I have chosen to look at The Saturdays website and marketing campaign they are a very current girl pop band and are relatively new to the music scene. They are currently releasing their album called 'Headlines' and therefore are a really interesting choice to look and analyse.
I have looked around the website and anaylsed about the girl band and about their music and who they are from this I can break down lots of different catergories
The institutions that are behind the band are Fascination Records. They made their recording debut in 2008 under the record label Fascination Records, a sub-division of Polydor Records which is shown at the bottom of the website this is significant as it shows that they are a signed band which means they have a budget this allows them to market and sell records and has made the pop band very mainstream.
Function that the website serves for the band is that they are able to sell thei image as a manistream band. They have pictures and galleries on the website and the main picture has the girls named which is very common of the pop genre. It allows them to appeal to their fans by having videos of them and also allows intercativity as their fans can leave comments. The webiste stylises the band with a set colour scheme and can promote upcoming tours and performances and their albums and single to buy.
The bands brand identity is very clear from the website. They have their main graphic of the bands name they have a very fun girly colour scheme and layout.Their pictures are the main feature on every page of the website which shows off the girls looks and personalities. The website looks very professional highlighting that they are a mainstream band, overall style is very fun, flirty and really pretty too look at. This reflects the pop genre and gives the band an identity that an audience can recognise very easily. The brand idetity allows personalisation and gives appeal to the audience
The target audience for the band is mainly teenage girls who are interested in pop music this is obvious by the layout style and colours of the website. It is also obvious from the fans comments who are mostly from girls.There is also advertisements that work in synergy with the website such as river isalnd that would appeal to girls. However I think the images on the website would also appeal to teenage boys who would think the girls are attractive and therefore listen to there music.
The website is designed to appeal to audience as its very interactive with lots of opportunites to listen to the girls music download tracks get involved in discussion, leave comments on pictures and performances, there is a store that the audience can easily access. The social networking sites is very much in the foreground and facebook and myspace arfe mostly used by teenagers therefore giving hem access.
There are lots of different stratergies used to market the band on the website. This done through the galleries, the performances, the news link, the different videos. The website also allows the band to announce tour dates and links to upcoming albums and singles there are lots of links to allow the audience to explore the band.
The audience are able to buy into the band by using this website. As soon as you go onto the website a pop up comes up which allows you to download the music on itunes which is an example of synergy and symbiosis with another company. You can buy tickets to their upcoming tours and performances by clicking 'buy here'. There is a tab to the main store which directs the audience to go and buy the album and single.
Apart from the band the record label are also being sold on the website, different adverts for shops and music sites are also being sold by the website. Synergy with facebook myspace and twitter are allowing the companies to be sold on the website. The symbiosis with Itunes is being sold on the website which is all the wider selling point.
The band are a very well known mainstream band therfore they have a big budget and lots of sources of revenue their website allows them to direct market and because of their huge fan base they are able to do a mainstream, huge marketing campaign therfore :
Music television, radio, magazines,the charts, the internet, festivals, live performaces, awards and links with other bands
Are hugely important for them and this is very clear in how they are marketing their new realease of their album they have a huge reach and therefore lots of choice and appeal in order to reach their target audience and sell their music, image and band.
The structure of the video is very disjointed as it cuts from different locations
The video is a visual response to the video- it narrates the lyrics and aloows the audience to watch something
There is not a balance between narrative and perfomance- no instruments are shown and Lady Gaga is shown throughout in both perfomance and narrative. The video is all part of a story with dance routines included
I think its a mixture of both narrative and the music- the music builds up slowly and the narrative gradually continues throughout
There is a closure pose however not a closure to the narrative
The video poses a few questions however the style of it doesnt mean for questions to be asked it just a very weird video. The location and the male used may pose questions as to there relevance.
