The music video for "Empire State of Mind" was directed by Hype Williams.
The video, which was filmed on location, features black-and-white images of New York City intercut with full-color shots of Jay-Z and Keys performing in Times Square.
"Empire State of Mind"'s music video began filming on September 29, in Tribeca and around Ground Zero, and was released on October 30, 2009. Keys praised the music video and said that the video has all the key elements of a homage to her hometown.
The music video opens with black and white images of locations in New York being shown in the form of a slideshow. The slideshow is then intercut with a black and white clip of Jay-Z, wearing a Yankees cap and a vest with no sleeves, performing the song on a street in front of apartment buildings. Then the video begins to rotate from images of New York being shown briefly, to clips of Jay-Z singing "Empire State of Mind" in several locations with different outfits. Images shown include a monument to John D. Rockefeller, Jr., street signs and stairwells leading to train stations.
Next we see black and white clips of Keys, who is wearing large hoop-earrings with high heels, a black shirt and pants, playing a Yamaha piano that has an image of the Statue of Liberty on it. She is singing her verse of the song in a street at night while cars drive by. Keys' performance is then intercut with aerial views of skyscrapers and clips of the Yankee Stadium, clips of the New York Police, and NYPD cars and logos. Some people, such as ones who are walking around New York or wearing Yankee emblems, have their faces shown or blurred out. Keys and Jay-Z, both wearing sunglasses at night, are then shown performing the song together as the video continues to be intercut with clips of them performing "Empire State of Mind" individually, as well as images of New York. The video ends with clips shown in color of; the duo singing on red-colored stairs waving their hands in the air, clips of Keys performing, and images of New York.
Jay-Z’s Lifestyle blog came out with an alternative video which features supermodels.
The music video for "Don't Tell Me" was directed by Jean-Baptiste Mondino, who worked with Madonna in her videos for "Open Your Heart", "Justify My Love", "Human Nature" and "Love Don't Live Here Anymore", and filmed in October 2000. The choreography was done by Alex Magno, who also collaborated on the Drowned World Tour. The tour designers Dsquared and Arianne Phillips also designed Madonna's cowgirl costume. The video features Madonna walking down an automated treadmill walkway in front of a projection screen, while cowboys dance and play on the sand in the video played on the screen behind her. Later, they join Madonna in front of the screen in a choreographed dance routine. The iconic final scene of the video depicts a cowboy riding a Skewbald horse in slow motion getting thrown to the ground, and getting up again.
There are four unreleased remix videos, using the following audio mixes: Thunderpuss Club Mix, the Thunderdub, the Thunderpuss 2001 Hands In The Air Anthem and the Thunderpuss Tribe-A-Pella.
Love Profusion (2004)
The music video was directed by Luc Besson and shot on October 28, 2003 at Universal Studios in Universal City, California. It was shot alongside the Estée Lauder "Beyond Paradise" fragrance television advert to maximise sales of both the fragrance and single, Madonna provided the theme song to the commercial. Besson later directed Madonna in the 2007 animated film Arthur and the Invisibles.
"There are a lot of special effects," Madonna said of the clip. "I talked to things that weren't there – which is what you do when you're doing green-screen or blue-screen stuff. There's going to be a lot of fairies dancing around me. Isn't that exciting?" she added, laughing. "I always have a lot of fairies dancing around me." The video originally world premiered in Europe on December 4, 2003 and its US premiere was on February 11, 2004 on AOL's First View.
There are 4 remix videos: the Ralphi Rosario House Vocal – Extended, the Craig J's Good Vibe Mix, the Ralphi Rosario Big Room Vox – Extended and the Ralphi Rosario Big Room Dub
Hung Up (2005)
Originally the video for "Hung Up" was scheduled to be directed by photographer David LaChapelle. LaChapelle wanted the video to have a "documentary"-style look, much like that of his 2005 film Rize, of which five of the dancers from the "Hung Up" video appeared.
LaChapelle and Madonna disagreed on the concept, prompting the project to be reassigned to Johan Renck, who worked with Madonna in her video for "Nothing Really Matters". According to an interview with MTV, Renck was directing Kate Moss for a H&M commercial whence he received a phone call from Madonna who desperately wanted to work with him.
