All The Small Things

blink-182

Ben Burgess

MUSIC VIDEOS DEMONSTRATE GENRE CHARACTERISTICSThe typical genre of blink-182’s songs are punk rock or pop

punk, the stereotypical features of a punk band’s music videos are instruments, like electric guitars and drums, screaming fans (occasionally!) and the location is often somewhere quite run down and even a little eerie, such as an abandoned warehouse, hospital etc..

The video for blink-182’s arguably biggest hit ‘All The Small Things’ does, for the most part, conform to these ideologies of punk rock. The video is somewhere between amplification and illustration as far as Goodwin’s theory of music video categories would say. The archetypal features displayed in this video include the heavy guitars, screaming girls and run down location that resembles an abandoned warehouse. But in many ways, blink-182 avoid these stereotypical features, using humour to mock characteristics that are emblematic of a ‘boyband’, with mise en scene such as costume changes, e.g. the Romeo shirts worn by lead guitarist and vocalist of the band, Tom DeLonge, when singing on the toilet.

RELATIONSHIP BETWEEN LYRICS & MUSIC AND VISUALS

This video is borderline amplification. The video shows performance, the definition of a straightforward illustration video, but there’s also a very creative edge. For example the video does not match the lyrics in the song as the narrative story that does feature is a mock up of boyband music videos such as ‘The Backstreet Boys’ and ‘N Sync’. This is illustrated by the white suits, dancing in skimpy combat outfits, slow motion shots of the band being blown by an industrial fan and black and white shots of the band singing on the beach. The way they mock it is by, for example, reenact these famous videos in their underwear, in a sarcastic, seductive way, or by showing close ups of the band with missing teeth. All of these archetypes of a boyband that blink-182 are using as their own joke suit slow, touching songs, often about romance, whereas ‘All The Small Things’ is high tempo, pop punk rock song with heavy guitars and poignant voices, and the lyrics, though about romance, don’t fit in with the visual imagery portrayed by the video director, Jerry Finn.

RECORD LABEL’S CAMERA DEMANDSThe record label may often request the director of a music video to include

close ups of the artists faces to make the band members recognisable for a marketing purpose, particularly if a song release is successful and it looks set to shoot a band into further stardom, like ‘All The Small Things’ did for blink-182, that is why this video contains a lot of close up shots of each individual artist at different points, Tom DeLonge is frequently shot performing vocals, but not in the expected way, for example in eccentric costume, or sat on the toilet, or at the mock photo shoot with the industrial fan blowing. Vocalist and second band member, Mark Hoppus, is shown in a close up of him dancing sarcastically in the ridiculous combat dance costumes, and on the beach fighting with a crazy dog, seen through a telescope within the screen and singing down the microphone. Final member of the band and drummer, Travis Barker, is illustrated in close ups of him waving and kissing towards the crazed female fans, suggesting he’s a ladies man, and in a shot of him and woman kissing on the beach in slow motion. As well as all of these examples, there are quite a few three shots to show all the band together as one unit and to market the band as a whole, together.

INTERTEXTUAL REFERENCESThere are quite a few intertextual references, specifically

with other music videos as blink-182’s theme for ‘All The Small Things’ was to make a mockery of some boyband’s music videos. ‘I Want It That Way’ by The Backstreet Boys, ‘Tearin' Up My Heart’ by N Sync, and ‘Because Of You’ by 98 Degrees are the three boybands that blink-182 target to parody because they demonstrate all the stereotypical and cheesy features that are associated with music of that genre. These features include the crazed crowd of girls with signs announcing their love for the band, the costumes and the frequent change in location to singing on the beach.