Yes there is a narrative running throughout and theme in a montage style
Editing
The editing does match the musical phrases and beat at the start the editing is slower then quickens with the pace of the music. The video is cut in time to the beat and example of this is when there is a lot of quick beats the video cuts in time to them swapping to different locations
The editing most definitely does break the rules of contnuity editing, there are lots of long shots to close ups, the 180 degree rule is broken, there is no even pace or smooth transitions and there are lots of zooms throughout
The editing in this video is definitely been made to be really obvious which draws more attention to Lady Gaga. They use lots of obvious graphics there are extreme changes in loaction and time, fancy cuts and jump cuts
Camera Movement and Framing
There are lots of close ups and extreme close ups of mainly her face but also her body
The style and framing does run throughout the video its very obvious and qwirky
The camera moves in time with both the music and the lyrics
There are master shots of her dancing used frequently
Digesis
I think this is untrue that the digesis is reaveled quite slowly because she starts in the loaction and quite quickly more is given away
Actions are suddently interruputed as another part is cut in so we only see smaal bits of each action
The character does do a lot of movement to the music this is shown in her dance moves and in the way she moves throughout such as moving her hip or opening her fingers over her eye in time to the music
There are gaps in the narrative where she is just performing or its her doing a small action with her hands
Lots of frames are shown more than once
There is repeitions throughout as we see similar camera movements, same beat, the same theme and the same image and perforamce.
Today we met up as a group for the first time during our lunch break this allowed us to discuss and gather our first initial ideas. We each played some tracks that we have been researching and that we are interested in. From this we discussed them and thought of what may work and what fits with the track selection rules that we have.
We decided we really liked a song that was written and sang by Tom's band- Indecisive. We talked through possibilities that we could try and work with and different ideas for the video. We all really like the track and think we could make something really interesting and exciting. This is not completely finalised but i'm happy with our progress so far
Our group took the camera out for a test run which allowed us to look at the different techniques that we could possibly use on our actual shoot. We tried out a few techniques such as slow mo, wide screen and different focus pulls.
Our group really liked the wide screen which is a possibility that we may use this in our final video and we will shoot in this mode. I think it looks really good and could work really well for our video, its original and depending on what genre we choose it could work well with it.
We are having our first group meeting this lunch where we will discuss all this and present different music tracks and hopefully decide on a final one or a couple of final tracks. I will keep posted on our progress and I am excited to begin the project.
I am going to analyse JLS- beat again and was produced by Steve Mac. The genre that is represented is pop and is shown through :
choreographed dance routines
beauty shots
fast paced editing
matching clothing
close ups
band shots
looks at the camera
focus on them
very stylised
What is the relationship between lyrics and visuals?
Many of the visuals are used to illustrate the lyrics and there are a number of shots which empasises this relationship. This is very typical of a boyband with a genre of pop music, it makes thes lyrics very clear to the audience it doesnt over compicate anything and it also appeals more to the audience. As there is no other meaning towards the lyrics or narrative given to show the lyrics, the band are in the whole music video, using lots of different movements to illustrate the lyrics
These pictures are all taken when words in the lyrics are things like 'up' 'die' 'me' and 'beat again'. It obvious from the pictures that they take words literally from the lyrics and have dance moves that then make that word visualised. By doing this they are giving a literal interpretation of the lyrics and the viuals illustarte them.
What is the relationship between music and visuals?
Throughout the song they cut the video in time to the beat. This is obvious straight from the start where they fade a black screen over the boy band to the first beats of the music in order to build suspense and emphasies them. Throughout the whole song the editing it sharp quick straight cuts in order to fit with music, as the pace is kept constant throughout the editing is kept constant throughout and this helps emphasise the music and the beat of the song. There are no instruments in this video therefore these visuals do not emphasises the music. However they constantly use drop down black visual screens to keep the beat constant and this really makes people aware of the music
Are there close ups of the artist and star image motifs?
