Several thousand euros of budget, scenarios and filming over several days: the clips have become real short films. A logical trend for musicians, who are expected to stand out on streaming platforms. "A clip on YouTube must be seen and be different," says an art director.

Over six billion views in three years. This is the number of times that the clip of the planetary hit Despacito by Puerto Rican Luis Fonsi has been watched. A record figure to date, but which is anchored in the trend according to which wiretapping in legal streaming supplants physical sales. And this process is accompanied by an increasingly important place for clips. Without boxing in the same category of Luis Fonsi, some French artists manage to accumulate several million views just hours after being published.

Real short films with big budgets

For the clip of Au DD , the rapper duo PNL rented a floor from the Eiffel Tower. A year later, the numbers speak for themselves: 138 million views on YouTube. The duo are used to very worked clips and with incredible landscapes: real short films with big budgets. An approach that pays for the two brothers, who have used almost only YouTube to make themselves known.

Angèle, who recently won the Victoires de la Musique award, went so far as to recruit actor Pierre Niney to illustrate her song Balance ton quoi. Again, the objective is the same: to accumulate as many views as possible on the streaming platform.

"The Internet allows much more freedom"

Why do musicians give such importance to the image? YouTube is where young people mostly consume music, and that's where careers are made or broken. "A clip on YouTube, it must be seen, it must be noticed, it must be different", explains Matthieu Tessier, artistic director in the record label Warner Chappell. "Before, for a clip to be broadcast on TV, it had to be positive and compatible with the format. The Internet allows much more freedom in what we show in the image," he continues.

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With smartphones, clips can now be watched anywhere: in transport, at the office, in bed. Some artists even play with this new consumption to adapt their clips to the telephone format. Orelsan, for example, filmed the clip for his title Family Defeat in vertical mode . Result: a remarkable performance on social networks, 27 million views to date, and a rapper who goes on sold out concerts…