Prior to the 80s when music video came into prominence, videos were described by various terms including "illustrated song", "filmed insert", "promotional (promo) film", "promotional clip" or "film clip".
The genre-defining surf films of Bruce Brown, George Greenough and Alby Falzon and others are also notable for their innovative combinations of image and music featuring sequences of specially-filmed surfing footage, carefully edited against long music tracks, with no accompanying dialogue. Greenough's landmark 1972 film Crystal Voyager concluded with an extended sequence (filmed and edited by Greenough) that was constructed around the 23-minute Pink Floyd track "Echoes". The band was impressed with Greenough's effort and agreed to allow Greenough to use their music in his film in exchange for the right to use his film footage when performing "Echoes" at their concerts.
During late 1972–73 David Bowie featured in a series of promotional films directed by pop photographer Mick Rock, who worked extensively with Bowie in this period. These clips are important landmarks in the development of the music video genre in the 1970s, and they are also notable because they were made by a professional photographer rather than an established film or TV director.
The music video for the song, helmed by the Australian director Russell Mulcahy, marked the début of MTV when the U.S. channel started broadcasting at 12:01 AM on August 1, 1981
The music video for Bee Gees' "Staying Alive" is of a completely different concept from Saturday Night Fever. It depicts the group singing the song on an abandoned subway terminal set at MGM Studios, directly adjacent to the one where Sgt. Pepper's Lonely Hearts Club Band was being filmed at the same time. This set featured buildings, a train station, and other elements.
The original three music videos for the movie Saturday Night Fever were shot on the soundstages, and edited at the facilities of Video City, Inc., in North Miami, Florida. The European video for "Stayin' Alive" (with Barry sans facial hair) was one of these original three. These original music videos were scrapped and re-shot in California after Barry grew back his beard.
The single produced the band's first music video, directed by Chuck Statler[3]. The video mainly features a performance on the Hope and Anchor stage in Islington, which was filmed on 7 October 1979.
The video also features Chas Smash, performed the lead vocal chant, although he was not at the time a member of the band. Lead singer Suggs is present in the video in front of the band, holding a microphone, although he does not sing the lead vocals.
Blondie's "Heart of Glass" promotional video was filmed at the Studio 54 discothèque in New York City with director Stanley Dorfman.
The video begins with footage of New York City in the night before joining Blondie perform at Studio 54. Then, the video alternates between close-ups of Harry's face as she lip-syncs, and mid-distance shots of the entire band. In the video Harry wears a silver asymmetrical dress designed by Stephen Sprouse.
To create the dress, Sprouse photo-printed a picture of television scan lines onto a piece of fabric, and then, according to Harry, "put a layer of cotton fabric underneath and a layer of chiffon on top, and then the scan-lines would do this op-art thing."
The popularity of the song helped Sprouse's work earn a lot of exposure from the media.
"Draped in a sheer, silver Sprouse dress," Kris Needs summarized while writing for Mojo Classic, "Debbie sang through gritted teeth, while the boys cavorted with mirror balls". Studying Harry's attitude in the "effortlessly cool" video, music writer Pat Kane felt she "exuded a steely confidence about her sexual impact ... The Marilyn do has artfully fallen over, and she's in the funkiest of dresses: one strap across her shoulder, swirling silks around about her. Her iconic face shows flickers of interest, amidst the boredom and ennui of the song's lyrics." Kane also noted that the band members fooling around with disco balls, "taking the mickey out of their own disco fixation."
Reviewing the Greatest Hits: Sound & Vision DVD for Pitchfork Media, Jess Harvell wrote that while "owning your own copy of 'Heart of Glass' may not seem as cool [anymore] ... there's the always luminous Deborah Harry, who would give boiling asparagus an erotic charge, all while looking too bored to live."
Though some artists had made video clips to accompany songs it was only after the success of "Bohemian Rhapsody" that it became regular practice for record companies to produce promotional videos for artists' single releases.
The video was directed by Bruce Gowers, who had directed a video of the band's 1974 performance at the Rainbow Theatre in London, and was recorded by cameraman Barry Dodd and assistant director/floor manager Jim McCutcheon. The video was recorded in just four hours on 10 November 1975, at a cost of £4,500. The director said that the band was involved in the discussion of the video and the end result, and "was a co-operative to that extent, but there was only one leader.
The video opens with a shot of the four band members in near darkness as they sing the a cappella part. The lights fade up, and the shots cross-fade into close-ups of Freddie. The composition of the shot is the same as Mick Rock's cover photograph for their second album Queen II. The photo, inspired by a photograph of actress Marlene Dietrich, was the band's favourite image of themselves.
The video then fades into them playing their instruments. In the opera section of the video, the scene reverts back to the Queen II standing positions, after which they perform once again on stage during the hard rock segment. In the closing seconds of the video Roger Taylor is depicted stripped to the waist, striking the tam tam in the manner of the trademark of the Rank Organisation's Gongman, familiar in the UK as the opening of all Rank film productions.
All of the special effects were achieved during the recording, rather than editing. The visual effect of Mercury's face cascading away (during the echoed line "go") was accomplished by pointing the camera at a monitor, giving visual feedback, a glare analogous to audio feedback. The honeycomb illusion was created using a shaped lens. The video was edited within five hours because it was due to be broadcast the same week in which it was taped. The video was sent to the BBC as soon as it was completed and aired for the first time on Top of the Pops in November 1975.
After a few weeks at number one, an edit of the video was created. The most obvious difference is the flames superimposed over the introduction as well as several alternate camera angles.