The next day he went to Los Angeles to meet the stylist and the choreographer hired by Madonna, who mailed him with her ideas for the video.
Madonna wanted to use a few performers from her tour, such as Daniel "Cloud" Campos, Miss Prissy from LaChapelle's "Rize" crew and traceur Sebastien Foucan, a practitioner of parkour, a philosophical French sport that involves moving via uninterrupted motion, whether over, under, through or around objects. Renck said that "It's not about the music, but the bodily expression, [...] We wanted to show the whole spectrum, be it krumping, breakdancing, jazz or disco."
Since they could not shoot all over the world, Madonna wanted the video to have an "omnipresent feel", with the middle section of the song generating a sense of congregation. Renck suggested that they include a boombox, used as a means of uniting everyone and everything since it was through listening to songs on a boombox that street dancing started.
Though some scenes in the video feature cities like London, Paris, New York, Los Angeles, Shanghai and Tokyo, in reality the actual sets were constructed in Los Angeles and London only. A London suburb was made to look like a Parisian one, where the routine for parkour takes place, whereas a restaurant in London's Chinatown was used for the Shanghai sequence and Compton stood in for Bronx. The dancers' scenes were shot in early October 2005 within half a day, for a total of six days of shooting.
Madonna clarified that the video was a tribute to John Travolta and to dance in general. Her dance moves for the video, which were inspired by Travolta's movies like Saturday Night Fever (1977), Grease (1978) and Perfect (1985) took three hours to shoot.
The video was nominated for five awards at the 2006 MTV Video Music Awards including Best Female Video, Dance Video, Pop Video, Best Choreography and the Video of the Year award although it did not win any of them.
The video begins with a man alone in his hotel room, shortly after having a shower. As the occupant freshens up and dresses himself, and as the song builds up to its main dance beat, several people of various ethnic groups also enter the room. The dancers begin to undress and re-dress themselves, all as if they have either just gotten out of the shower themselves, or come home from work. George Michael appears in the centre of the room, singing while seated on the bed. The camera zooms out to show the full hotel suite when the entire cast performs a brief, synchronized dance sequence. After this exchange, a hotel employee comes by the door with room service as the occupant is still dressing himself. The employee dances briefly as the occupant turns away to grab a pen to sign for the meal. As the song fades out, the dancers vacate when the occupant sits down to dinner in front of the television, with George Michael turning out the lights and leaving the room last.
As there is no interaction between the occupant, George Michael and any of the other dancers, it can be speculated that they were all in his imagination, and that the only true interaction is between the man and the hotel employee.
The entire video was done in one four-minute take.
OMG. I remembered getting freaked out by this video when I was 8. For a few months after that, I went through a phase where I would check my body to make sure my skin wasn't going to peel off
The music video revolves around the fantasy of a computer store employee, as he dreams about a relationship with Carey. Throughout the video, the pair is seen to have a pillow fight; play laser tag, Guitar Hero and slot cars; and throw a frisbee. The video also features Carey in various revealing outfits. The video begins with a small Geek Squad Volkswagen pulling up into the driveway of Carey's large manor. As the employee introduces himself, Carey rudely refers to him as a "CumpuNerd", and asks him to follow her to the broken computer. As he attends to it, Carey removes her robe, and enters her large closet, leaving McBrayer to begin his fantasy with her. The first scene is of Carey wearing a tight pink number, laying seductively on the bed, as the computer employee plays with an electric guitar. He joins her on the bed, and she begins playfully spanking him as the two enter a pillow fight. Another scene is interspersed, of Carey sporting a mini silver dress, with tall socks and heels, flaunting her body. The fantasy then adapts to a new scenery, of the pair dressed in medieval clothing, while walking a unicorn, followed by the duo in a large room in the mansion, racing electronic cars. As they proceed to play laser tag, they are shown outside, laying on a picnic bed, with Carey dressed in a "naughty school girl outfit". They both get up, and begin to throw a frisbee, before relocating in front of the main stairwell in the mansion. The final scenes of the fantasy are of Carey, wearing a shortened red gown, standing atop the staircase, and McBrayer climbing on his knees while carrying flowers. All the scenes begin to fade, with the last being Carey feeding him by hand by the refrigerator, as he wakes up with Carey, now dressed, poking him. She tells the employee that security will let him out when he is finished, and leaves him while he is still fantasizing about her.
