music video research 4 Artist: Red Hot Chili Peppers Song: Californication

'Californication' by 'Red Hot Chili Peppers' is a conventional song from the 'Alternative Rock' genre that features unique elements within its music video.

There is a blend of visual styles in the music video: the real depictions of the band are fairly realistic with no exaggerations of their appearance or emotions, while the game depictions of the characters (produced purely in CG) are more akin to fantasy with the more unrealistic scenarios the characters find themselves in combined with the loose physics. The camera follows each character (in the game) separately from a third person perspective, meanwhile the band members are often featured individually in close up shots with them only ever being fully together in a few shots in the entire video. The editing technique takes full advantage of the video game setting, utilising 'character selects' and 'check points' to transition between the characters. Furthermore there is a cropped display of the band within the top left corner of the video whenever the video game is in focus, represented by the cube; at certain points of the video, such as when the chorus is in play, the cube will expand and act as transition between the game and reality. The video game version of California is set during the day and the band are performing to a backdrop of a clear sky so the lighting reflects this. The band is wearing very casual clothing in both worlds, consisting of them shirtless with jeans and indicates the casual tone of the song.

'Californication' does contain a solid narrative that intertwines the game and the reality the bands are in. At the beginning of video there is a shot of a loading screen which informs the viewer of the locales the band has to get through in order to beat the game, followed by an overhead shot of California. Even within the first 10 seconds of the video it implies that California, or more precisely Hollywood, feels like some sort of nonsense game. Throughout the video we see the four characters traverse California, encountering countless unpredictable dangers such as being surrounded by chainsaw wielding maniacs or having to snowboard across the Golden Gate bridge. These events feel like they belong in a video game yet they are common place in action movies; helping draw the connection between Hollywood and games. There is also a 'timer' that ticks down throughout the course of the video and when it hits zero the song reaches its end and the game world is over (game over). However once the 'game over' occurs the band members reunite, appearing quite happy and relaxed. This may symbolises that they don't have the pressure of no longer having to play Hollywood's games anymore as they are now an established band. the use of a sign of failure, a game over screen, as a sign of relief is a unique perspective to look at video games from; now that there are no more goals to meet or enemies to defeat a player can finally take in what they have experienced, likewise the band no longer have to get past the hurdles of executive producers trying to excessively change them to cater to a target audience or alter the music they create to be more trendy, granting them some freedom.

The song is conventional for the 'Alternative Rock' genre, The narrative has a negative message with a positive silver lining, the idea that these incredible things still occur in Hollywood despite the sometimes of soul destroying and exploitative nature of it. The clothing worn by the characters (that being no shirt paired with jeans) is casual, fitting with genre conventions. While the setting is virtual ,the city locale (California) is conventional for 'Alternative Rock'. The unique aspect of the video is of course the use of CGI to represent a virtual game; which works well in the song's favour because it helps convey their message.

The best elements of the video are the use of a different art form (video games) to support the narrative/message and the use of specific devices (such as the check points) to trigger transitions. On the other hand the actual shots of the band performing over a clear sky background are rather dull and in my opinion could have been expanded on.


(directed by Jonathan Dayton & Valerie Faris)