Genre is a category of artistic, musical, or literary composition characterized by a particular style.
Daniel Chandler;
The issue with genre.
A number of perennial doubts plague genre theory. Are genres really 'out there' in the world, or are they merely the constructions of analysts? Is there a finite taxonomy of genres or are they in principle infinite? Are genres timeless Platonic essences or ephemeral, time-bound entities? Are genres culture-bound or transcultural?... Should genre analysis be descriptive or proscriptive?
The Cure’s ‘End Of The World’ begins with non diegetic bird noises as tiny animated birds appear on the screen surrounded by flowers to create a happy feeling in the establishing shot of the video. This follows the typical generic conventions of ‘pop’ videos, however due to The Cure being an alternate pop/rock band, they have also shown clear conventions seen in alternate music videos. Robert Smith (the lead singer of The Cure) is shown to be a character (the protagonist in fact) as well as narrating the song itself, as it frequently cuts to scenes of him singing in sync with the song as it plays in the background. As in most videos of a similar genre, Smith is shown to be isolated from everything else outside the gothic red and black décor of his house, which matches to the way he looks and dresses; stereotypical Goth hair as it’s long, black and back-combed out, black clothes and he wears distinctive red and black make-up. Outside everything is shown to be bright and colourful, and as he is the only person seen for most of the video isolation is easily felt throughout the video. As in most indie or pop music videos the front man of the band is seen to be the main person; this is seen in this music video as he is the only member of the band shown through-out the video.
At the start of the video, the camera does a quick cut to Robert Smith’s face as soon as he starts singing; this shows a relationship between the visuals and the soundtrack which comes from one of eight main principles by Goodwin. Although there are many typical conventions that suit this genre of music, it doesn’t not follow stereotypical iconography of the typical indie-pop band as he looks very gothic; this however alienates him more so from his surroundings as everything is bright, colourful and connotes a happy environment, where as he is dressed all in black in a typical Goth style. The house he is in also shows this (dark, black and red, messy) to show that he is isolated within the confines of the building while everything outside is happy.
As the music gets heavy things round the house starts self-breaking; the lyrics ‘end of the world’ are played at this point and so relates to the concept of the video, then as verses start everything calms down; this further shows correlations between the rhythm of the song and the visuals. Other lyrics throughout also show this link; ‘not too hard to hid’. This lyric is ironic as he fades in with the dismal background of the kitchen. The fast movements of the items in his house shows time going by fast while in contrast he is still alone not doing much; this links to lyrics of him not being with his girlfriend anymore and how it’s ruining his life.
Throughout the video, Robert’s character is shown to be fighting with himself; the video is edited so there are multiples of himself. The main hook at the end gets slightly heavier tone and so everything begins to fall apart more vastly (again showing a link between the song and the video). In the last verse of the video, it shows other people in the same place as him doing the same thing but all still far apart not communicating with each other; this keeps hold of the isolated feeling, but at the same time tells the audience the feeling happens to everyone. The video shows all the guys trying to carry on as normal but it’s not the same (as everything’s broken).
Throughout the video there are lots of close ups of his face which links to Goodwin’s theory of the notion of looking, which relates to how the artist is represented; Robert Smith is shown to be an outcast and an individual which is often typical of artists of an alternate music type.