This is a main part of the music video, the close ups on the band are very constant and there are lots of shots of there faces. I think this is very much how the record company are wanting to sell the track. They are using the boys looks in order to target the audience which would mainly be teenage girls and by giving close ups draws the audience in and allows the band to be seen individually. They are offereing a very sexy image, they are making all the members look as
attractive as possible and along with their dance routines they are suppose to look very cool and someone that the audience would 'fancy'. This was there first video, however they came from the x factor and while they were on it they use to always wear different colours, blue, green, red and yellow with JLS on the front of the clothing which use to be there trademark. In this video there clothing has very much changed and i think this is so they become a real band and make themselves a bit more serious and the record company have given them clothing that instead makes them look good and will look attractive for the audience.
Is there reference to the notion of looking?
This video is all about 'the look' however it subverts the gender thoery as they are not using the female body to atrract the audience instead they use the males bodies. They use the bands bodies and faces in order to make them look very sexualised and put there phsique on display as you can see from the pictures. The costume they are wearing are all matching however some have there buttons undone and rolled up sleeves I think this gives them an edge and again adds to 'the look'. There dance moves are not neccesarily sexualised however they are used to allow them to show off, as one of them does backflips and they have a lot of movement. Parts of the camerawork have close ups on their chests and torso which i think is done again to add to 'the look' and make them look sexy. I think this has all been chosen as its very much part of boyband pop genre. It allows them to sell the record and they use the bands image in order to sell the track and gain audiences. The main audience that this would appeal to would be teenage girl and the gay audience, by appealing using the look they attrract them and therefore make money for institutions and the record company
Are there intertextual references? This breaks the conventions of Andrew Goodwins music video key theory. This is because there is no intertextual references throughout the video. It all set in one location and the video is all about the band instead of intertextual references they use there image and dance routines to make the video interesting.
Is the music video performance base, narrative-based or concept-based
This video is very much perfomance based there is no reference to any sort of narrative or concept based. Its all about showing off the band and the whole video is made up of just them. There dance routines allow them to perform throughout which entices the audience and gives centre of attention on them throughout the video.
Conclusion
Overall I think this video of JLS is a very good example which follows Andrew Goodwins theory of music videos almost perfectly. It has genre characteristics, relationship between lyrics and visuals, relationship between music and visuals, close ups of the artist, image, reference to the notion of looking and a performance based. However intertextual reference is the only point missing from this video which does not fit with Andrew Goodwins theory.
This video if of the Spice Girls that represent a classic girlband, the genre they display is 90's pop.
The genre is shown by:
Bright colours
Routine dances
Timed movements
Lots of beauty shots
very conventional
fast paced cuts
energetic,lots of movement and dances
They all had individual costumes to make each person in the band unique and represent their name. Wore very tight clothing such as leather dresses, leopard print, bellytops, choker necklaces
Hair and make up big and bold. Again representing each of their personalities which the audience can then pick who they like best
Band shots
individual shots
Sexual dance moves
Lots of Close ups
Bright lightning-high key
Another video I have chosen to anayalise is Kayne West- Gold digger representing the r 'n' b genre.
This genre is shown in this video by
Lots of beauty shots of girls
Shots are cut to the beat of music
Close ups of girls lips, bums, breasts and legs
Main focus on girls
Sexual Dance Moves
Costumes- males suits gold jewellery, shirts un buttoned, sunglases
This video was made by Busted for their chart hit Year 3000.
This song was hugely popular and the video was shown numerous time on music channels. In the video they have used the gaming world to appeal to a broad market and also to appeal to teenagers as it's fun and exciting
The video takes a journey from the end of a playstation game until the band our engulfed into a gaming world. The imagery they are surrounded in is cartoon graphics.
I think this really suited the bands image as their genre was pop and by using the gaming world that influence is the same as their target audience. This would mean the audience would understand it and it also represent the bands image as they are quite child-like, always messing around and suppose to be quite cool. By using intertexuality of the gaming world its reflect the bands image and works well with thei audience.
After much research ive decided to pitch a track to my group which is quite different but i think will allow us to be creative as the lyrics are quite repetitive giving us freedom to explore different ways we could interpret the track.