The music video won in the category of "Best Comedic Video" at the 2008 BET Awards, and won the "MTV Video Vanguard Award" at the 2008 MTV Video Music Awards Japan. Additionally, the video was nominated for "Best Female Video" at the 2008 MTV Video Music Awards in the United States.
The music video was filmed in two days in August 2003 on a sound stage at Universal Studios in Los Angeles, California. The cast consisted of over 100 girls. Each of André 3000's parts was shot several times from different angles, and he performed the song 23 times during the course of filming. Because releasing "Hey Ya!" as a single was a last minute decision, André did not have time to choreograph the parts, and all of the dancing was improvised. Ice Cold 3000's sequences were the first filmed, resulting in the character's energetic performance, and Johnny Vulture's were the last, so André, exhausted from the previous takes, sat on a stool for those sequences.
The music video proved to be a success. The video debuted on MTV's Total Request Live on September 5, 2003 at number ten. It topped the countdown for 19 days and retired at number eight on November 24, having spent 50 days on the program. At the 2004 MTV Video Music Awards, the video won four awards for Video of the Year, Best Hip-Hop Video, Best Special Effects, and Best Art Direction. It was also nominated for Best Direction but lost to Jay-Z's "99 Problems". "Hey Ya!" was nominated for Best Short Form Music Video at the 46th Grammy Awards, but it lost to Johnny Cash's cover of Nine Inch Nails' "Hurt".[25] In Canada, the video topped MuchMusic's Countdown for four weeks, and it won the award for Best International Group at the 2004 MuchMusic Video Awards
The music video for Pump It features The Black Eyed Peas in an indoor arena with a group of other people. Here they go crazy with scenes of street dancing, road rage as well as getting drunk. The video has a "drunk at a party" theme with a Fight Club Demeanour. In addition, two Honda Civic Si models (one sedan and one coupe) are featured. At the end of the video, The Black Eyed Peas sang closer to the camera and Taboo punches the camera. Quest Crew member Steve Terada made an appearance in the music video.
The music video for the song was shot in December 2007 in one day in Bedford-Stuyvesant, Brooklyn, New York. It was directed by Bernard Gourley. The video is M.I.A.'s first filmed in the United States. Initially planned to be shot in a factory on the border of Ecuador, the filming location was changed to accommodate M.I.A.'s time constraints due to touring commitments in the United States. The video was filmed during one day in the city, which she had free on the American leg of her KALA Tour after 4 months of concerts. It was made available on MTV's website on December 15, 2007. The video for "Paper Planes" was uploaded on M.I.A.'s personal "worldtown" YouTube account on December 16, 2007, eventually gaining 43,500,000 views. The video was to have premiered on Total Request Live. The video was uploaded onto M.I.A.'s official YouTube page (via VEVO) on June 16, 2009, ammassing 20,000,000 views. "Paper Planes" video debuted on 17 December, 2007 on video chart programs where it proved successful. It peaked at number 1 on MuchOnDemand's Daily Ten and number 1 on Total Request Live. It appeared at Number 56 on BET's Notarized: Top 100 Videos of 2008 countdown.
Personally every time I hear this song I can't help but immediately playing the source of this song's success, the sampling from: The Clash "Straight To Hell" (1982)
THIS is an outstanding album (Combat Rock), highly recommended to anyone with a ear for brilliant eclectic music.
The music video of "Crazy in Love", released in May 2003, was directed by Jake Nava. In MTV Making of the Video 2003 documenary, Knowles described the video's conception: "it celebrates the evolution of a woman. It is about a girl who is at the point of a relationship. She realises that she is in love, she is doing stuff she would not normally do but she does not care. It does not matter she is just crazy in love."
