Resarch - Task 7 - The Police Every Breath You Take - Music Video

Intro 

This is the song Every Breath You Take by The Police whilst they were signed to A&M Records. It was directed by Godley and Creme. The video has been watched approximately 160 Million times on YouTube and most likely has been seen many more times than that. The director said that he based it loosely on a song called jammin' the blues from 1944.

Relationship between lyrics and visuals 

This is clearly a love song that has a very sad feel to it, which is highlighted through the use of the black and white effect that is used throughout the video. Sting the writer was going through a divorce whilst writing this and at the same time his cheating scandal came out and he was really getting attacked by the media, so he went missing for a while to get away from it all. "Every breath you take, every move you make, I'll be watching you." Some may say that this sounds a bit like a stalker, however I believe it to be him watching the woman he was having an affair with. This is portrayed through the slow movement of the camera and the band in the video and the fact that no-one is really moving around.

Relationship between music and visuals

The video really is in time with the music, with nothing moving particularly fast in the video and the overall tone of the music is very slow and steady. The band in the video are all stood still with small amounts of rocking their bodies but nothing massive.

What image does this create for the band?

The video was seen as quite revolutionary with the black and white and is regarded by many as a great music video and has been voted in the top 100 music videos in the rolling stone. It is clearly the most popular song by the artist by a long way and ties in with their others songs and isn't anything completely new to them.

Reference to the notion of looking

I don't believe there to be any sexual displays in this video, I don't think that it is anything like that. The camera work uses a lot of close ups of the band members in the video particularly closing in on the face. There is also a zoom from a wide shot of the band and then a jump shot takes us to a close up of a blacked out character in the background.

Conclusion

The video is a big hit and ties in really well with the music and lyrics they all fit together perfectly which is most likely why it is so famous. The video is also performance based with them just playing their instruments on a staging area.