Textual Analysis of Music video two: Pink - Funhouse

Alicia Moore (AKA Pink) is an American pop singer and song writer who released her first album in 2000 and so far her latest in 2009. The song fun house is produced by Jimmy Harry and Tony Kanal. Tony Kanal of No Doubt, also the co-writer and the producer of the song, appears in the music video, playing a piano after the second chorus.The songs main focus or meaning as the star said herself is personal to her as it is about her split with Carey Hart. This song seems to return Pink to her full rocker mode as the song is upbeat with guitars among other instruments. Billboard (an American magazine) was quoted saying: "gave the song a very positive review, saying "Pink again displays her versatility on this complex number, which calls for blues, funk and rock vocal styling's that few other pop stars could pull off" This shows how diversified Alicia can be.

Rock music entered the mainstream at 1950 which drew on folk music, jazz, classical music and others. While in the 1970s, rock developed a number of sub genres, such as soft rock, glam rock, heavy metal, hard rock, punk rock with more appearing in 1980 such as alternative rock. These various rock genres have been combined together in various rock tracks to produce an even better single which pink has done in multiple tracks including the title song "Fun house".

The video begins as it pans low to the ground showing an Elvis grave briefly. Pink then soon emerges from an old empty pool and begins to sing the first verse while doing such things as kicking over a toilet and throwing a photo frame. She then passes a toaster before entering a house that is on fire with various clowns around. For a reason that i can't think of she picks up a stick quickly then throws it back down. She counts down from 9 with her fingers and hand gestures. She moves to a table and takes a sip of some red liquid but becomes disgusted by screwing up her face thus she throws it down. Pink soon jumps onto a mattress attached to a chain which is being pulled by two clowns. She soon gets off the mattress and climbs onto the burning fun house to finish the scene. It then shows three clowns before she walks up to the one clown playing a guitar. She counts down from 9 yet again. After this clip Pink climbs threw a doggie door where a male jumps to play the piano who is in fact the male who helped produce the video. Alicia then moves to a motorcycle that is positioned near the piano and puts on sunglasses and a leather jacket which is followed by another countdown. At one she rides away on the motorcycle as the house explodes before showing a typical scene of the female riding into the distance/sunset.

Pink keeps to the genre of rock within this song from the typical instruments that are used within it as well as the swearing at one point when she sticks her finger at the camera, Her hair has a slight mohawk down the centre which again is stereotypical to the rock genre however they would probably have it bigger than . She also wears a leather jacket at the end of the video which shows her rock type genre.

Reference to looking is also given a couple of times within the video such as a reflection in a toaster which i feel almost makes the audience seem slightly nosy as you want to know what is happening due to being able to see things happening from it yet being unclear at what exactly is going on. Another is when you see the photo frames on the floor which could signify that you are at a friend's house and they are simply showing you their family images.

Throughout the video various lyrics match what is happening within the video which i feel can help the understanding of the music video, especially if it is narrative based as it is like a film. You need to know all the factors in order to understand the ending of one which is just like a narrative based music video. "Dance around this house" for instance is used near the start of the video when Pink begins to dance showing her connection to the music thus i feel trying to make the audience connect to the track also. Also near the start of the track she says "Throw you out" while making a gesture of throwing something out to emphasis her emotion at that point in the song. "Spinning all around" is used just before the female begins to spin in a full circle with the camera panning past as she does so. Another lyric match is when she picks up the photo frames when saying "Pictures framing up the past, taunting smirk behind the glass" which she throws behind her as the word behind is used again to emphasis her emotion at that point in time. "Tickle" is used as she tickled her body before going off the screen with a grin on her face. She is constantly saying "evil clowns" and most of the time the clowns appear on screen. "Used to be" is spoken when Pink walks past the toaster which i feel could represent her looking back on the past due to the reflection showing her back as she walks away as well as it is combined with the photos of the female with her husband that she was divorcing at the time. Thus i feel that this is showing her walking away from the past as it used to be a certain way which means that it isn't that way anymore. "House" she sings as she walks into the house before the beat kicks in. "Mattress" is spoken as she jumps onto the selected item after she sings "Movers" which makes two clowns pull the item across the floor thus these various factors i feel help the understanding of the music video. "Crawling through doggy door" shows Pink crawling through a cat flat which is ironic as she sings doggy dog which could show that she is repelling and is a rebel as she calls it a doggy door instead of a cat flat. "Key don't fit my lock no more" shows a door behind the female which is locked.

Certain visuals within the video also link in with the music or with certain beats. For instance when the female walks she is nearly always in tune with the beat of the music as well as with her hand gestures which she performs. Flames near the end of the video burst with the beat to increase effect and to focus the audience's attention with a large one at the end of the video. There is a scene roughly between 1.30 and 1.40 which shows when the female says "Down" flames burst outwards to the beat.

There is no sexual reference within the music video at all as i feel that Pink is more of a rebel and a rock punk type person instead of flaunting herself which most female pop stars. Such as Lady Gaga, Katy Perry, Kesha among others. She has however flaunted herself slightly before in other music videos yet it was to portray an image for instance "Stupid girls" was a track where she basically had a go at all the plastic women in American for using cosmetic make up and being at girly when they used to have powerful women and natural/comfortable with themselves. Thus i feel that Pink makes her videos to either give a story away and to prove or point or to express her own views and ideology.

The music video is based on Pink as it shows her most of the time however it does show the other band members yet strangely you never see their faces as they are the clowns thus all the attention is still in the female. She is shown in various ways by a full shot of her, a low shot, a landscape shot and various other shots. I feel that the video does this as Alicia is very much her own person as i feel that to express that fact they wanted to base the video just on the female thus showing her independence and power as well as the fact that she is quite well known yet she is still being used to sell the record.

This music video has other in textual references within it such as the horror film "it" which has a main villain or monster of an evil clown which links to the evil clowns that are commented on within the video. Others film techniques are looked at, for instance there is almost a blockbuster film ending with a large explosion near the end of the music video which has been used in various films. Another typical scene is when Pink goes off into the sunset on her bike, again this is used in a lot of various films e.g. Simpsons movie.

Pink also refers to her other music video "so what" which has the female on a vehicle in the middle of the road banging her head which she does in this video except she is on a motorbike. "So what" is also referred to as that video was based on her break up with her husband which is the same basis in this track as she was quoted with saying that both were hints at the break up yet her husband didn't mind them at all and in fact thought that they were good fun.

I feel that this video is narrative based as it follows her walking through the fun house until she gets on her motorbike and gets away from the scene. It also feels slightly performance based as she performs to the audience and looks at the camera a lot of the time.