Lyrics

Below are the lyrics for the song 'Room To Breathe' that we have chosen for our music video.
(Click the image to enlarge)

Chosen Artist

For our music video, we have chosen to use 'Tom Boardman' who is a good friend of both of ours. He plays guitar and sings, with two other friends joining in sometimes to create more of a band for some of his songs. Most of the songs he plays are originals along with a few familiar covers, and the song that we have chosen to use is called 'Room To Breathe'. Tom's music is mellow, and acoustic with a feel of music from the likes of Jack Johnson, Jason Mraz and John Mayer.

The Online Revolution

 

(Above is a printscreen of the Niz Lopi website)



Nowdays, the internet is used for a phenomenal amount of things such as advertising, buying and selling products, for both business and pleasure. This is now being used more and more to the advantage of up and coming or exisiting music artists as they can reach a whole new set of fans, from around the world who normally would never get the chance to listen to their music.

 

(Above is a printscreen of the website for the JCB song)



Niz Lopi is one of the best examples of an artist that promoted and make themselves known, entirely on the internet. Using a website called 'Monkeehub' they created a video for their song 'JCB song' and then sent it round to friends via email. Friends send the song onwards and soon enough the song made it to the number one spot in the charts the week before Christmas . The 'JCB song' managed to stay in the charts for 8 weeks and having a total of 400,00+ sales, which for a song that was only passed round from computer to computer is very impressive! The 'JCB song' has it's own website which was also created on 'Monkeehub', this means that people can find out about what goes on behind the song and it is also a clever way of marketing the band. The band also have their own website which has information about tours, and you can also purchase and listen to their music.



(Clip from Mark Ronson's album advert)



Although the internet is proving very useful for new artists and bands that want to promote their music easily and for free or a small price, for already well known existing artists that having a bigger advertising budget it may be a better idea to use other ways to promote. Artists such as Taio Cruz and Mark Ronson both have television adverts on various channels to promote their new CD's, as well as bus stop posters which are more noticable to the publicbut are more expensive.

Branding

You Me At Six is a pop/punk band from Surrey, who have had a huge amount of success in the last two years. They started off as a support band and since then have become more popular, doing gigs all around the UK, including playing at festivals such as Reading and Leeds. One of the main reasons that the band grew a large following was because of the advertising that they did when playing gigs. At each venue that they played at, there woul be merchandise available such as posters, t-shirts and badges which would immediately attract the attention of potential fans. At the beginning, as they were fairly unknown, when playing as a support band flyers would be given out in the queue for people to see when they were next playing which meant that people were more aware of who they were before they saw them play. At every venue, t-shirts and posters are available to buy, and since they have become more popular it is possible to buy badges, stickers and even scarfs which are used in offers when buying their cd. This means that their fans ar more likely to buy their music because they get free band merchandise in with the music.

Artist Album Covers

I have purposely chosen to analyse album covers of artists that are in the same genre of music of the artist that we are using for our music video. This means that when we come to making our album cover, we will have better knowledge of what should be on it.

This is Jack Johnson's album cover for 'In Between Dreams'.

The three houses colours for this cover are black, white and yellow keeping it simple as the picture is black and white, with he yellow only used as a background colour making it stand out. The colour yellow could symbolise sunshine, mellowness and happiness which links with the genre of music as Jack Johnson's songs are acoustic and relaxing to listen to. The image of the tree symbolises nature and has the connotation of the outdoors. Music which you could imagine listening to in the summer, in a field which is exactly what Jack Johnson as an artist represents

Although there is not much white space on the cover, the image takes up a large amount of room, leaving the artists name to look less significant than the picture. This has the connatation of the music being more important than the artist because the image of the man (whos is meant to be Jack Johnson) is more obvious than his name and the album title.
 The album title is 'In Between Dreams' which links in with the image on the front of the cover as I think that it looks like the tree and man are on an island. This symbolises a place that people would think of as a 'dream island' and somewhere that you can go to, to get away from everything. I think that this is what Jack Johnson wants people to feel like when listening to his music, that you can get away from everything and just listen to his music to relax.

