The book Music/Video: Histories, Aesthetic, Media addresses how music videos have more of an ability to be treated as an art form now than they did when MTV was popular for showing music videos on the channel and the videos themselves were created as a “marketing tool” for the audience (Arnold et al, 4-5). While music videos now may have more potential to be considered as artistic short films, actual brands and companies are now replicating the aesthetics of these audiovisual displays to create their own music video inspired advertisements.

The American reality TV series Dance Moms (2011-2019) created a commercial for one of their seasons that is a parody of the music video for “Take On Me” by Aha. The song itself actually plays in the background of the advertisement while the dance moms chase after their daughters and the show’s dance teacher, Abby Lee Miller, through the drawn paper world. This commercial not only borrows the original aesthetic and song, but it also blatantly copies specific moments from the music video like having an arm pop out from the page at the beginning (the commercial used a leg instead of an arm) and having a doorway in the drawn world that shows a window to reality.

Credit: “Dance Moms – Take On Me” by FamousDancersXXO

While the Dance Moms commercial is clearly copying off a pre-existing video, some brands make their ads more loosely inspired by music videos than directly referencing one in particular. The food delivery company Just Eat is known for having several commercials featuring original music by popular artists that promote ordering food through their service, including one with the famous pop artist Katy Perry. Although the ad is only a minute long, it features Perry in a variety of food-themed costumes as she eats in the different rooms of a colorful and elaborately decorated house. These visuals used in the ad are very similar to the aesthetic that is normally associated with a Katy Perry music videos with overly saturated colors, vibrant locations, and outrageous fashion. Advertisements that embrace the music video approach show how there is currently a shift to high-production value and eye-catching visuals in the marketing industry.

Credit: ‘Just Eat and Katy Perry, Did Somebody Say” by Just Eat

-Olivia Arenburg

Reference: 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