Home Work (Music Video Analysis)

Overview

Goodbye Mr. A was produced on the 8th October 2007, by the Hoosiers, from the album: ‘The trick to life’. This song is noted for it’s similarities to Electric Light Orchestra, Mr. Blue Sky, etc.

The video itself is was written in the key of B major and was created in memory of frontman Irwin Sparkes’ secondary school English teacher, Jonathan “Mr. A” Anderton, after Sparkes heard of Anderton’s death in 2006. The Video to “Goodbye Mr A” is reminiscent of superhero comics and popular culture, such as the 1960s Batman television series. In the video, The Hoosiers kidnap Mr. A, a comic-book character and the world’s greatest superhero. They then take his place fighting crime as incompetent anti-heroes. Despite being fired into space at the end, Mr. A. Survives and opens his eyes; this is reference to the film Fantastic Four: Rise of the Silver Surfer.

My Own Thoughts

In the video they use a small comic sketch to show the quirky visuals of comics, after these visuals the front man Irwin Sparkes enters the lair where the drummer and guitarist start playing as they get changed into their uniform to take the place of Mr A and plan to remove him from the picture.

In some of the scenes you get a small close up of Mr. A being hoisted from a rope above a pit of acid and at the end when he is launched into space and opens his eyes. Just before he is launched into space by the hoosiers Irwin Sparkes rips of his mask as a way to humiliate him for his incompetence of fighting crime.

In most of the scenes there is a number of close up and mid-shots to show their dominance and superiority to Mr. A and make the scenes more clear because of the quality of the video. At 55seconds into the video their is a number of newspapers placed on a bow stating that Mr. A is kidnapped and their loss of a hero which allows criminals to roam the streets without anyone to stop them, the scene for this is a close up of the papers which shows their urgence for a hero and how lost the city is without someone to inspire them and keeps the streets safe even though Mr. A did not do such a good job.