This is the album cover for Jason Mraz's debut album 'We Sing, We Dance, We Steal Things'.

The house colours for this cover are simply black and white which has the immediate connotation of being very simple. The music and songs on the album are all acoustic and easy going which links with the basic cover. The picture of the man is supposedly of Jason Mraz which looks as though is has been drawn by a child and the font also looks like it has been written by a child. This suggests that the artist is not bothered what the album looks like but is more importantly interested in people listening to his music instead.

There is a large amount of white space on the cover which makes you immediately look at the bold artist name and as there is not much going on it draws you to what the music is like rather than anything else. Having a drawn picture is a simple way of having the artist on the cover, but without having a posy photograph.

This is the cover for Paolo Nutini's album 'Sunny Side Up'.

Firstly, in contrast to the two album covers above this one is cluttered and has house colours of yellow, green, red and white which automatically looks a lot more colourful and catching for the eye when amongst other albums. Paolo's music is once again acoustic, happy and relaxing which links in which the cheerful cartoon image on the front cover. The man in the centre is Paolo, with the view outside being very sunny and picturesque. This has the connotation of happiness, which links which the songs on the album and the music videos for some of his songs which are full of people dancing and 'having a laugh'.

The album title is 'Sunny Side Up' which links to the rainbow and sunshine outside on the cover, but also expresses the saying when it is used in the kitchen. The eggs on the table link to the title as it is the saying that people say when cooking eggs.

The artist's name is clearly shown at the top of the cover which is noticeable and in white, standing out from the rest of the complex cartoon on the front.

Creating A Niche

It is very important for a new artist to make sure that they have a 'niche', something about them that makes their brand identity different from any existing artists. It is obvious that if the brand identity isn't original, people will not bother to listen to the music, even if it is the complete opposite as they will assume from first impressions that the music and whole image of the artist is the same as the previous, similar one.

Amy Winehouse is one of the most famous female artists to come up with a completely different and original brand identity to any other existing artists around. With her tattoos, well known black 'bee-hive' and head-turning voice she automatically became very popular purely because of her image.

If a new artist attempted to 'copy' a well known artist, it is likely that they will not be as popular. An example of this is the singer 'Prince', who was said to have copied Michael Jackson also he did well in his prime, the singer was never as successful.

An exception of this is rock bands as there are many bands that have the same types of songs/music and are not compared nearly as much to other similar bands. I think that this may be because the rock genre is not so much based on image, but on the actual music.

It is also possible that once you have made a name for yourself, you can sell whatever music you decide to play as your fans will follow you. A good example of an artist that continues to change her music with time is Madonna.

The indie band 'Super Furry Animals' came up with the idea of having a niche in their music video for 'Golden Retriever'. The video was concept based and used intertextuality by having the band dressed as furry animals, which had a simiarity to 'The Wombles'. The idea for the vide was very simple, but yet original.

Artist's Websites

This is the website for 'The Saturdays'.
Before even getting onto the actual website for the group, an 'enter site' page shows the dates of their new album release as well as giving you te chance to buy their new single directly from the page which means that before even getting to the website you can buy the music.
The pale green background, along with the japenese type pale pink flowers at the top of the page give the homepage a very feminine feel. It is obvious that the group is girly and without listening to the music, they are clearly a pop group. Their are many videos on the website of the girls, showing them in both perforamnces and off stage which lets you see that they are down to earth and just 'normal' girls as well as being popstars.



This is the website for 'You Me At Six'.

Firstly, all of the font and typogrpahy matches with the logo for the band, which means that although there are lots of colours and images on the website, it fits together with the image of the band. The background colour of the website is brown, which also matches the album cover background.
As soon as you get onto the page, there are five small images of the each band member and underneath is an up to date 'tweet' from their twitters, which means that they have used web 2.0 and the popularity of social networking sites to show their fans what they have been doing. To the right of the page, there is also a bit which shows tweets, comments from facebook and photos from flickr. This makes the band seem in touch with their fans and very intereactive.
There is a link at the top of the page, that takes you directly to a page of their available albums to buy, so aswell as being able to watch the band's music, from videos on the homepage, but you can buy online aswell.


