Digital music videos have run through the motions from being a medium to advertise a track to a synaesthetic artistic expression to a platform for advocating for social and political issues since the popularity of MTV in the 1980s. Even today, music videos lie somewhere in between short film & advertising; wherein, on one hand, they add a visual and artistic element to an aural experience, and on the other, it is a marketing tool. The transition from music videos that were yoked to distribution on cable television, major label sponsorship, and an expensive filming process, to the advent of music videos on the Internet has opened doors in terms of creativity and innovation.

Dean, a South-Korean alternative R&B artist, uses his song and music video ‘instagram’ to comment on feelings of loneliness, FOMO, and overwhelm from scrolling through social media; “I don’t wanna do this, this damn information age/ There is definitely a problem/ These days, knowing more makes you more miserable”.¹

The music video is highly symbolic, placing Dean in a closed-off empty warehouse room. Black goo slowly trickles down the walls as the music video progresses, literally and figuratively drowning him with an endless sea of images and information projected onto the dripping liquid. Interestingly, the images that feature while the #dean appears on screen are referring to fine art, including Salvador Dali, Van Gogh, Auguste Rodin, etc. K-pop as a genre is often socially considered very manufactured ‘bubblegum pop’, and low class² therefore providing contrast; “Virally, therefore, the music video re-engenders debates about high art and low culture in a transformed digital and social media context”.³

Post-cinematic forms and elements like glitches, liquefaction, and image morphs are also used by Dean to highlight lyrical moments. A standout moment is when he sings “There’s a hole in my heart/ Nothing can fill it up, yeah/ I’m sinking right now/ Inside a square ocean”. The complementary visuals involve a literal black ocean overtaking the room of the warehouse, followed by the screen refocusing on the room through a pixelated special effect – this is a clever reference to Instagram’s feed layout being a “square ocean” and his unhealthy preoccupation with digital social media, along with the negative impact it has on his mental health.

By Nikita Cecil [33656165]

1. Genuis (2017) Genius English translations – dean – instagram (English translation), Genius. Available at: https://genius.com/Genius-english-translations-dean-instagram-english-translation-lyrics (Accessed: 23 November 2023).  ↩︎
2. Oh, I. and Park, G.S., 2013. The globalization of K-pop: Korea’s place in the global music industry. Korea Observer, 44(3), pp.389-409. ↩︎
3. Gina Arnold, Daniel Cookney, Kirsty Fairclough, and Michael Goddard ‘Introduction: The Persistence of the Music Video Form from MTV to Twenty-First-Century Social Media’, Music/Video: Histories Aesthetics, Media, 1-14 ↩︎