pop websites research

As I have been further looking into websites with brighter themes to them, I found that Jessie J's website is basically completely white. I really like this look, I think it looks cleaner, more professional, and generally more typically pop as it is bright and stylish. Again as with all the other websites I have looked at the websites main center is around images of the artist. Therefore it is vital that in my website I stick to this theme and have the artist as the key image on all of the pages, as this is what the fans of our artist would want.

pop websites research

Katy Perry's album is similar to Beyonce's in that it is also very visual showing the news stories on the home page in creative images, and so you scroll the background image of the artist changes. This is typical of pop artist websites as they are trying to immerse you in as much of the star as possible because that is what the fans expect and want. Contrastingly to the last two websites that I have looked at the Katy Perry website is very bright, which is simply due to the images from her recent album being used as the background.
I think for my website I might try to emulate this brightness as it is a key convention to the genre to keep colour and brightness in the work, even in the other websites which had a black theme, they were still bright. For example, the Avril Lavigne website had bright pinks and the artists face was extremely bright due to the contrast and therefore caught your eye.

pop websites research

Avril Lavigne's website is a prime example for less is more, which is typical for the pop genre, generally only featuring an image of the artist on a plain background. Avril Lavigne's website is on a black textured background, this could an attempt to translate her alternative, punky star image. The image of the artist is the front cover of her recent album, therefore creating a linking marketing campaign and helping to subliminally promote her new album.

pop websites research

Beyonce's website is very visual, with the home page acting as a photo news feed. Which as you hover over images it reveals the news story for the image. It has a hidden side menu page that when clicked on comes out to show a search bar and two of the typical pages for music websites, of music and tour. The others are promotional pages, marketing her fragrance, shop and raising awareness for her charity. The website helps to get across the stars image which is so important for this genre, it does this through the images on the home page showing her as the confident, sexy independent woman that she is so well known for being. Showing her personality and caring attitude through the page dedicated to her charity. And her music through both the music page and store, in which when you open the page it automatically plays a video presenting the clothes with one of her songs playing over the top.

Websites

There are typical codes and conventions for a music artists website. They typically have a home, news, music, and gallery page. On which will be filled with all things to do with the artist. Generally they also have links to social media sites such as Twitter, Youtube and Facebook as well so that you can access all information to them easily from the one site. The main function of the website is to inform the fans of what the artist is up to and sell to them, and  to promote the artist to the target audience. For example you might not be a huge fan of the artist but if you went onto their website for a mundane reason and it automatically played their new music video and then gave you a link to purchase the song, you'd be more likely to buy it.

Genre

Each genre has a particular style to their websites. For example the rock genre tend to stick to abstract shapes as the backgrounds or just plan back colours, showing the bands interests and style (Cage The Elephant and The Hives). The pop genre ALWAYS have a large image of the artist, which sometimes flicks through similar images as you scroll down the page, showing how important star image is (Britney Spears). The rap genre tend to have videos as their immediate visual , showing that the music is what they care about/ the message they want to give (Profession Green).

pop digipack research

The Femme Fatale album by Britney Spears is typical of female pop artists, again having a close up image of the artists face as the front cover, and then a body shot of the artist as the back cover. With this album the artist is still trying to regain her star image, and so is has styled the album in a very sophisticated manner to try to detract from her public reputation. Therefore showing how recording companies try to rebrand and market stars so as to get the best reaction from the audience and sell records.

pop digipack reseach

The album art for Rihanna's Unapologetic album has a voyeuristic nature to it, featuring images of the artist naked (front cover), and nearly naked (back cover). Again showing how important it is for their to be an image of the artist on the front of a pop album as they are the star, they have star image, and then fans want and expect to see the artist. Rihanna's star image is that of a slightly rebellious sex icon, therefore keeping up this image in her album art as it is what the fans expect. However the cover has a different meaning too as nakedness doesn't always reflect sexual objectification, and in this album it seems to more represent vulnerability showing the artists softer side; shes showing her entire body, all of her metaphorical flaws, you can see everything and as the title suggests ('Unapologetic') she is not ashamed. Therefore, yes, presenting the sexy star image of Rihanna that we all know and expect but also showing deeper meaning and context to perhaps what the songs on the album are like.

