes a scene where the singer is being followed by papparazzi and gets into a limo. usually ends in the hotel bed or bathtub because being famous is so fucking lonely and sad.

band playing on a rooftop

* has your techno/grunge/metal band suddenley got a lot of money to make a video, you need a high budget horror movie pastiche usually ripping off The Fly (lead singer transforms into insect) or set in an insane asylum (lead singer chased by evil insane children/genetic freaks).

*song been in a Major Hollywood Production? The video will somehow insert the band in the movie, depending on budget there will either be sets, lighting and events depicted that are similiar to the movie with the singer playing the part of the movies lead character or at least helping the lead character in some way or if you have less money thne clips from the movie will be interspersed with footage of the band playing in a warehouse.

*the band are replaced by similiar looking puppets/animation/animals.

*Chris Cunningham

*Michel Gondry

*Spike Jonez

*various time-warpages - recorded with vocals at double-speed and then the video slowed (coldplay, "yellow"), or vocals at half-speed and video sped up, or backwards and then reversed (coldplay, "the scientist"), but so that the lip-synching then appears normal but all other action is disorientingly zippy or dreamlike.

* Black Metal dudes stood halfway up a bleak, snow-covered mountain

* Also, Black metal dudes standing around in a forest glen, by a small babbling brook in the late autumn, gesticulating angstily and waving their long hair about.

* Band in room, being lit by slanted sunlight through venetian blinds (a particularly 80s one, this)

venetian blinds + fern. doesn't get much better than that.

*Band frolicking in fountain. With or without their instruments.

* An eagle-eye camera pans across a panoramic landscape, and whaddayouknow! It's the artist/band playing in the middle of the desert or on top of a mountain! With no audience, and no electricity either! How cool is that?!

* Humans as exotic animals or birds in the Amazon or somewhere rainforest. That they are hunters by nature is indicated by their sharp gazes, sudden head movements with stationary body, etc

???

* that stodgy policeman/businessman/postman/old bitty put up a good fight, but eventually even they are a slave to the song and cannot help but shake their tailfeather as part of a street-wandering, giddy mob.

*girls wrestling in mud/foam

* well i don't know why you guys hired me to direct, I have virtually no creativity. But whaddaya say we cycle through all these post-production effect throughout the course of the video? No, they don't really have any connection with the music or lyrics but check out out look at this! it's you but a negative image, crazy huh?

* really fast editing, often making use of outtakes and goofs of the singer messing up the words and laughing, inter-cut with the real deal
* out-of-focus image quickly gets in focus
* hiphop videos with fish-eye lenses

* this song is summery, so look, here we are goofing around in a tropical locale. we got to right off our vacation as a business expense lol.

*not only is the full band miles away from anywhere in desert, mountain range, forest, beach, but there are also no mics and not a single guitar cord for all the non-acoustic instruments they're rockin' out on(the "Temple of the Dog" look)

*onscreen imagery gets more literal depending on what genre band is in(young country, etc)

*videos of one genre ape cliches of videos of other genre, only a decade later(as the Onion pointed out)

* lead singer is in focus in the foreground, rotating cast of musicians that are the "backing band" out of focus in the background.

*band playing in the middle of a warzone or something

*vocalist quits ad libbing for a few seconds, while his/her vocals are still playing, to accomplish some other task involving their mouth, then resumes ad libbing

*Cut to one of the instrumentalists doing a high kick just before the big key change.

haha i like reading this thread like a 'guess the vid'

* While the band plays, the camera gets bored and just happens to follow a route somewhere else that has the lyrics written out/on ever changing t-shirts/cgi to change around them etc.

*Video for a song critiquing consumerism takes place at a grocery store or mall

So many of these are Radiohead videos

video that celebrates the band's hometown / adopted city with various sights and and sounds depicting its beauty, excitement, interest, etc. must include places where band members have had soulful reflections

* rock band playing pool in a scummy bar

* Rock band is incidental to scummy bar (their song is playing on TV, or they are on stage but nobody cares - except maybe the love interest)

* single camera follows singer throughout the whole video while people in the background dance and join in mostly on the chorus
* faux department store with generic brands (a la Repo man) meant to satirize consumerism to sell subversive musical product

* After FX

"Production value" - Tapeheads

* Sadé rides through your video on a horse

* Replace Martha Wash and/or Loleatta Holloway with model.

