Research: Amplification, Illustration Or Disjuncture?

Out of them all I would say my favorite type of video is 'Amplification'. This is because many of the music videos that follow this have deeper meanings and are very creative. However, that is not to say that Illustration and Disjuncture types of videos aren't as creative.

One of my favorite music videos right now that use elements of amplification is 

Emeli Sande - My Kind Of Love. 

The story line depicts a strong friendship. "Cause when you've given up, and no matter what you do it's never good enough, when you never thought that it could ever get this tough, that's when you feel my kind of love" she sings over the piano-laden beat.

The songstress said her inspiration for the video came from her time as a medicine student.

"During my time studying medicine, I found it hard to write, but one of the things that inspired me were the patients and the interaction that they had with their loved ones during their time of illness," she shares. "When people arrived at the hospital, money and status became irrelevant and only health mattered, which sparked an honesty between people which was amazing. This interaction, declaration of support and love, was the inspiration for 'My Kind of Love' and something I wanted to try and portray in this video." - Emeli Sande

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When she's walking through the hospital at the beginning, to me it shows her thinking about something. Its almost like she's sharing her story with the audience. And that's the same when she's on the merry go round and she's by herself. It could symbolise her wanting time to herself to just pour her heart out to the audience. I also noticed that in many of the scenes where she's by herself her facial expressions are serious, stern and unhappy as to say she's going through some sort of emotional pain. However the scenes where she's with her friend who seems to have an illness, she's smiling and happy. I think she does this to show that she wants to be brave for her friend. I realised that her friend had cancer as Sande is seen giving her a wig. Sande makes a reference to how she feels about her friend through the lyrics and her friends illness through the music video which I think is very effective. For example, she say's "but don't ever question if my heart beats only for you, it beats only for you", and in the video we see her friend lying down on a hospital bed with a monitor on her finger which checks the pulse and is also connected to the heart. I think that was very clever as again it has a deeper meaning. The lyrics also say "I can't buy you love, don't even want to try". I think in the music video this lyric was expressed very well. For example, Sande goes to the park with her friend and takes her one a car journey. I believe this is supposed to show that she wants to make her friend happy emotionally rather than 'buying' her material things that probably won't have that much of an effect on her. I also noticed that in most scenes Sande is dominant which shows that she tending to her friend. For example, when they are in the car a cut away is shown alongside a close up, where Sande is sat at the front and her friend is at the back. Another example is where an over the shoulder shot is shown whilst Sande is speaking to her friend. Again in this part we see more of Sande, I guess to show that she is looking after her and obviously has some sort of bond or relationship with her. In my opinion this video is very powerful not only because of the message but because its a fairly low budget video but Sande still managed to put her point across to her audience and this is something that I've noticed in many of her other music videos. For example, Next To Me, Heaven, Daddy, Beneath Your Beautiful ect.