Textual Analysis - "Golden" by Jill Scott

The video immediately starts with a smile from the singer in close up. Along with the light piano playing in the background this instantly indicates to the viewer that this video and song is going to be light hearted and easy to listen to (easy listening). The close up slowly cuts to a mid shot of Jill’s whole body revealing her costume to be entirely white. Of course white connotes purity implying her song has no negativety involved, it’s just pure soul. One could link her costume to post-feminist views as she is a female singer but isn’t going about staying true to your tradtional R&B female singer i.e. her clothes being too revealing and therefore you could say she is breaking the stereotype as she isn’t your usual R&B singer she’s different, she has class as white can also be seen to connote professionalism.

The camera again cuts to long shot of her singing in the middle. This shot now reveals the location of where she was singing. She seems to be on a busy street with loads of people rushing to get to work. She is the most visual on screen due to her costume and her basically being in the middle. This shot suggests that she isn’t letting the seriousness and harsh reality of life get to her. (e.g. 9 to 5). This could inevitably link to the lyrics as she is “taking my freedom, putting it in my car, wherever I choose to go”. She’s basically saying she’s going to ‘go to with the flow’ and let life take it’s course and not be bound by work and stress. A car is the prop she would probably use to escape that stress. Stop Motion is used here as a technique to make the people around Jill seem robotic; almost as if they're following their life like a schedule day in day out, never being able to breach this vicious cycle. They're all wearing black to further make Jill seem apart from the crowd, different, her own self not a ‘robotic drone’.

We cut to a low angle shot of Jill riding her bike. The shot makes the buildings around Jill seem to tower over her almost representing the authority in society trying to bring her down. Yet we zoom to a close up and she’s wearing a brigh yellow jacket with a matching yellow flower in her hair. We get a variety of close up shots her, some to her side, some in front of her. At some points she’s not even looking ahead suggesting she’s not bound by one path in life and she want’s to broaden her horizens. Of course her yellow jacket is a reference to song. Yellow or Gold can instantly connote happiness and glee which is how she appears while she is riding her bike. Also her bike is major clue to her happiness. Bikes are often identifyed with being carefree. One memory everyone has with a bike is learning to ride it for the first time which is probabaly how she feels everytime she rides it.

While riding her bike, we get a brief shot reverse shot with a little girl and Jill looking at the girl. The girl is playing what appears to be Lego or some kind of board game. She herself is wearing a very bright orange shirt also further referencing the song title. The little girl’s scene is filmed entirely in stop motion. This time the stop motioning is very rapid and not entirely robotic. This is probably to link with the little girl’s ‘bubbly’ attitude after seeing Jill on her bike and sticking her tongue out. A shot reverse shot is displayed of both of them sticking tongues out at each other. Then a zoom in occurs on the little girl’s lego with a CG image of a Jills faces animating in lego. This may be a refence to 70’s music as the colours used in the animation are very bright and ‘groovy’. 70’s music generally identified with these kinds of colours suggesting Jill gets inspiration from 70’s disco because she believes those songs made her happy.




We enter verse two with another stop motion scene with Jill and her mother or aunt looking at a photo album of Jill’s childhood. Sharing memories with a loved is often associated with good feelings and laughter – ‘remembering the good times’. We get images of her childhood to her teens all the way up to her early adulthood. I believe Jill has done this specifically as a way of interacting and inviting the audience into her life. She wants the audience to be able to relate to her on a comfortable level which is identifyable with most familes in society. After looking at the album we get a close up shot of Jill’s mum or aunt kissing her on the cheek to probably thank her for coming. Maybe she understands that not many children see their parents once they’re all grown up and left the home so after seeing this scene and listening to this song she wants to appeal to those sorts of people to change their ways and make their family smile once in a while instead of shutting them off.


The chorus begins again with Jill on her bike in a low angle shot waving at someone off screen. Again she isn’t not conforming to one path by only looking ahead but branching herself and giving herself more freedom. Near the end of the chorus, Jill’s bike riding scene finally becomes stop motion. Here we are greated with a low angle shot of Jill finally letting go of the handle bars and continuing to ride. The scene doesn’t show Jill riding forward but almost on the spot as if she was trying to balance. The spreading of arms suggests breaking free of constriction, the handle bars representing that constriction holding her back and she wants to break free of that. The technique with the stop motion by making her appear to be balancing of the spot is sort of refence to those tight rope walkers. They’re professional, they know they won’t fall. But the audience has that sense of distress and tension – “is he going to fall? Isn’t he?” and that sense of tension that sense of ‘don’t know know what’s going to happen next’ is another way to truely living your life or her life to the fullest. Never planning, just going forth and doing it not caring about the consequences.

As the chorus continues more stop motion scenes are depicted of various life situations in which people are ‘living their life like it was golden’. The first depicts a couple in an intimate close up. The man whips out a ring obviously indicating he’s asking her to marry him. Various close up shots are used to fully display the expression on her face. The stop motion enhances that as it quickly gets the point across without having to drag out the scene. Just a few shots are used to show her expression, and a few is all you need as you expect she is going to be happy because of the atmosphere of the song.









The next verse begins and we get a low angle shot of a kid getting a box of “Freedom O’s” cereal out of the cupboard. The colours on the box are again bright colours orange, yellow, red etc. to further emphasise the songs nature. Stop motion again is used here to demonstate the kid making the cereal. Cereal or breakfast is always associated with the line ‘the most important meal of the day’. Kids grow up with this line and generally come to love breakfast time making it their most happiest times of the day which could now link to the song.

The third installment in ‘a day in the life of happy people’ portrays a woman (in stop motion) finally finishing work. This is indicated with a close up shot of her looking her watch and a mid shot of her stretching her arms after a long day and with a generally happy expression on her face. She is shown in mid shot picking up her bag and leaving work. And then the screen zooms out seemlessly into a photo of the woman going to a ballet class and the words ‘Never Stop Dreaming’ written across of the bottom of the photo. The line probably suggests that she is living her life the way she wants and not just going home after work. She wants to be something more than your average office worker. Ballet is also associated by being a very elegant dance when you dance, you’re letting yourself go of all the troubles.





Next stop motion scene depicts a boy coming home from school to be greeted by a new bike from his father. A close up of the father hugging and kissing the child indicates how close they are to each other. The video shows the father then teaching the boy how to ride it which is often most associated with father and son gaining a closer bond. The photo image appears on the screen again with the words ‘My son, my heart’ written. The heart connoting love indicating he loves his son.











The next stop motion scene depicts several kids inside a car pretending to drive it. Kids at that age (7,8,9) always seems to look up to their parents and want to be like them. Again a generally happy moment in a childs life.

Jill is shown in the next scene lying on the beach in a high angle shot. And then again in a mid shot with her back to the camera but showing her looking out to sea with the sun setting. The sunset is used to indicate the video coming to an end. Generally sunsets are associated with warmth and beauty. People generally lose themselves when watching the sunset again. The sun is sorce for letting oneself go.

To conclude, Jill doesn't let herself conform to the convention of female R&B singers. She sort of let's the music sell her, not her image which is generally what most R&B females do - sell themselves to the record company. 'To get more money, you gotta be more sexy'. She subverts that making her a very independant and strong role model for females everywhere. The song is also used to further broadcast her message of basically 'living your life to its fullest and not letting life get you down' and I think this is clearly demonstrated in the video.