Audience Research

Nirvana's 'heart shaped box'

The establishing shot of the video is of a dieing man in a hospital bed with the three band members sitting on chairs by the side of the bed. One noticeable symbol in the room is a black cross on the floor coming out of the bed. With the dieing man in bed having long brown hair and a beard it's clearly a symbol of Jesus and the crucifix. Another noticeable factor is the stream of light that comes through the curtains and falls on the main singer Kurt Cobain. And with Kurt Cobain's blonde long hair the light makes him appear angelic. This all may be linked to the next scene which may appear like a dream, where by the old man is now dressed Jesus and is next to a crucifix. The mise en scene shows a field of red poppeys and with a clear blue sky that all seems quite tranquil other than the crucifix, maybe symbolizing heaven with Kurt Cobain 'the angel' being the dead man's guardian angel. However the tranquility is soon overturned as you see the man start to climb up to the crucifix and the sky turns red as kurt cobain and the band start to perform, this maybe symbolising hell.

Within the performance section the camera pulls focus onto kurt Cobain as well as putting him out of focus. This maybe symbolising Cobains confusion and the illusion that all the happenings within the video are day dreams or images within his head as well as a technique used to create a more frantic performance, perhaps reflecting the band's performances. This may also be for audience appeal and to sell the band as a live band.

Throughout the whole video many symbolic images are used and in conjunction with other elements raise questions of representation. Such as the little girl seen throughout the video dressed in the Klu Klux Klan outfit. She is seen looking up at what appears to be lynched fetuses. This may be a way in which Cobain, in an anti-establishment and anti-religious manner, wanted to question Christian views. As the Klu Klux Klan see themselves through the eyes of god and argue their views through the bible. The use of an old man with a Santa clause hat on who appears to be Jesus as he is crucifying himself on the cross may be a symbol of how Christian values and a Christian festival has now become dominated by commercial use with Santa Clause, not St Nicholas, and the giving of presents. So within the music video Christians appear to be represented as a racist and anti abortionist group. However the use of the Klu Klux Klan child may be a symbol and representing the klu klux klan as being naive and stupid highlighting their ignorance symbolised by the little girl looking up emotionlessly at the dying old man, now wearing a bishops hat, as well as skipping past in a child like manner. The use of the fetus is also used within the drip for the old man as the girl's outfit turns black, symbolising the mans death.

The music video appears to want to argue against Christian values and Christian views much going with the genre of the band from which many anti establishment and anti religious are expressed through lyrics.

Radiohead's 'There, There...'

Dir. Chris Hopewell,

Radiohead's video for 'There, There...' is a serial music video in which we see the main singer in Radiohead, Thom Yorke, walking through the woods with strange anthropomortic woodland animals acting out human like events such as a wedding, feast and within there cottage like houses. The narrative then moves on to a hanging coat within the forest surrounded by crows. It then moves on to Yorke putting on the coat and shoes and running from the birds but failing to get away due to the woods seeming to consume him and turn him into a tree.

The video uses a lot of different techniques to create the correct atmosphere and aesthetic quality of the video. One noticeable way in which it does this is the use of both animation and real footage. And the video itself connects these techniques by using stock motion in the real footage to create an animation like quality to Yorke's walk. This also is the case from animation back to footage as the video ends with Yorke turning into a animated tree. The aesthetics the camera and post production create an archaic or old looking video which is created using a sepia like filter along with a darkened framing to the whole video to make the video look like an old black and white silent film. The use of lighting to highlight certain aspects of the video is used throughout. Such as when Yorke is seen looking around a tree and a beam of light goes across his eyes as he looks left and right. also used to highlight the coat, the wedding and the small tree cottage.

The music itself starts to crescendo and become more dissonant as the narrative comes to what appears to be the answer to the enigmas throughout the narrative, such as why is he walking through the woods, why do the animals act like humans etc. This being the hanging coat much like the golden fleece in Greek tales that Yorke has come to collect. These enigmas are what keep the audience questioning and carry on watching the video. The change in the mood of the music pushes through the narrative much like conventional equilibrium, disequilibrium, new equilibrium style. As the equilibrium is broken as the narrative moves away from the woodland creatures to the coat. The disequilibrium is Yorke being chased by the crows and then the new equilibrium is Yorke being turned into a tree.

Foo Fighters - The pretender

The Foo Fighters single from their latest album 'Echoes, Silence, Patience and Grace' is available in a standard CD single format as well as on Vinyl and MP3 download.

The simple artwork of the piece that just consist of a modified light-bulb along with the title of the single and the bands name is eye catching due to simplicity and draws the focus onto the light-bulb. This simplicity will be mirrored in my artwork as i'll use very simple artwork with an interesting object centered in the frame of the picture.

Genre-wise the band is grunge/rock band who often play big shows and could be said to be one of the biggest acts in rock music. This is reflected in the artwork and the font as it reminds me of a broadway like aesthetics with the white bright light-bulb and the art deco like quality to the font. Also the hand shaped light-bulb could be a symbol of the power of the band.

How are contemporary media issues changing ‘the music video’?