Artist- Shy FX
http://www.myspace.com/shyfx
Drum n Bass/ Jungle / Soul
Songs call ' On the Run'
Shy FX crashed the British pop charts in mid-1994 with "Original Nuttah
If I was to start making a video of this early ideas would be originated around something very modern and new. I would want to create something very fresh, lively and energetic to reflect the fast paced rythum in the song. I feel that the setting should be in the inner city and should involove some sort of party atmosphere with a big cast.
Audience
I think the main core audience would be teenagers both female and male between 15- 21. However the secondary audience would be again female and male but young adults between 21 and 30
Our target audience would be into their music and not just like mainstream. They would need to like drum and bass and would be update with the news genres and music.
I think this sort of genre allows escapism for the target audience its something they can listen to with their friends and played at small gathereing as background music. Although the beat is quick I don't think it something that would be played in clubs i feel its more for people who want to relax and socialise and listen to it as background music
I think this kind of music could be downloaded of something like itunes and be spread easily around facebook and myspace.
Deconstruction:
Artist on both front and back, Artist centered, black and white colour scheme, main title in light blue, simple fonts, songs, album name in small white font, Artist name covers the centre of the cover horizontally, artist main feature on front,Black front cover and light grey colour surrounding artists picture, colour scheme continues on back cover and on the spine of the cover. Barcode in topright, songs listed vertically on the right side.
The reason I chose this CD cover is because of how simple it is but also how effective it is. It's an album cover that uses just the artist to attract the audience and make the CD album stand out amongst others.
The text and the image have the same colour scheme both the text and image are kept in a black and white colour scheme. This allows the artists name to really stand out as this is put in baby blue. By doing this the audience are instantly attracted to the CD and fans of her music can recognise it easily. The text reflects the pictures as her pictures are quite serious.
By using Rihanna as the front and back cover imagery they are using her looks and image in order to sell the album. This album was where her music became a bit more serious and I think this album cover represents the genre and music she is now trying to promote
I think its very obvious from this album cover that she is mainstream as they can just use the artist alone to sell the music. They do not needs to use any other graphics or imagery, or any genre signifiers using the colour scheme or text instead its been kept very simple reflecting a mainstream popular artist. I think it is also obvious from this album cover that its not her first album as they do not need to give much away they've just kept it really simple in order to attract the audience and they don't need to be obvious as she alreasy has a huge fan base that would go out and buy the CD.
1. What are the typical features that an album cover has? Make a list of all the elements they have in common.
Typical features that are dominant on every album cover that I have chosen are:
Name of the artist
Imagery - either of the artists or a photography or graphics that reflect the album
Colour Scheme
Name of the album
List of the songs- not always on the back
Barcode
The actual CD matches the imagery on the cover
Name of album and artist down the spine of the cover
2. How would you categorise the covers in front of you? Are there any other ways of distinguishing between them other than generically?
When first looking at them it is the most easiest to catergorise them into the different types of genres infront of me. This would be pop, r 'n' b, indie-rock, and jazz. However I feel i could also put them into catergories from oldest to the most modern CD. I think this is firstly the vinyl record is distictively larger which is why I know this the oldest as the size and make of a CD has significantly changed. I think also the imagery looks much sharper on the CD covers as they become more modern. I could also catergorsie the CD's into who they would most appeal too, as in the PCD CD is obviously very girly and will attract a younger mainstream market, whereas the red hot chilli peppers album cover is attracting more of a male audience as the picture is not of the band its just very plain. I could also catergorise the CD album covers by the way the different ways they try to appeal there audience wether it be by artist or by picture or graphics.
