Comparison of Massive Attack- Unfinished Sympathy to Radiohead- Burn the Witch

Comparison of Massive Attack- Unfinished Sympathy to Radiohead- Burn the Witch 

• What are the songs about? Massive Attack's Unfinished Sympathy is about how someone is trying to leave a bad relationship, yet they feel like it is following them and won't leave them alone, where as Radiohead's Burn the Witch is about how you cannot trust people so have to be careful what you say and do.
• What message or messages do they convey to the audience? Unfinished Sympathy may put forward the message to the audience that you need to let go of what is holding you back, whether its your history or the present, whilst Burn the Witch is about how whatever you do or say can be used against you so you have to be careful in life.
• How have the artists been represented in their respective videos? In Unfinished Sympathy, the singer is shown to be walking down a street, and she is presented as slightly carefree as she forgets about her worries and carries on with life, yet in Burn the Witch the characters in the video are harrowing so put forward the representation of something to be afraid of.
• Why have they been represented in such a way? This is to make both of the videos convey how the lyrics are supposed to make the audience feel.
• Do the videos represent the artists successfully? Yes as the stereotypical thing about mainstream artists, is that they write lyrics that are usually positive, whilst alternative artists stereotypically write lyrics that are negative.
• What styles of film making have been used? Why utilise such styles? The mainstream video is live action, as it may be easier for the audience to relate to, whilst the alternative video is done in stop motion clay modelling, as the artists want the video to be shocking as they have taken a children's programme and made it quite morbid by mixing it with a horror type of film.
• Why does the Radiohead video reference Trumpton and The Wickerman? As these are well known and people will remember them from their childhood, and if they took Trumpton, which was a children's show, and mixed it with a horror such as The Wickerman, it would make the video even more disturbing.
• How and why has 'the street' been used in the Massive Attack Video? As it shows how the lyrics are a part of everyday life and makes the song relatable to the audience.
• Do the visuals work well with the musical and lyrical content? Yes as the normality of Massive Attacks video portrays the realism in the lyrics of the song, whilst the video for Radiohead does portray the sense of instability and paranoia which the lyrics also do.
• What 'pleasure' does the audience get from each video? Consider fans of the artists in question. The fans of Massive Attack would enjoy their video as it is something that they can physically relate to, whilst Radiohead's fans will like the aspect of imagination, but also the intertextuality mixed in.