Music Video: The Specials- Ghost Town
The Specials - Ghost Town: Blog tasks
Reading and questions
Read this excellent analysis from The Conversation website of the impact Ghost Town had both musically and visually. Answer the following questions
1) Why does the writer link the song to cinematic soundtracks and music hall tradition?
Written in E♭, more attuned to “mood music”, with nods to cinematic soundtracks and music hall tradition, it reflects and engenders anxiety.
2) What subcultures did 2 Tone emerge from in the late 1970s?
2 Tone had emerged stylistically from the Mod and Punk subcultures and its musical roots and the people in it, audiences and bands, were both black and white.
3) What social contexts are discussed regarding the UK in 1981?
5) Look at the final section (‘Not a dance track’). What does the writer suggest might be the meanings created in the video? Do you agree?
It’s just a cry out against injustice, against closed off opportunities by those who have pulled the ladder up and robbed the young, the poor, the white and black of their songs and their dancing, their futures. Drive round an empty city at dawn. Look at the empty flats.
Now read this BBC website feature on the 30th anniversary of Ghost Town’s release.
1) How does the article describe the song?
It starts with a siren and those woozy, lurching organ chords. Then comes the haunted, spectral woodwind, punctuated by blaring brass.
2) What does the article say about the social context of the time – what was happening in Britain in 1981?
Released on 20 June 1981 against a backdrop of rising unemployment, its blend of melancholy, unease and menace took on an entirely new meaning when Britain's streets erupted into rioting almost three weeks later - the day before Ghost Town reached number one in the charts.
3) How did The Specials reflect an increasingly multicultural Britain?
With a mix of black and white members, The Specials, too, encapsulated Britain's burgeoning multiculturalism. The band's 2 Tone record label gave its name to a genre which fused ska, reggae and new wave and, in turn, inspired a crisply attired youth movement.
4) How can we link Paul Gilroy’s theories to The Specials and Ghost Town?
The representations in the music video are racially diverse. This reflects its musical genre of ska, a style which could be read politically in the context of a racially divided country. This representation of Britain’s emerging multiculturalism, is reinforced through the eclectic mix of stylistic influences in both the music and the video. The song and video offers evidence of Gilroy’s Black Atlantic diasporic identity theory – that black culture is forged through travel and hybridity, a “liquidity of culture”. The Specials are representative of ska – itself an international hybrid music genre blurring reggae and American 1950/60s pop and later elements of punk rock – which brings in working-class British culture (linked in part to Coventry in the Midlands where they were formed).
5) The article discusses how the song sounds like a John Barry composition. Why was John Barry a famous composer and what films did he work on?
"There's something frenzied and mad about that record," he says. "It has such a kaleidoscope of influences - jazz, (film score composer) John Barry, Middle Eastern music, a solid reggae undertone and stuff that sounds like nothing else.
Close-textual analysis of Ghost Town
Watch the video several times and make bullet-point notes of your close-textual semiotic analysis using the following headings:
1) Mise-en-scene: Setting, Lighting, Colour, Actor/performer placement and movement, Costume and props. How are some of these aspects used to create meanings?
The video combines eerie shots of a deserted East End of London with the band in a 1962 Vauxhall Cresta lip syncing. The mise-en-scene and cinematography seem to reference a range of film styles including British social realism, thriller and horror genres, with the expressionist lighting drawing attention to the different meanings of the lyric ‘ghost town’.
Construction of a narrative and links to song lyrics (the journey through a deserted landscape, lyrics which refer to effects of political and economic conditions) • Narrative appeal and pleasures offered • Audience positioning and invited responses
2) Cinematography: Camera shots and camera movement.
3) Editing: Pace, juxtaposition, timing.
The pace of the song is quite slow and eerie. The baseline of the song is pretty basic yet so effective. This allows the audience to really focus on what the message is behind the song
Now apply media theory to the video - perhaps by considering whether Ghost Town reinforces or challenges some of the media theories we have studied. Make bullet-point notes on the following:
1) Goodwin’s theory of music video.
Music video was still a very new media form in 1981 so it’s therefore difficult to find ‘repetition and difference’. However, the video clearly uses recognisable genre conventions of film genres such as social realism and horror to create something familiar to audiences and yet new and different as it was in the form of a music video.
3) Gilroy’s diasporic identity/postcolonial theory.
The representations in the music video are racially diverse. This reflects its musical genre of ska, a style which could be read politically in the context of a racially divided country. This representation of Britain’s emerging multiculturalism, is reinforced through the eclectic mix of stylistic influences in both the music and the video. The song and video offers evidence of Gilroy’s Black Atlantic diasporic identity theory – that black culture is forged through travel and hybridity, a “liquidity of culture”. The Specials are representative of ska – itself an international hybrid music genre blurring reggae and American 1950/60s pop and later elements of punk rock – which brings in working-class British culture (linked in part to Coventry in the Midlands where they were formed).
4) Bricolage and pastiche.
We can see examples of bricolage and pastiche – a merging of British film genres such as social realism and hammer horror in order to create something new (as music videos were in 1981). The lighting, colour and camerawork also create intertextual references to these film genres. Arguably, the narrative offers an example of bricolage - a postmodern take on the 'road movie' but with no destination or quest to complete (which is perhaps why the video ends with them aimlessly throwing stones into the River Thames).
5) Strinati’s definition of postmodernism.
The hybrid mix of references and music video forms – an experimental combination of narrative (the journey), performance and concept – means that the video can be read through a postmodern approach with reference to intertextuality and hybridity. Finally, it could be argued that the combination of an arthouse film-style with a popular genre of music (the song reached #1 in the British chart) provides an example of Strinati’s definition of postmodernism as a blurring of art and popular culture.
Reading and questions
Read this excellent analysis from The Conversation website of the impact Ghost Town had both musically and visually. Answer the following questions
1) Why does the writer link the song to cinematic soundtracks and music hall tradition?
Written in E♭, more attuned to “mood music”, with nods to cinematic soundtracks and music hall tradition, it reflects and engenders anxiety.
2) What subcultures did 2 Tone emerge from in the late 1970s?
2 Tone had emerged stylistically from the Mod and Punk subcultures and its musical roots and the people in it, audiences and bands, were both black and white.
3) What social contexts are discussed regarding the UK in 1981?
England was hit by recession and away from rural Skinhead nights, riots were breaking out across its urban areas. Deprived, forgotten, run down and angry, these were places where young people, black and white, erupted. In these neglected parts of London, Birmingham, Leeds and Liverpool the young, the unemployed, and the disaffected fought pitch battles with the police. “Ghost Town” was the mournful sound of these riots, a poetic protest. It articulates anger at a state structure, an economic system and an entrenched animosity towards the young, black, white and poor.
4) How can we apply cultural critic Mark Fisher’s description of ‘eerie’ to the Ghost Town video?5) Look at the final section (‘Not a dance track’). What does the writer suggest might be the meanings created in the video? Do you agree?
It’s just a cry out against injustice, against closed off opportunities by those who have pulled the ladder up and robbed the young, the poor, the white and black of their songs and their dancing, their futures. Drive round an empty city at dawn. Look at the empty flats.
Now read this BBC website feature on the 30th anniversary of Ghost Town’s release.
1) How does the article describe the song?
It starts with a siren and those woozy, lurching organ chords. Then comes the haunted, spectral woodwind, punctuated by blaring brass.
2) What does the article say about the social context of the time – what was happening in Britain in 1981?
Released on 20 June 1981 against a backdrop of rising unemployment, its blend of melancholy, unease and menace took on an entirely new meaning when Britain's streets erupted into rioting almost three weeks later - the day before Ghost Town reached number one in the charts.
3) How did The Specials reflect an increasingly multicultural Britain?
With a mix of black and white members, The Specials, too, encapsulated Britain's burgeoning multiculturalism. The band's 2 Tone record label gave its name to a genre which fused ska, reggae and new wave and, in turn, inspired a crisply attired youth movement.
4) How can we link Paul Gilroy’s theories to The Specials and Ghost Town?