Pop Digipak research

Again with Adele's 21 album both the front and back cover feature a picture of the artist. However unlike most female pop albums the cover is in black and white with the artist appearing to be deep in thought. This may be to hint to the artists sophistication and therefore appeal to a much wider age range encompassing older audience members as well. Then once you open the case and get the CD it is a bright green clearly showing the conventions of pop by keeping that bright colour, just on the inside as the outside has to appeal to the large audience range of both young and old. The green on the CD links to the green 21 on the front cover, therefore connecting the two in a recognisable style, therefore if you saw just the CD or just the case you'd know which album it belonged to.

What makes a good music video? - in depth

Director - DANIELS

The DANIELS directing duo are made up of Daniel Kwan and Daniel Scheinert. They work together to create innovative music videos, one of their more famous videos being Don't Stop (Color on the walls) and Houdini by Foster The People, which are actually some of their more subdued videos.




They frequently work in the indie genre creating groundbreaking videos which are often based around hypnotic themes which give a psychedelic feel to the videos. In the video for Pigeons by The Hundred In The Hands, the use of editing and camera work help to make you feel like you are experiencing what the character is feeling by giving off a disorienting feel.



This is typical of their work, much like the video for Underwear by FM Belfast which again uses editing as a key feature in keeping the attention of the viewer.



Most of their videos use the idea of synesthesia to help carry the video, for example in the video for Cry Like A Ghost by Passion Pit the flow of the video is purely dictated of the movements of the character and camera which are controlled by the sounds of the song.


They often are seen to appear in their own videos, for example here they are shown in Houdini by Foster the People.

Director - Marc Webb

Marc Webb was born on the 31st of August 1974 and made his first music video in 1997 for Canadian Rose by Blue Traveler, the video consists of the band performing the song in front of an american flag and inter cutting of a couples relationship. This was around the time music videos were music videos were just starting to become popular and so it is understandable that the video is a bit basic. He also directs short and feature length films with his debut film 500 days of summer coming out in 2009 leading him to later directing The Amazing Spider-Man in 2012.


He later progressed to make other videos such as Move Along by The All American Rejects which includes clever editing cutting together many different shots of the lead singer Tyson Ritter in different outfits in the same frame to make it look like he is playing many different people that all have struggle. With the climax of the Ritter falling backwards into an empty swimming pool, but being caught by a crowd and then crowd surfing; I think this is one of my favourite videos by him.


He also directed videos like Call Me When You're Sober by Evanescence and 21 Guns by Green Day which featured more elaborate mise-en-scene and concepts, both still showing performance which is typical of the rock genre.



Webb developed a signature of a white lamb which features in some of his videos, such as 'Sic Transit Gloria... Glory Fades' by Brand New in which it appears on the door of the bar and a girls top inside the bar. It is also present on the black briefcase in 'Rough Landing, Holly' and 'Ocean Avenue' by Yellowcard.



Although the vast majority of Webb's music videos are of the indie rock genre he has made a few pop music videos such as Wait A Minute by The Pussycat Dolls and London Bridge by Fergie.



Marc Webb's most recent music video for Last of The American Girls by Green Day clearly shows his progress and his innovative concept ideas and editing. But still remaining the same with the inter cutting between performance and narrative.

Intertextuality

Intertextuality is essential the idea the 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.

A classic example of music video intertexuality would be the video for Material Girl by Madonna which refers to the iconic image of Marilyn Monroe from the film Gentlemen Prefer Blondes.

The music video for Without Me by Eminem uses a lot of intertextual references to popular TV programmes 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.



What You Waiting For? by Gwen Stefani is based around Alice in Wonderland, showing things such as the mad hatters tea party and the queen of hearts.

Music videos can also use other previous music videos as reference for example Wrecking Ball by Miley Cyrus, although aimed at a completely different generation, uses the iconic scene from the music video for Nothing Compares 2U by Sinead O'Connor in which there is just a close up of the artists face looking sad with a single tear.


This could either be the artists trying to expand her audience by creating an affinity with the older audience or it could simply be bringing new meaning to the original text and using a theme that was popular before to become popular with a new generation.



Artists tend to develop and grow over time by changing their image and sound. Avril Lavigne's video for Here's To Never Growing Up plays on the nostalgic feeling of the song by reverting back to her old image from videos like Sk8er Boi, this would help to make consistent fans feel nostalgic about her past and their own creating meaning for them, help bring back old fans and just give new depth to more recent fans.





Generally when artists use intertextual references to other music videos they tend to stay within the same genre, most likely because those were the videos they probably grew up with and so draw inspiration from. As was shown with Wrecking Ball (staying within the pop genre), Situations by Escape The Fate draw an intertextual link to the video for Hot for Teacher by Van Halen, which essential shows the same thing.

Voyeurism

Voyeurism is based around the concept of viewing to gain pleasure and is usually considered under the idea of the male glaze. Under this theory Goodwin says women are portrayed in music videos as sex objects with the use of fragmented body shots, use of camera (e.g. angles), editing and costume (i.e. little to no clothes).

An obvious example of this would be Satisfaction by Benny Benassi which shows sweaty women wearing provocative clothing and operating power tools. The video includes a lot of fragmented body shots of the females bums, chests, legs etc. There are frequent close ups of their mouths singing the lyrics and also licking their lips in a sexual manor. Also there are a lot of low angle shots to emphasise their bums and there is a tracking shot which scans up the females body as if it were a eyes looking her up and down. Also as the women are using drills and other power tools it makes their bodies shake further showing them as sex objects. It has been suggested that the overly sexual, almost pornographic and voyeuristic nature of the video could actually be recognizing the theory and poking fun at it. This is furthermore supported by the captions which explain how to use and operate the machinery as it is clear that men watching the video would not be reading the captions and therefore it is a little humorous.



Women are also commonly used as adornments in many videos to help flatter the male ego. An excellent example of this is Blurred lines by Robin Thicke, in which the women are wearing revealing clothes (and in the uncensored version are seen topless) dancing around the 3 male artists provocatively. The video is completely voyeuristic as the only thing holding the audiences attention at all is the sexualised images of the women and the misogynistic behaviour of the men.




Voyeurism is evident in most music videos, even if it is not as obvious as the previous examples. An example of subtle voyeurism would be Burn by Ellie Goulding, the video is not at all commonly voyeuristic, however there are a few subtle techniques used to help keep the attention of the male viewer and to sell the artist. The video shows occasional fragmented body shots of females, which help to maintain the viewers gaze. Also although the artist is shown to be a strong woman she is still shown sexually as she is wearing subtly provocative clothing which reveals her stomach and cleavage area. Furthermore, the use of occasional slightly high angled close ups help to flatter the artist, it could also

be argued that the slight high angle could give the audience more of a powerful controlling gaze on the artist especially in this shot where the artist appears vulnerable. Also the way the camera moves closer into her face is as if it is inviting us to look at her and admire her.

Some music videos portray the less frequent notion of the female gaze, in which the idea is reversed and so it is the females who are viewing the video and gaining some sort of sexual pleasure from it. In the video for Rock DJ by Robbie Williams it does contain some fragmented shots of the females to please the male viewer, however it primarily features the artist in the center of all of the woman, dancing provocatively and trying to get there attention and admiration. As dancing does not work he begins removing all of his clothes, as they still show no interest he begins to rip off his own flesh in order to please them, the video is meant to portray the message that being a sex symbol can sometimes go too far.

The video for How to be a heart breaker by Marina and The Diamonds is probably the best example of the female gaze and voyeurism, in which it shows the males wearing next to nothing, being used as adornments, fragmented body shots (including a crotch shot), and camera work and editing to objectify the men. Throughout the entire video we are shown many shots of the men's bodies frequently in slow motion to emphasise their physique and to help create a lingering view of them as if we are watching
something intimate. The fragmented shots help to sexualise the men and show them as purely objects. The shot in which the artist is shown holding a served head helps to amplify the meaning of the entire video, in that she is in control and that the men are her play things and that we are being urged to join her in her games. Although the video is seemingly all about the sexualisation of the men, the video still sells the artist as it is showing the men as her adornments and that they constantly have their attention on her and so she is seen as the object to be desired. The video is all about how she is playing the men and so it shows her as being the most important person in the video. This idea is further supported by her being the prominent image in all on the shots she is in, e.g she is show in the foreground of most the scenes, she is generally in the center of the shots, she is seen on top of the man when they are laying down and also in the scene by the car she is dancing around and so your attention is on her.



Voyeurism also refers to the idea of screens within screens and is captivated by the idea of people within the textual world of also being viewers. A good example of this is I Wanna by The All-American Rejects in which the video tells the entire narrative through phone screens.



Another example which shows the idea of people in the fictional world being the viewers is Iris by the Goo Goo Dolls in which it shows the artist looking through a number of different telescopes and portrays him as a voyeur of the world from a secluded building top.

Stay - Rihanna

Stay by Rihanna is a simple, heart-felt video set in a bathroom and centered around the artist portraying the emotions of the song in a very honest, vulnerable performance. The room is dimly light which helps to show the sadness of the song. Rihanna is naked throughout the video which helps to present the image of vulnerability. I personally like how raw and emotional the performance by Rihanna is, which is amplified by the use of close-ups and extreme close-ups, and feel that this is what keeps the audience watching as it is a rare view on the artist who is usually shown dancing around to an upbeat song.
This has shown me that for our music video performance can be key to the video and we should not try to over complicate things.

Rock N Roll - Avril Lavigne

The music video for Rock N Roll by Avril Lavigne is an upbeat, light-hearted, narrative based video. It begins with an opening before the song comes in which shows Avril having conversation which references and pokes fun at her early song 'Sk8er Boi'. It then goes into a comic book styled world in which Avril is fighting to save rock and roll. The video features funny things such as Avril hitting a baby away, a knife wielding lobster and a bear-shark. These unusal humourous things are what keep the audience watch and also rewatching the video as they may have missed things. I think this is a good video as it is really fun and silly, it is the type of video you'd want to share with people which is part of its success.
Technically, the editing is quite fast paced which keeps up with the tempo of the song on the light-hearted nature of the video. The lighting and style of the video is generally quite bright which links in with the comic book style it is trying to portray.




The video has been thought to be a tribute to Guns N Roses as the video features an intertextual reference to the iconic video November Rain in which there are multiple shots of the guitarist outside a church from a helicopter.

Can you feel my heart - Bring Me The Horizon

Can You Feel My Heart by Bring Me The Horizon is a video typical to metal genre. It is performance based video with a shocking side narrative of a male being chased by menacing hooded creatures which climaxes with the boy being held down and cut open. The performance shows a lot of close-ups of the lead singer Oli Sykes as it tries to connect with the audience, there are also close-ups and slow motions of the band playing to try to emphasize the importance of the instruments. The shots which involve the band play a lot with lighting, allowing it to be gloomy but at the same time have streaks of bright light, which I think my be symbolic of hope as the song and most of the album deal with issues such as suicide, so I think it may be trying to show that there is still hope. The main thing that makes you want to continue watching the video is the narrative.

Personally I think that the narrative is based around the lyric "I can't drown my demons; they know how to swim." as the creatures chasing the boy could be symbolic of how he is trying to fight his own demons, which is a subject that occurs in a lot of Bring Me The Horizon's music videos and songs e.g. It Never Ends which features the lyric 'you said this is suicide, I said this is a war, when I'm losing the battle' and shows Oli allowing the demonic people to kill him.

Domino - Jessie J

This video is all about star image and performance as it consist of purely the artist singing and dancing around with changing backgrounds. Green-screen and editing are key to keeping the interest of the audience. The editing is extremely fast paced with a cut being made at least every 2 seconds even during the slower part of the song, this paired with the interesting mise-en-scene, bright lighting, star performance and animated backgrounds helps to keep the viewer watching.
This is typical of the pop genre as the majority of pop videos look to sell the artist and project the artists image rather than using maybe a concept or narrative as it is to sell to the masses and it is easier to project an image of the star for people to connect with than a story. Also, narrative would not suit this type of song as it is easier to keep up the tempo with just shots of the artist than a story as a story would need more time in order to be understood properly.
This has shown me that concept and narrative are not necessarily key to the success of a music video.

Sacrilege - Yeah Yeah Yeahs

The video for Sacrilege by Yeah Yeah Yeahs is purely narrative based in which we slowly see a story pieced together of how a group of people end up shooting a man and burning a woman alive from end to beginning. The pace of the video is quite fast with each shot being explained by the next, which is of the same shot but moments before and from a slightly different perspective. This is what keeps you watching and keeps you interested as you want to know what would push a group of people to go so far and also to seemingly take pleasure in burning a woman alive. The fast paced cutting helps to keep interest, yet with the cuts only showing what happpened moments before it helps to reveal to story at a slower speed (keeping the audience in suspence) but still keeping a fast paced feel to it. The video ends with a light image of the girl as a bride about to walk into the church, this is very contrasting to the opening dark image of the towns people gathered around the fire.    
The video has a very powerful concept which highlights the hypocrisy of the people who are shaming woman as they themselves are the adulterers. It is open to interpretation, however, with many people seeing the shots of the girl having relations with the people in the town as just the peoples own fantasies rather than real affairs, as the girl is being seen to take on many different roles e.g. a sophisticated woman, an innocent teen, a housewife. And so when the girl is found by them to actually be having an affair they take pleasure in hunting her down and killing her as to them she is seen as an object that they posses and that only they should be able to have such a relationship with her.

Why'd you only call me when you're high? - Arctic Monkeys

Why'd You Only Call Me When You're High by Arctic Monkeys, much like a lot of other recent music videos, has a opening before the music comes in. In this opening we hear 'Do I Wanna Know?' playing diegetically, this is a subtle way to promote the rest of their album, this is done by a lot of artists nowadays. The opening helps to set the scene, in which Alex Turner (the lead singer) is out for a drink at the pub. We soon find out from the video effects (the clock smiling/ frowning at him, the multiple reflections, the fire) that he is high. This captures the audiences attention and keeps them watch the, what should be very boring, video. I say it should be boring because it simply shows Alex walking from to pub to a girls house, however, it is what he 'sees' (e.g. a man jumping off a building and running away or the multiple sexual acts the female character 'Stephanie' is seen in) on the way which keeps us watching as we are wondering what might be shown next. There is a humorous ending, in that we are being led to believe that it is the girl who is texting him whereas when we finally see Alex arriving at the wrong house, which is made funnier by an old woman peering through the curtains, we find that it is actually him who has been texting her and that she is just ignoring him which links in with the song lyrics. I like this video because i think it is quite cleaver how they have made such a mundane of walking home into the entire music video, and that it is not boring but actually holds the attention of the viewer as it is seen to be quite unusual.

In one ear - Cage the elephant

In One Ear by Cage The Elephant shows the band trapped in a mental hospital in which the lead singer Matthew Shultz eventually escapes from. This video is mostly performance based as the audience is captivated by Matthew's exaggerated portrayal of someone with mental health issues, in which he makes weird faces and generally acts insane. This could be linked to the meaning of the song in that the song is about people criticize them, yet they don't even care to understand the music. This is shown by them being in a mental hospital as people don't get them, so they just think they're crazy. In this video I think it is the performance, fast paced cutting (which is tied in around the music. e.g. at the beginning of the video as each new instrument comes in a cut is made) and key concept which keeps the audience interested.

There are two other music videos for this song, one American release and one which was released at a much later date. Both in my opinion aren't as good because they aren't very concept based they mostly just feature the band performing. In the later release it does also feature shots of people messing around and a few weird shots (e.g. the topless man with an owl head) however I still personally think that the first video is better as it has more meaning behind it and is generally a more unique video.