3. Album covers serve many different functions. What do you think these are (ie what is their purpose?)
I think the main purpose of a CD cover is to sell the artists music, it needs to attract and appeal the right audience in order for them to want to go to the shops and buy it. The album cover has to be asthetically pleasing however different album covers do this in very different ways. All the r 'n' b and pop album covers seem to use there artist to attract their audience this is shown on the PCD, Christina Aguilera, Beyonce, Mis Teeq album covers- which all have the same genre. However the more indie music album covers use art to sell the album. The cover needs to reflect the music there trying to sell in order to appeal to the correct audience and give them a taster as to what they will listen too if they bought the cd. This is obvious on the Jazz CD which has a painting of someone playing the saxophone and this would allow the audience to know what the music will be like. An album cover generally needs to look appealing needs to stand out on the shelf and also needs to sell the artist aswell as the music.
Today we presented our ' what music means to me' choices from childhood teens and now. It was really interesting to see everyones choices of tracks and videos and major patters occured with each presentation. I liked that the music tracks everybody chose were each really original and personal to us however throughout we shared common links.
Music- When do you listen to music, where, who with?
I think this question is really personal to everyone and depends completely on you. I listen to music everyday, I listen to the radio every morning while getting ready for school, I listen to Kiss 100 and Capital FM mainly.I rarely use my ipod except for on holiday and in the gym, mainly because I dont own itunes. I love listening to music with my friends mainly when were getting ready to go out and when im in different places i listen to different types of music. I mainly consume my media from the music channels on the TV just because I can enjoy music more when im on my own if theres something to watch with it. I also love listening to the radio in the car for background noise. Music to me isnt about finding the latest band and constantly downloading I just like consuming it for entertainment, with friends and for escapism.
Pleasures of listening to music?
For me, listening to music is to give me escapism and different genres of songs can give me different feeling and emotions. Music can really cheer me up and get me in the mood if im going out for the night. I think sharing music with others can help people socialise it can create an atmosphere and help release tension
From hearing others presentations today I feel alot of people listen mainly to music to realease many different emotions. I think the lyrics of songs can help express peoples feelings and can perhaps remind you of a memory or a time in your life which is why people like listening to the music. Depending on different places the pleasure of music reflects that for example if your in a club the pleasure of the music is to express happiness and socialise in a group. Whereas if you sat on a train you would prefer to listen to music indvidually for company and to entertain you.
Our choices of music- did they follow any patterns?
When presenting our music choices numerous patterns came up. Firstly a main pattern that came up was memories. Lots of people including myself choice tracks that reminded them of something in their lives, something that realy stands out to them, whether that be a holiday, a trip or a song that reminds them of growing up. Most of our childhood tracks werent chosen because of the lyrics but mainly because they were targeted to appeal to us. We also saw gender difference with boys choosing football songs and the girls choosing disney films and pop music. People said that the music was influenced by people around them such as siblings or what their friends listned too. The music industry itself influnced many of us with CD covers such as 'Now that what I call music' appealing to the younger audiences and making it something we would all want to listen too. Alot of tracks that out class chose were from a ceratin occasion such as holidays, summer, gigs, festivals, school trips,first CD. With out childhood tracks many of us liked songs because of the look of the band, particualy the girls. Groups such as S club 7 and Steps had a look that we wanted to be like and so we were instantly attracted to them. The tracks that were then presented for early teens and now showed patterns of us all growing up and growing into music genres and types of bands I think as we have got older we all grow into our own tastes. Many people also widened theit music tastes and become more open minded.
What was the relevance of this task to our project?
This taked allowed us to really start thinking about the audience involved in music and how they are targeted. This will be crucial for our upcoming video as we need to target our audience in order for tehem to listen to it. We will need to create a genre and visuals that will suit that audience and allow them to recognise it. It also showed us that a music video must draw on peoples emotions and ther must be something in it that makes it so memorable and plays on peoples feeling. Overall it really got me thinking more carefully about the project in order to create something that will really work
These are a few tracks that I have been listening to in order to find a track suitable for use in our music video project. I focused a lot on shy fx because I don't think there music is very mainstream and I think its quite different. I've also looked at a couple more which are linked below:
