Focus group Questions

Questions

Thumbs up thumbs down: do you like the song  

-what sort of Target Audience would you expect the song to have

·        Age:

·        Gender:

·        Type of person who would listen to this song please tick:

 

We will now present our idea:

 

·        What changes would you make?

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·        Have you seen an idea like this before? Scale of uniqueness, 1 being unique 5 not:

 

·         1       2       3       4       5

 

What genre you think it is – multiple choice

________________________________________________________________

 Your name: __________________________________________________________________________________

Your Age:

__________________________________________________________________________________

You’re Gender:

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Post Modernism Within Music Videos

In order to make a music video experience unique and to break new ground in the creative aspect of music videos, directors use post modernism and related concepts when creating their vision.

 Post modernism is defined as "A late 20th century style characterised by use of earlier styles and conventions and mixing of different artistic styles and media". In essence post modernism uses modernism as its base. Modernism was a movement between the 1890's and the 1960's that intended to change out dated culture and reject realism in doing so. Post modernism is the idea of using modernism as a base and mixing that with other culture. There are a range of sub-divisions in post modernism including: intertextuality, parody, pastiche, and homage. All of these can be seen across all of popular culture including film and television, and of course music videos are no exception.

Intertextuality:
 Intertextuality is when one media text refers to another, this is quite similar to both parody and homage, however the reference is less direct as an homage, and is not intended as a mockery in the sense that a parody is. Intertextual references are essentially a tribute to a genre or the conventions of  another genre in popular culture.

The video for "Buddy Holly" by Weezer is an intertextual reference because it uses earlier popular culture and bases its video on it, in this case the video is set in an episode of "Happy Days".

Parody:
A parody is the use of a reference to other forms of earlier media intended as a mockery of that product. Often a parody will exaggerate certain parts of the mise en scene of the referenced product in order to make fun of it, or they will produce a similar narrative aspect to the imitated media with a, more often than not, comedic edge to it.

The video for "Sabotage" by the Beastie Boys is a tribute to cop shows from the 1970's and 1980's which had very distinctive elements of mise en scene such as the aviator sunglasses, moustaches, and American muscle cars, elements that are exaggerated in this video along with certain conventions like kicking down doors and sliding over bonnets.

Pastiche and Homage:
A pastiche is a work that imitates the style of another work, period or artist as a self-conscious imitation, this particular term is used in close relation to homage. An Homage, much like a pastiche, is a respectful imitation of an earlier work. These are often used because of the artists personal admiration of these works.

The video for "Time is Running Out" by Muse is an homage to the movie Dr Strangelove being set in a war room as part of a crisis meeting like in the film.

 The video for "In Bloom" by Nirvana is a mixture of what is, stylistically, a parody of The Beatles' appearance on the Ed Sullivan show, and what, by the end of the video, is a classic  representation of a chaotic Nirvana live performance.

Band's and there Inspirations

Band / artist	What is inspirational	Where are ideas from
Fat boy slim – praise you	Movie theatre unique performance parody.	Possibly what happens in real life as to the dancing and it was making it recognised
Sledge hammer Peter Gabriel	All stop motion which would have been very different for the time when this music video was done. Uses serialism. Dali!	Dali with the image  of people forming, the face made out of fruit
Nirvana – in bloom	Breaks conventions of a grunge band and grunge band video. Using intertextuality.	Taken its inspiration from 1950s TV pop music show
R.E.M- everybody hurts	Disjuncture. Montage. No strong narrative. Performance at the end. Band + narrative mixed.	Could come from everyone joining together to help each other in times of need or moving on from what has happened
Johnny cash- cut you down	Range of famous people. Jerky effect. Classic black and white.	The inspirations comes from Johnny cash’s  life and is effective in black and white showing without him all colour and fun in life has left
Weeze – pork and beans	Sets of viral videos and cartoons. Direct reference	This is inspired by modern day viral video and children’s cartoon e.g. famous five and slow-mo. guys
A ha – take on me	Links of animation and real video slick for its time	This could be inspired y a romance between these two people and that they couldn’t be together but they found away as in the video.

Lyric Idea's

Music Video: Will and the People

 

 

 

Will and the People are an alternative rock band from London, UK. The band members consist of Will, his brother Jamie Rendle, Jim Ralphs and Charlie Harman. The band released their eponymous debut album in 2011. It included the singles, The Game, Salamander and Lion in the Morning Sun. The band’s second album, Friends was released in January 2013 and included the singles, Holiday and Eyes. The band members live together west of London, where they rehearse and record music.

What style of music?

The style of this music video is a mixed genre being alternative rock and have found themselves being nominated for the best of British song award with their song holiday.

What are the conventions in that style?

The conventions of an alternative rock style of music is that it was supposed to be against the norm since alternative rock emerged in the 1980’s, however the style has since become very popular and some may say mainstream therefore paradoxing itself from its original purpose. For example artists such as Coldplay and Fall Out Boy came out with very “against the norm” songs and videos with them such as The scientist from Coldplay.

Inspirations?

For our group the main inspiration of finding and making a music promo to this style of song is that it is a song in which you can do anything with, you can give a narrative that follows the lyrics exactly and tells a story, or you could do the complete opposite with barely any narrative and still be able to pass it off as a good music promo. We feel that this would work well as the point of a music video is to get the audience repeatedly watching and talking about the video and some of the controversial conventions within it expanding popularity for the band.

Example of existing videos?

·         Will and the people band video of song

·         Clean bandit, rather be (this video follows the style we would like but not the song choice)

·         Vampire weekend, A Punk

·         Two Door Cinema Club, what you know

·         Wilkinson, afterglow

·         Coldplay, the scientist

·         Kings of leon, Red morning light

·         Red Hot Chilli Peppers, Can’t Stop

 Theory?

We feel that the song choice and the video that we will produce will subverts the theory of what a music video consists of by Laura Mulvey and also the theory of Michael Shaw, as they believe that they objectify men and women in different ways sexually and with power, and also that the majority of videos are made up of recycled styles, immediate gratification and even soft core porn.

Intertextuality

Intertextuality is essential the idea of using other texts to inspire a new one which creates feelings of nostalgia and reliability within the audience or whole new meanings. Music videos can link to many different things including cinema, fashion and photography.

The music video for Without Me by Eminem uses a lot of intertextual references to popular TV programs and news stories, however the main theme of the video is the intertextual link between the video and comic books/ superheroes in which he dresses up in a similar outfit to Robin and gives himself the name 'Rap Boy'. The video aims to make a humorous link to comic book heroes by poking fun at saving a boy from listening to his music, this would appeal to his majority male audience who may have read such comics when they were younger and also just creates a funny video for all audiences to enjoy.

Short Analysis of Dancing in the Distraction Factory

• Music videos demonstrate genre characteristics (e.g. stage performance in metal video, dance routine for boy/girl band).

• There is a relationship between lyrics and visuals (either illustrative, amplifying, contradicting).

• There is a relationship between music and visuals (either illustrative, amplifying, contradicting).

• The demands of the record label will include the need for lots of close ups of the artist and the artist may develop motifs which recur across their work (a visual style).

• There is frequently reference to notion of looking (screens within screens, telescopes, etc) and particularly voyeuristic treatment of the female body.

• There is often intertextual reference (to films, TV programmes, other music videos etc).