The words are on various scattered things that we pass in rapid succession - one word on a guy's T-shirt, the next on the side of a milk bottle.

I have got to watch more videos. Some of these cliches sound awesome.

Some All of these cliches sound awesome.

Self-fixed.

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* Humans as exotic animals or birds in the Amazon or somewhere rainforest. That they are hunters by nature is indicated by their sharp gazes, sudden head movements with stationary body, etc

???

― n/a is just more of a character....in a genre polluted by clones (n/a)

Well say like this Duran Duran clip for Rio: see 2:50 onwards -

Ha - I'd figured it was about this:

which apparently has TWO different ILX song ID threads:

African Song
Identify this music video solely based on a loose description?

* Humans as exotic animals or birds in the Amazon or somewhere rainforest. That they are hunters by nature is indicated by their sharp gazes, sudden head movements with stationary body, etc

???

― n/a is just more of a character....in a genre polluted by clones (n/a)

This is, if nothing else, "Hungry like the wolf" by Duran Duran. Doh xpost!

they also ported that over to arcadia for the "election day" video

One video can indeed become a cliche by itself. This is, in fact, a central part of the magic of Duran Duran.

Humans as exotic animals or birds

Battle of the sexes, girls win

omg I had completely forgotten about that dario g video, I used to love it when I was 10, esp video.

Thanks ILX for revealing that the hook was a sample as opposed to the chants of playful animal spirits or whatever. Great sample though!

man-horsie around 2:17

*if i ever become a video director my mission in life will be to make a video that includes every single video cliche in some capacity.. or is that in itself is a cliche?

again do they do this thing in the "wild boys" video at 5:59 with man-lizards.

lead vocalist just can't take it anymore

Yeah! Smashing plates or objects angrily off a table in a sweep of the hand; punching a wall in frustration, angrily striding thru downtown while he sings the chorus, bumping into passers-by (actually that on its own is a cliche cf the Verve etc)

sounds like Battlestar Galactica

*song been in a Major Hollywood Production? The video will somehow insert the band in the movie, depending on budget there will either be sets, lighting and events depicted that are similiar to the movie with the singer playing the part of the movies lead character or at least helping the lead character in some way or if you have less money thne clips from the movie will be interspersed with footage of the band playing in a warehouse.

Best variations: "I Should Have Known Better" by Jim Diamond (where the movie is completely fake, just to make the video more long and Meaningful), and "Elevation" by U2, which subs The Edge into various Tomb Raider footage to replace the goober love interest from the film. Making yourself Angelina Jolie's love interest through video trickery, what better way to cash in on all the wish-fulfillment cred you've earned as a rock star?

Dave Chappelle: Ever since Ive been doing this show a lot of rappers have been offering me to be in their videos. Which is nice but they get me to do stupid stuff. Like, whadda got to do, Snoop? "Okay, here it is, Dave. Its a club scene and like you is dancing and then you slip on a banana peel and land in some doo-doo. Splat. Then you rollin around got doo-doo all over you and then here I come with my gatas, my now an' lata' gatas, steps over and then you see me walk off in slow-motion." And I'm like, "Hold up! Why cant I be the one in slow-motion? I'm tired of being the one in the doo-doo!"

Through progressively mirthful partying, the band and their friends innocuously trash their apartment/hangout/neighborhood/van - throwing confetti, paint, balloons, etc., all over everything, probably in slow motion. When the song ends, candid footage shows everybody breathlessly surveying the damage.

Band is shrunk and whole video takes place inside a snow globe, fishbowl, disco ball, etc.

Empty decadence of celebrity's life signified by sepia-toned footage of Weimar cabaret theme parties. Singer participates in the hollow merrymaking but is dead inside.

Late 00s only: all kinds of faux-screenprint Adobe Illustrator type graphics flying all over the fucking place in saturated CMYK, doing twirls and ka-pows and growing out of stuff a la time-lapse footage of flowers growing, basically obscuring your view of anything going on in the live action footage.

note, the stuff can also be faux-"high school notebook doodle". maybe it provides like an alternate reading of what we're seeing or maybe it's just hyperactive horror vacui.

Opening montage of news anchors talking about the band indicates their global dominance and unstoppability. Increasingly rapid cuts between the different clips, quickly down to just the parts with the band's name. The last one lands with an echo on dramatic silence before the song starts - THEY HAVE ARRIVED.