This is the website for 'Susan Boyle'.
The house colours for this website are mainly black, white and gold, which gives the convotations of it being classy and sophisticated. As Susan Boyle became famous for her unattractive image at first, and not her voice it shows the complete transformation as the website is almost the complete opposite as what she was seen as before.
The image of Susan is one of the main focus points of the homepage and the gold font of her name matches with the image, and has the conotation of the writing glowing, and being very radiant which she looks like in her photograph.
Like the other websites, this page also has a link to an online store which allows fans to purchase music online, making it very up to date with time and technology. However, this is the only website that has had a flag for 38 different countries, which lets you choose your chosen language and read the website in it. This shows how worldwide the artist has become.

The Notion Of Looking

The notion of looking in music videos can include:
- Screens Within Screens
- Telescopes
- Eyes
- Looking Glass
- Indirect/Direct Address
- Voyeurism (Looking at someone for the pleasure of doing so, for example, in the 'Moulin Rouge' video)

PINK - 'Who Knew'

- In this video, PINK keeps direct, fixed eyes on the camera most of the time, this direct addressing of the camera means that the audience feels as though she is singing to them. The couple in the video also keep contact with eachother, which is another part to the notion of looking. At the end of the video, PINK keeps contact with the camera and a fade out effect is used to end the video and the music.



Miley Cyrus - 'Can't Be Tamed'

- Throughout the video, Miley keeps close contact with the camera and voyeurism is used majorly during the whole video. Near the beginning of the video, and photographer uses a camera which then flashes and cuts to Miley Cyrus again.

Intertexuality In Music Videos

John Stuart quoted his description of the music video as 'incorporating, raiding and reconstructing'. Some music videos are made as re-constructions or re-creations of exisiting forms of media, this is called intertextuality.

Music Videos and TV
REM - 'Bad Day'- The video is set out like the news, where the lead singer is the head news reporter and says the lyrics instead of news.

Beastie Boys - 'Sabotage'
- The video is a spoof cop show.

Music Videos and Film

Madonna - 'Material Girl'
- The video for this song is set out like the film 'Diamonds Are A Girls' Best Friend' starring Marilyn Monroe. One particular part is almost identical to the film, as both Madonna and Marilyn are in pink dresses, with blonde curls and being lifted by men in suits.



(Clip from 'Californication')

 

Music Videos and Video Games
Robbie Williams - 'Let Love Be Your Energy' (Directed by Olly Reed, 2001)
- The video consists of a cartoon type character, that looks like robbie williams running through a virtual world. There are also a couple of sexual parts to the video, which are not censored as the video is in cartoon type graphics.

Red Hot Chilli Peppers - 'Californication' (Directed by Jonathon Dayton & Valerie Faris, 2000)
- The video for this song is set out like an actual video game, with scenes from skiing to skateboarding. Each of the four band members has a character that is supposedly them.

Gorillaz - 'Clint Eastwood'
- As a whole, Gorillaz are probably the most well known cartooned band, as it is very rare for the band to show themselves as people. Their videos are all in cartoon form, in the style of cartoons such as Pokemon.

Music Videos and Fashion/Photography
George Michael - 'Father Figure'
- Supermodels are used in this video to promote fashion as the models are in fasionable clothing and outfits that were on the catwak at the time.

Robert Palmer - 'Addicted To Love'
Shania Twain - 'Man I Feel Like A Women'
Bill Knigh - 'Christmas Is All Around' (Love Actually)

-The three songs above have used the exact same idea in their music videos, which is the singer in the foreground with good looking style icons wearing black clothing, in the background playing instruments.

