Faux Reel: why do pop stars think that studio videos are more authentic? | The music

EEveryone remembers the 2007 Brit Awards for the sudden transformation of Devon-born Joss Stone into an American teenager with purple hair, but what you may not remember is that she was there to present a prize to the troubadour gravel voice James Morrison, that you could not too. remember. Well, the couple was recently reunited for the awful film My Love Goes On, the video that sees another meeting, this time between pop and the theme of the beautifully unimaginative "in the record studio" video.

Up there, in the video "Are you all right?" With "live editing" or, "God does not allow it," animated, "the authentic visual" in the studio "is littered with recurring tropes . My Love Goes Most of them are presented, from James and Joss staring at a mixing desk, clumsy fingering instruments and scribbling to scribbling words on a notebook. This is reminiscent of the holy days of 2012 and the video of Little Things, which features the boys – filmed in black and white, of course – surrounded by untouched studio trash. Although not a music video, Dua Lipa's online teaser for the current single Swan Song also features a studio installation and a lyrics sheet, Dua changing a line of diamonds with a stroke of pen.

Another clbadic of its kind is the oversized helmet. They appear in Paul Anderson's Haim videos, the kind of visuals that scream "AUTHENTICITY" so loud that you barely hear the songs, and they glamorize two absolute jewels of the genre in the form of the Boyz II Men collaboration 1995 by Mariah Carey One Sweet Day and her 2000 duet with Westlife, Against All Odds. The first is like a glossy advertisement for padded audio wear, with Carey using the experimental technique of an ear on an ear without a headset (pictured below).

In the 2000 low-budget remake, Mariah goes to the studio in a private jet while Westlife seems to arrive by bus (later leaving by taxi). Once inside, we get slow shots of the printed lyrics, the mixer and, brilliantly, a close-up of a tape that contains a rough mix of the song that Mariah then listens on a yacht. (We know it's a rough mix because it's written "ROUGH" on it in big red letters.) At the end of the two minutes, we're back in the studio with everyone gathered on a damaged couch for Hi, the shot just wipes out just as Brian seems to take a look at Mariah's chest (strangely, the same shot is used again at the end).

Superficially revealing, the deliberately discrete video "in the studio" is just as wrong as any other high-level musical short film. The shady spirit, however, is the pretense, the dramatic play and, in Mariah's case, trying to determine if she has any idea who Westlife is.