The invention of music videos is normally accredited to 1970s band Queen, who, in November 1975, found they were unable to appear on BBC TV's Top Of The Pops due to tour commitments. Their solution to the problem was to spend two days and under £4,000 on recording a video for their latest single, 'Bohemian Rhapsody' to be shown in their place. It was a decision that inspired many other acts to do the same and by the early 1980s. But Queen were not the first band to do this. To attain that accolade they would have had to travel back a decade before.

The Beatles were always at the forefront of the technology of music. The same group that pioneered backward loops, the sitar, and feedback can also be said to have invented the music video. Therefore, on 23 November, 1965, they make a series of promotional films specifically designed to be broadcast by television companies throughout the world. Videos of 'We Can Work It Out', 'Day Tripper', 'Help!', 'Ticket To Ride' and 'I Feel Fine' were filmed. Less sophisticated than the segments that appeared in the film Help, they nevertheless managed to capture the energy and sense of humour that the Beatles were famous for.

Music videos then took a different direction with Michael Jackson’s short films, in the 80’s.Such as; Thriller, Moonwalker, and Bad.Michael Jackson’s music videos all included a narrative structure that appealed greatly to his target audience and started a convention for music videos to come. Due to these elaborate films the expenses were very high. This was money well spent as the video’s advertised his music to a wide audience.

As time has gone on and technology has developed music videos have become less necessary to bands and artists due to various other mediums such as spotify, last.fm, MP3 players and social networks. For example Radiohead’s album ‘In Rainbows’ had no official videos and left it up to the fans to create animated videos of any track on the album. This shows that normal music videos are not so exciting any more for alternative bands to make it different and challenging for audiences.

Michael Jackson appealed to a wide audience however today with contemporary media issues changing music videos are tending to be targeting niche audiences.For example, sites such as Blogoteque and Guerrilla Videos, are creating music video for unique alternative bands such as fleet foxes and arcade fire, in unconventional locations such as in a lift and in the back of a black cab, for less money and which takes less time to make. This is an original idea and make it new and appealing for the bands particular audiences. Also this give more power to the band and their fans, ie Daft Hands (made by a fan), and less power and control to the record label, who used to organise all music videos for the artists.

Music Investigation

Spotify

Is a free music streaming application, also available with a monthly subscription payment for advert free streaming. The user can access over 6 million records through searching artists, track or album or from the charts or through genre based radio. An application is currently under production for the ipod touch and iphone. The application could affect the music industry in the future in many ways. It could be very good for the industry as it can advertise music to a potential audience with an inclusive link to the artists for download etc. Also allows the user to listen free of charge to there choice in music with the adverts, which only last between 15 to 30 secounds usually, paying for the music. So may be a way to punch out illegal downloads. But on the other hand may overly abused by people much like illegal downloads have to gain access to free music sources so making CD's etc obsolete.

Subculture

Is a culture within a culture of which the group of people within the subculture in someway differentiate from the larger main culture. Subcultures are a useful way in seeing why and how people consume music as you may be able to see correlation within genres and their subcultures and events or activities in which music is consumed by the culture. An example could be raves for rave, techno or dance music etc or opposed to a heavy rock gig. The subcultures are associated with a type of music as well as a way in which to live or behave which may be appealing to people for both the music and the activities that surround them.

last.fm

Is a UK based internet radio station. The users taste in music is built up and reflected by the radio by the radio choosing playlists that may suit your taste. This is called 'audioscrobbler' and is a music recommender system of which last.fm and audioscrobbler websites merged in 2005. Contains over 3.5 million tracks for the user to have audioscrobbled for them. Last.fm is an important area for debate in media studies due to its potential audience with an almost effortless contribution from the audience new and different music that they could potential like can be played to the user free of charge, with few adverts, and potentialy having a large enough impact on the user so they will buy the music. also last.fm in 2007 warner bros with all of warner bros music becoming available.

Urban Tribes

Are micro groups within society that share a common interest in metropolitan areas. Within the groups they usual have similar views, dress sense and behavior patterns. Urban tribes can be linked to how audiences consume music due to groupings of these small groups may often identify with and listen to similar music. Also it may be an important area of debate in media studies due to the representation of these micro groups and the stereotypes that may surround them and how it may be possible to identify someones music taste from their fashion sense and behavior.

'Subcultures [ can be seen to be] symbolic or ritualistic attempts to resist the power of the bourgois hegemony by consciously adopting behavior that appears threatening to the establishment. [on the other hand] youth culutre is inherently consumerist and integral to the divide and rule strategy of capitalism. They argue that [youth culture/ subculture] creates generation gaps and pits groups of youth against each other [mods/rockers], especially as youth culture is the dominant culture in the west.

The above quote shows two distinctive theories on how and why subcultures develop, especially in youth culture. The first argues that the youth or subculture seek out a different or disruptive path against the normal system and main culture to try and break away from or break apart the system. This points out a conscience decision to try and go against the system unlike the second theory. The second theory argues that due to the main system, a mainly capitalist society within the west, sub cultures are create from it without a conscience decision to do so. It argues that due to the nature of capitalism and competition within the social behavior of capitalism this is spread amongst the youth and is inbeded within them creating opposition and subcultures in youth culture. Both theories shows how subcultures can be seen as an inevitable byproduct of the main culture either by a need to show opposition to the system and conscientiously do so or showing characteristics of the main culture that are reflected in an opposing or mirroring subculture.

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