Goodwin's Principals

Andrew Goodwin has come up with 7 principals that should be seen in every music video, these are;

• Genre Characteristic - For example, rock bands tend to have a performance based video with each member shown playing their instrument.
• A Relationship Between Music And Visuals - This is visuals link with the music in the video for example, if the song is about love and there are lots of heart in the video.
• A Relationship Between Music And Lyrics - Having the lyrics fit in with the video is what a majority of artists tend to do in videos, for example if a line of the lyrics is 'a girl was waiting at the station, for the one she loves', the video may show a girl at a station, holding her phone with a text saying 'I'm on my way, love you'. Narrative based videos tend to be told like a story which may link to the visuals.
• Close Ups Of The Artists And Star Motifs - To make sure that the artist or band in any video is unique, it is important to use close ups to show the artist and let the viewer relate to them. Also, by creating star motifs, fans and viewers of music videos can tell easily who is on the video. This means that the star motif can be used on merchanise and album cover so that the artist is recognisable and stands out. A good example of a band that has a worldwide recognised logo/star motif is the 'red Hot Chili Peppers'. Their logo which is to the left is on merchandise from band t-shirts, sticks, posters, banners and CD covers, as well as being in the background of some of their videos so that when people or fans see the logo, it is recognised automatically as linking to the band.
• Reference Of The Notion Of Looking - This is when mirrors, cameras and eyes etc are used in music videos so that it gives the feel that artists are relating to the viewer.
• Any Intertexual Referneces? - In many music videos, intertexuality is in the video which is when other forms of media are linked into the video for example a spoof cop video could be the same as an existing cops and robber film.
• Is The Video Based On?
  - Performance
  - Narrative (Lyrics)
  - A Concept or Idea

Ok Go - Here It Goes Again

(Clip from 'Here It Goes Again' video)

The video for 'Here It Goes Again' is 'concept based' and currently has 2,975,789 views on YouTube.
The video has a completely original idea, which is all four of the band members on treadmills doing a routine for the whole duration of the video.
There is no performing in terms of the band singing/playing their instruments in the video and it does not tell a story that links to the lyrics of the song.
During the video, there is only one camera angle/shot as the camera stays in the same place for the whole thing.


This is the link for the Here It Goes Again video:
http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=dTAAsCNK7RA&ob=av2e

Green Day - American Idiot

(Clip from 'American Idiot' video)

The video for Green Day's song for 'American Idiot' is a performance based video which means that the song is literally played form the beginning to end, usually with the whole band shown playing their instruments throughout.
In the video, all band members are present and playing their instruments for the whole of the video which explains why it is 'performance based'. The camera is left on for a few seconds which allows you to watch them walk away from a low angle shot.
At one point in the video, each member of the band is playing in a different speed to the others, for example the lead singer is in slow motion, the guitarist is normal speed and the drummer has been sped up, they then take it in turns to swap around.
Brand identity is shown at the beggining of the video, when you can hear the opening to the song but not see the band. A cartoon hand holding a heart granade is shown, which existing fans and people that know Green Day would recognise which means that even before the band is shown the audience are aware of who will be in the video.

This is the link for the American Idiot video:
http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=VkmEZs_Kcms

Lady Gaga - Bad Romance

(Clip from 'Bad Romance' video)

Lady Gaga's music video for 'Bad Romance' is 'narrative based' which means that it tells a story. The video is set in a brothel, where men are bidding to 'win' Lady Gaga' for their own.

Close ups and reaction shots allow the viewers to see the reactions of each person, so that they can almost feel what Lady Gaga is feeling. Straight cuts and jump cuts are in sync with the music beat and follows the visual so the viewers can keep up with whats happening.

In each of the scenes, allof the dancers tend to dance in one particular colour, with Lady Gaga either blending in or wearing an outfit which although is the same or a similar colour, still stands out.

Product placement was also included in the video, where a particular brand of vodka was shown, with a close up view and allow it wasn't for very long it can be thought of as a type of synergy.

This is the link for the Bad Romance video:
http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=qrO4YZeyl0I&ob=av3e

Introduction

I will use this blog to post my A2 media studies work, this includes a practical piece involving a promotional package for the release of an album, to include a music promo video and two ancillary tasks.

(Due to a technical fault in my previous blog, I had to create a new account and have moved my already existing posts on to this one.)