The representations in the music video are racially diverse. This reflects its musical genre of ska, a style which could be read politically in the context of a racially divided country. This representation of Britain’s emerging multiculturalism, is reinforced through the eclectic mix of stylistic influences in both the music and the video. The song and video offers evidence of Gilroy’s Black Atlantic diasporic identity theory – that black culture is forged through travel and hybridity, a “liquidity of culture”. The Specials are representative of ska – itself an international hybrid music genre blurring reggae and American 1950/60s pop and later elements of punk rock – which brings in working-class British culture (linked in part to Coventry in the Midlands where they were formed).
5) The article discusses how the song sounds like a John Barry composition. Why was John Barry a famous composer and what films did he work on?
"There's something frenzied and mad about that record," he says. "It has such a kaleidoscope of influences - jazz, (film score composer) John Barry, Middle Eastern music, a solid reggae undertone and stuff that sounds like nothing else.
Close-textual analysis of Ghost Town
Watch the video several times and make bullet-point notes of your close-textual semiotic analysis using the following headings:
1) Mise-en-scene: Setting, Lighting, Colour, Actor/performer placement and movement, Costume and props. How are some of these aspects used to create meanings?
The video combines eerie shots of a deserted East End of London with the band in a 1962 Vauxhall Cresta lip syncing. The mise-en-scene and cinematography seem to reference a range of film styles including British social realism, thriller and horror genres, with the expressionist lighting drawing attention to the different meanings of the lyric ‘ghost town’.
Construction of a narrative and links to song lyrics (the journey through a deserted landscape, lyrics which refer to effects of political and economic conditions) • Narrative appeal and pleasures offered • Audience positioning and invited responses
2) Cinematography: Camera shots and camera movement.
3) Editing: Pace, juxtaposition, timing.
The pace of the song is quite slow and eerie. The baseline of the song is pretty basic yet so effective. This allows the audience to really focus on what the message is behind the song
Now apply media theory to the video - perhaps by considering whether Ghost Town reinforces or challenges some of the media theories we have studied. Make bullet-point notes on the following:
1) Goodwin’s theory of music video.
- A link between the visuals & lyrics (complement, contradict or amplify)
- Genre characteristics (heavy metal in industrialised settings; rap music in urban street contexts etc.)
- Contain intertextual references (references to popular culture)
- Contain notions of looking (e.g. screens within screens)
- Include objectification of females (e.g. male gaze)
Music video was still a very new media form in 1981 so it’s therefore difficult to find ‘repetition and difference’. However, the video clearly uses recognisable genre conventions of film genres such as social realism and horror to create something familiar to audiences and yet new and different as it was in the form of a music video.
3) Gilroy’s diasporic identity/postcolonial theory.
The representations in the music video are racially diverse. This reflects its musical genre of ska, a style which could be read politically in the context of a racially divided country. This representation of Britain’s emerging multiculturalism, is reinforced through the eclectic mix of stylistic influences in both the music and the video. The song and video offers evidence of Gilroy’s Black Atlantic diasporic identity theory – that black culture is forged through travel and hybridity, a “liquidity of culture”. The Specials are representative of ska – itself an international hybrid music genre blurring reggae and American 1950/60s pop and later elements of punk rock – which brings in working-class British culture (linked in part to Coventry in the Midlands where they were formed).
4) Bricolage and pastiche.
We can see examples of bricolage and pastiche – a merging of British film genres such as social realism and hammer horror in order to create something new (as music videos were in 1981). The lighting, colour and camerawork also create intertextual references to these film genres. Arguably, the narrative offers an example of bricolage - a postmodern take on the 'road movie' but with no destination or quest to complete (which is perhaps why the video ends with them aimlessly throwing stones into the River Thames).
5) Strinati’s definition of postmodernism.
The hybrid mix of references and music video forms – an experimental combination of narrative (the journey), performance and concept – means that the video can be read through a postmodern approach with reference to intertextuality and hybridity. Finally, it could be argued that the combination of an arthouse film-style with a popular genre of music (the song reached #1 in the British chart) provides an example of Strinati’s definition of postmodernism as a blurring of art and popular culture.
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