The highly-anticipated music video for Adele’s epic, album-closing “Someone Like You” hit the internets last night.

It’s your classic, melancholy music video; relentlessly simple, filmed in black and white, and almost completely driven by the charisma and beauty of it’s star.

I adore this video…as well as all the videos that came before it that are exactly like it. Because the “Someone Like You” video is also completely unoriginal and beyond formulaic.

And that’s ok.

httpv://www.youtube.com/watch?v=hLQl3WQQoQ0

 

Sometimes being derivative is a good thing. “Someone Like You” is a simple, minimalistic song, and the video does a great job of underscoring the song’s gloomy, heartbroken core.

I just think it’s kind of funny and strange how effective this formula is, and how often it’s utilized. This kind of video has been done so many times, and it never gets old. It’s like the oldest music video-making trick in the book, and we always fall for it. There’s something very masochistic about that….

Anyways, below are just a few classic examples of this video-making strategy being utilized to near-perfection.

Notice how, in each of these videos (for the most part), the female vocalist is singing her most heart wrenching song in complete solitude, while either staring off into oblivion or wandering aimlessly. The video is usually black and white, or with very few colors present, a tear or two are shed, and there’s lots of direct eye contact with the viewer.

It’s all designed to make you feel utterly miserable. And I love it.

So grab some tissues, and get ready to feel like shit. This is a celebration of the stark, intimate, sometimes black-and-white, heartbreaking, female singer-songwriter-driven music video.

Enjoy…?

 

 

Amy Winehouse “Back To Black”

 

httpv://www.youtube.com/watch?v=TJAfLE39ZZ8&ob=av3e

 

Duffy “Rockferry”

 

httpv://www.youtube.com/watch?v=6zQP6vgWiek

 

Christina Aguilera “The Voice Within”

 

httpv://www.youtube.com/watch?v=nA2k79EGHbc&ob=av2e

 

Sinead O’Connor “Nothing Compares 2 U”

 

httpv://www.youtube.com/watch?v=iUiTQvT0W_0

 

What do you think of Adele’s video for “Someone Like You”? Tastefully simple, pardonably unoriginal, or just relentlessly boring?

Sound off below!