Music Video in Revivew ( Bring the Noize by M.I.A )



By Bedor Alobaidi

"Bring the Noize"  is a song recorded by British recording artist Maya Arulpragasam, better known by her stage name of M.I.A.

The multi-talented artist M.I.A was asked about the inspiration behind the title of her music video "Bring the Noize" the singer noted: "When I went to India, I was looking on Google for stuff that was the color of a certain green, and that's when this green goddess, Matangi, popped up," she said. "I was like, that's weird, the whole time I've been alive on this planet, my mom never mentioned where my name came from. Matangi was the goddess of knowledge and the arts—music, art, dancing, spoken word. When they invented this mythology 4,000 years ago, the concept of someone being about all those things was normal."

Biased on what I have seen from people's comments and opinions about this music video in which some of the comments seemed to me logical and understandably clear. I touched sense that we all have different standards in liking or disliking a certain work or maybe appreciate the efforts but possibly not the quality of the work itself. Sometimes we blame the artist on couple few points and without noticing ourselves of what we are trying to explain but most of us do criticize artist's work whether about the music, theater, fine arts, and so on.  However, as I'm a big fan of creative work and how creativity should take a bigger space from the scene just any creativity especially in music videos nowadays; in which we all have noticed how the music videos industry has become more artistic, meaningful, and it's about the message that the artist is trying to deliver to his/her audience. 

As a matter of fact, let me stop here and first indicate a brief description of what does "video art" mean and relate it later to "Bring The Noize" music video by M.I.A.

Brief about the video art meaning and it's effective message:

So first of all, video art is a term used to describe art that uses both the apparatus and processes of television and video. It can take many forms: recordings that are broadcast, viewed in galleries or other venues, or distributed as tapes or discs; sculptural installations, which may incorporate one or more television receivers or monitors, displaying 'live' or recorded images and sound; and performances in which video representations are included. Occasionally, artists have devised events to be broadcast 'live' by cable, terrestrial or satellite transmission. Before video production facilities were available, some artists used television receivers and programmes as raw material, which they modified or placed in unexpected contexts. In 1959 the German artist Wolf Vostell included working television sets in three-dimensionalcollage works. In the same year nam june Paik began to experiment with broadcast pictures distorted by magnets. He acquired video recording equipment in 1965, after moving to New York, and began to produce tapes, performances and multi-monitor installations (eg Moon is the Oldest TV, 1965, reworked 1976 and 1985; Paris, Pompidou). Paik is generally acknowledged to be the single most important figure in the emergence of video art, but he was not alone in grasping the artistic potential of electronic media. Several American independent film makers, including Stan Vanderbeek (b 1927) and Scott Bartlett (b 1943), made use of video processes to develop new kinds of imagery, although the end result was usually a projected film. Others, such as Steina and Woody Vasulka, used electronic skills to produce elaborate transformations of television camera images on videotape.

Music Video OF "Bring The Noize by M.I.A:

I liked to mention in that summarized definition about the idea behind the video art and it's importance in people's life and how it became so popular to see not only in the American, or western culture but the power of video arts projects has arrived to the Middle Eastern art movement in late 90s and it continued until our present day; so people get more encouraged to admire this type of art especially when it's growth going wider everywhere in the world

Not too far from that but as an example in the 1960s and '70s, artists began focusing their attention on the possibilities of the moving image through video art movement.

Some captured and later distorted documentation of historic events, while others explored the limits of the newly employed medium - the guidelines of the ever-evolving technique was anything but fixed. In a somewhat rare occurrence for the sadly male-centric history of art, woman artists were pioneers of video art from the very beginning. While the histories of painting and sculpture often omit the female forces from the books, the chronological lateness of video art made way for a far greater female influence.

 I see from my point of view, this video carries the meaning of semantics distinct outstanding images and views that has been brought from the customs, traditions, the culture of other people, and we see the artist here reflects in some way and in an innovative way, uniquely different or in better words kind of unusual aspect from the culture of a different region and far removed from the form and content of what we used to see in the American culture or from where M.I.A came from in England as well as the western culture, generally speaking.

 Also, I even think with myself not as a writer here but as a part of a large society that it's people more likely see themselves got very interested to analyze  a certain  type of music and notice it's difference especially when you watch the song and view it on the big screen.

 I often ask myself repetitively, why M.I.A is so different than any other artist even though people might consider hip-hop genre is about the routine but at the same time we start bringing up some examples of artists who do perform hip hop whether that performance would be live on stage or as a music video form and realizing always that there's a good number of hip hop performers and singers that they go all creative and make such a remarkable accomplishments to make their names shine brightly and become interestingly popular in the region and around the globe just because he or she was significantly unique and different in many ways, which I simply think Mia is one of those names by all meanings. 

Check out Mia's music video by clicking on the below attachment and be sure to make some noize while you listening to the song as well! 

 Enjoy :)