The Streets

The Streets is the stage name for Mike Skinner who is a UK artist from Birmingham, England. The Streets often make simple, yet interesting videos.

The Escapist – The Streets

I love this song as well as the music video because it is so different, but this is mainly due to the fact that it wasn’t done professionally. It is so simple and could be seen as quite boring but he goes to so many places and it still keeps you watching because you want to find out where he goes and where he ends up. It does break the conventions of most videos due to things such as no frequent cuts, imaginative angles, varied distances etc. but it wasn't made professionally and they actually commented that:
“During a great period of intense mixing we decided that it might be nice to shoot a video. This isn't the way the record industry works and so it was under the radar of the label and done totally for us by us on a shoe string. It was totally different from any other promo that I've made in that it was something real that we just filmed rather than trying to create something real looking using lots of people and lots of angles. I feel like it's more than a video in that sense. Aswell as looking quite odd without all the singing and quick cuts.”

As Mike Skinner said, when watching the video, you can believe it more because it is so simple. I love the ending on the beach, because throughout the video, the audience is led on a journey with a man through the use of long shots from behind him walking. He seems extremely alone, but free, forgetting about everyday realities, anchored by the title, as well as the lyrics:
All these walls were really never there

Nor the ceiling or the chair

I’m eking weeks of peace at the beach

I see the breezes weave the trees

I am not here at all,

You are dearly fooled,

I see bristling trees, the shush at the sea

Mischievous

Fluttering seagulls

No.

I’m not trapped in a box, so I am glancing at rocks

I’m dancing off docks

Since this stance began

That’s where I am

But it then ends with a closer shot and we finally discover who it is. I love the framing of the shots, especially as they shot it themselves, without the backing of their label.

Never Went To Church – The Streets

The use of close-ups are really engaging in this video and the audience feels real sympathy for Mike who has lost his father. Mike is nearly always placed either really right or left of frame which is really effective as it makes him seem lonelier because there is no one around him, and therefore evokes sympathy in the viewer, as well as the close-up shots when he is not singing and he directly addresses the camera. I like the shots on the train because I think their framed really well, as well as the shots that are quite unusual in music videos such as the slow tilt up at 2:14, which works really well, as the song is quite slow and the camera movement reflects the lyrics as Mike is looking at his reflection in the water, saying:

I guess then you did leave me something to remind me of you,

Everytime I interrupt someone like you used to,

When I do something like you you'll be on my mind or through,

'Cause I forgot you left me behind to remind me of you.

How the video makes the audience feel is essential here, as the emotions they evoke is what makes them want to watch it again and listen to the song’s meaning.

Prangin' Out - The Streets

This video builds up to the end when the audience is shocked. I also think the abrupt stop of the music at 2:18 is really effective as its unexpected to the viewer. To shock viewers will make them watch it again. I also like all the shots that relate to his paranoia because we are seeing what he sees and this is really effective, but quite confusing as we see short, quick glimpses. The video is also really enigmatic, as it makes the audience want to know what has happened – has he died? Or is it part of his paranoia from the drugs.
It ends on a cliff-hanger, as the lyrics state:
Right now logic states I need to be not contemplating suicide,

Cos with rational thought it would seem that I need to be not doing the stuff that makes

death seem like

an easier option,

I need a totally trojan plan right now

Has It Come To This? - The Streets

This video has more of a narrative and I thought it was quite interesting because it uses a split screen to tell two different stories that centre on the same person. The video makes you want to watch it again because it’s not made extremely obvious to start with that it is telling different stories, but the differences that you start to notice are small such as the different breakfast, one drops his keys after he bangs into people, the other meets a girl etc. overall, it’s an interesting twist on the use of narrative in a music video.