In the video, Knowles performs in various dance sequences, beginning with Knowles wearing a tank top, short shorts, and red high-heels. She performs an elaborate solo dance on a riser. The scene shifts to a gold set with a mock photo shoot, before moving into a scene with dancers detailing Knowles and dancing against a wall while wearing caps and full length pants. Jay-Z appears and ignites a line of petrol leading to a car which explodes in flames. Jay-Z performs his rap in front of the burning car, and Beyoncé dances beside him, wearing an exotic silk print over a fur coat, before kicking the valve off a fire hydrant. She continues to dance while the water is flying everywhere. The video ends with Knowles and her dancers wearing vibrant dresses in front of a large fan. Their outfits contrast with the neutral colors of the background, the video. Carmit Bachar, a former Pussycat Dolls singer, is one of the dancers.
The music video was acclaimed by critics and won several awards. Cynthia Fuchs, writing for PopMatters commented that the photo shoot scene uses the routine used by Jennifer Lopez in the video for "Jenny From the Block" (2002) with hot lights, scary makeup, and "lots of leg."
She wrote that: "...Beyoncé's body becomes its undeniable emblem. Tom Moon of The Philadelphia Inquirer wrote that Knowles shakes every inch of her famously photogenic goddess frame."
The music video won three awards at the 2003 MTV Video Music Awards in the categories of Best Female Video, Best R&B Video, and Best Choreography. It however lost to Good Charlotte's "Lifestyles of the Rich & Famous" in the Viewer's Choice category.
Director Nava also won a Music Video Production Association award for the Best R&B Video in 2004. During the same year, the video won the Best Collaboration award at the 2004 MTV Video Music Awards Japan, where it was also nominated for the Best Female Video award. "Crazy in Love" was nominated at the 36th NAACP Image Awards for the Outstanding Music Video award. It won the Best International Video award at the 2004 MuchMusic Video Awards.
The music video for "Overload" was directed by Phil Poynter and filmed in London, England in August 2000. The video has no plot and is known for its fresh and simplistic style, a theme that they would continue in their early videos. It features the group in a variety of ever-changing outfits, singing the song in front of a plain white background, either by themselves or together as a group.
Sugababes - Girls (2008)
The music video for "Girls" was filmed on 28 August 2008 and directed by Daniel Wolfe, The video premiered on 4Music and Channel 4 on 6 September 2008. In the clip, bandmembers Amelle Berrabah, Keisha Buchanan and Heidi Range enjoy a girl's night out at a pole-dancing club, embraced by a "1980s disco style." It features the girls dancing and performing, focusing more on the other dancers during the chorus and on the girls while singing their verses. During their verses, Amelle engages sensual dance moves with one of the fellow female dancers and Keisha teases a male dancer.
The music video was principally at shot at Wrest Park in Bedfordshire, England and directed by Nez. It premiered in the UK via Channel 4 on 4 December 2008. It starts off with Allen singing from a caravan window, while a clothes line on the right has underwear and a teddybear hanging from it. As she exits, her clothes are revealed to be a smock dress with a big bow and high heels; upon returning through the caravan door, the interior changes to that of a luxurious mansion, in reality an English country estate.
The chorus starts and she walks down the hall, surrounded by butlers, all making synchronized moves and starting a choreography with Allen. Afterwards, she climbes the stairs and the camera cuts to the next scene, where she is sitting down in front of the mirror in an extravagant bedroom, with dresses, lamps, toys and cupcakes. The scene changes once again, with Allen walking into a room with giant, brightly coloured presents. They suddenly stand up, having two human legs, and begin to spin around, with the singer joining them.
After descending the stairs and walking through the same hall she entered, she exits the estate, and the video takes down a darker, more serious tone, while the verse "Forget about guns and forget ammunition/'Cause I'm killing them all on my own little mission/Now I’m not a saint but I’m not a sinner/Now everything is cool as long as I’m getting thinner" is sung. The euphoric visual effects appear once again soon after, as the chorus takes place. Allen walks down the estate stairs, being surrounded by dancing balloons, hopping butlers and coloured fog. The camera zooms out showing the estate tied in a giant ribbon, but also grey, melancholic clouds, which contrast the cheerful party from before. Allen stated that she hoped the music video would convey parts of the song's sarcasm.
**** You (2008)
A music video for the song was posted on the official Parlophone YouTube page on 15 June 2009. EMI hired the French production company Frenzy Paris who in turn hired the art collective AB/CD/CD and the post-production company "Firm". The video is shot from Allen's point of view (she can be seen using a polaroid she takes of herself). She is seen to be making the journey from her hotel room to a television studio. Throughout the video, Allen warps the shape and size of her surroundings using her hands and her own perspective; for example, by moving her hands apart she stretches the Eiffel Tower and enlarges a man's afro hairstyle.
