1. Magnetic Man – Getting Nowhere
The concept of this music video is referring to the ways some people are trying to fulfil their
pointless life goals. Achievements in video games, chasing after money, job promotion, reputation –
these are the values people in the video have set as their aims.
There is intertextuality to ‘Lord of the Rings’ motive of ‘Nazgul’, the Ringwraiths. In the movie those
creatures are representing the most loyal servants of the evil force. Once good and noble lords they
turned into malicious, demonic beings and if not killed in a certain way their life would not ever end.
By doing that the producers not only added a
significant figure which emphasizes the concept of
falling completely for a bit of power, also they
brought some of the‘Lord of the Rings’ audience to
the video just by using a character which is very
familiar to them.
However, the Nazgul is not the main character in the
video. The initial shots include the four boys meeting Scene where Nazgul is introduced
up somewhere in London and riding on BMXs, since that time they can be seen throughout the
whole video. They are sort of a contemporary representation of the Nazgul. Having their hoods on,
they are travelling throughout London on their bikes
without doing much of a direct harm to anyone. The
most important of their characteristics is the lack of
any facial features just as it was with the Nazgul.
They are observing and somehow spreading the evil
atmosphere wherever they appear in the video.
The music video is rather amplifying than illustrating
The first scene with all the boys together, on BMXs
the lyrics. There are moments when the text is really
close to what is actually happening in the video, although it never does visualise the lyrics exactly. It
is enhancing the situations in particular scenes in more of a basic and broad sense. An example can
be the scene on the right when a businessman is
reading a newspaper with heading ‘World economy:
getting nowhere’ on the front page. At the start he is
just reading it having a very shocked and worried
face, and then the paper suddenly sets itself on fire.
The whole scene is accompanied with the line ‘Feel
like we’ve been getting nowhere’ which emphasizes
the concept of needless money chasing in this case.
Burning newspaper scene
There is a bit of performance in the middle of this
music video when John Legend by singing and using
very emotional body language highlights the
seriousness of the music video’s concept.
Performance bit - John Legend