Smile (2006)
The song's music video was released on 3 July 2006. Having been directed by Sophie Muller, it contained a vengeance theme, similar to that of the song. It starts off with Allen sitting on the bed in her apartment, eating chocolate and cheeseballs. Interleaved, there are shots of her and her ex-boyfriend spending time together appear as a memory. He is played by Elliott Jordan.
As the bridge comes up, the scene changes to the singer standing on the corner of a street, talking to a man and paying him money. The man leaves and goes to some gangsters, giving them instructions and each a share of money. As Allen's former lover walks down the street talking on his mobile phone, one of the gangsters pushes him into an abandoned playground; where they are joined by a second gangster, and the pair give Allen's ex a beating.
In this time, Allen, witnessing the scene, smiles. She then meets with her bruised ex-boyfriend, and takes him to a coffee shop. There, he tried to explain to her how he was beaten by the muggers, not knowing that, meanwhile, they were breaking down his apartment door and destroying his furniture and possessions, including scratching his gramophone records.
The ex-boyfriend leaves the table for a while, enough time for Allen to put laxative pills in his coffee; upon returning, he drinks it and leaves the shop. After, he goes to his apartment, only to find it trashed and destroyed. Scavenging through what's left, he happily finds the record box, thinking they are intact, but he suddenly gets diarrhoea as a result of the laxatives, but is unable to use his toilet, as it is clogged with his clothes.
He goes to Allen's apartment with his records, seeking consolation, unaware that she is laughing behind his back. As the video finishes, the scene changes to Allen walking down the street, at night, smiling, singing the last chorus, while her ex-boyfriend, actually a disc jockey, is in a nightclub, getting ready to put his music, but finds out that all his records have been scratched.
The bounty hunter activates a killbot mounted on armoured hover cycle in the video, then it proceeds to track the Crazy Frog as he commutes around the City on his imaginary motorcycle. As the bounty hunter closes in on his prey, the Crazy Frog becomes aware of his pursuer and an unlikely chase begins over skyscrapers and through the city's sewer system, before the killbot launches a guided missile at the Frog.
However, the Crazy Frog is able to mount the missile as it approaches him, evidently confusing its guidance system, as it then begins to loop and glide uncontrollably. The missile eventually locks onto the bounty hunter's van, destroying it and creating a large mushroom cloud. The Crazy Frog manages to escape the blast, covered in dust from the debris and appearing to deliver the closing 'lyrics'.
The accompanying music video for "Don't Stop the Music" was directed by Rihanna's regular collaborator Anthony Mandler. Mandler previously directed the videos for Rihanna's 2007 singles "Shut Up and Drive" and "Hate That I Love You". It was shot in a nightclub in Prague, Czech Republic. The choreography in the video is made by Tina Landon, who also worked with artists like Janet Jackson and Ricky Martin. The "Don't Stop the Music" video was digitally released on iTunes, July 26, 2007. It reached number two on MTV's former video countdown show Total Request Live.
The video begins with Rihanna and two of her friends arriving at a nightclub in a yellow taxi. After they get out of the car, they enter a candy store where is a boy standing with his mother. As Rihanna tells the boy not to tell anyone where they are going, the singer and her two friends sneak into the back of the candy store where is a secret entrance to a nightclub. This is intercut with scenes of Rihanna chanting the song's lyrics against a wall and dancing in the club. As she enters the club, Rihanna is shown in a restroom, checking her make-up as she sings the lyrics. The singer then leaves the restroom, and returns to the dance-floor as the chorus begins to play. As the video progresses, the singer is shown dancing with her friends and singing the song. The people in the club clap to the beat of Jackson's "Wanna Be Startin' Somethin'"'s music sample. Bill Lamb for About.com listed the video at number six on his list of Rihanna's top 10 music videos, describing it as a "lot of dancing video". Latifah Muhammad from The Boom Box placed the song on her list of Rihanna Best 15 music videos at number three, behind "Pon de Replay" and "Only Girl (In the World)".