The state of the Music Industry

The music industry is one of the biggest industries around and there are four big names like Universal, Sony etc. The big four own the rest of the company's as subordinates and the artists are all the way at the bottom. In recent years there has been a very steep decline in the sales of Music in general - there is many reasons for this and it's not just music but movies too. In the past decade Artists made a lot more money from album sales but these days they are left to make big tours and shows to earn the money because album sales have plummeted.

Although artists are still very much wealthy, they earn a lot more less mostly due to the downfall of sales, most people blame illegal downloading for the crash in sales of physical albums. Not only illegal downloads but also regular downloads like Itunes that provide not only albums but also singles on the internet, so the sales of physical copies has gone down. Artists are looking for new ways to keep up with the times by giving their music out for free to get publicity.

Review of Favourite student Video

This was my favorite Music video for many reasons, first of all it actually looked like a proper video. As soon as I saw it I knew it was going to be good just with the opening scene. The actors in it were very skilled and the lip sync was very much on form, as well as the actors being very believable, the main person who was the girl looked like she belonged on a music video because of the clothes she was wearing and how she owned the stage so it was convincing. The camera work was very skillfull, it looked and felt like a real music video because it was so fluid and clean cut, it had a lot of jump shots very common in music videos and it also made good use of lighting background colour. The editing was smooth, it went along to the beat very well and the special effects added on later was well used like the writing on screen and it felt really well planned. I was a 10/10 score.

http://vimeo.com/17676420

Laura Mulvey’s Ideas: Representation

a) “In this world, the men in the society freely stare at women, openly while women have to do it secretively. The men look at women expecting them to look a certain way and the women have to dress in that way to please them.

b) Based on her view, I would expect most music videos to have an overly sexualised image of women in their videos, also men having power over the women.

c) Unfortunately this might be evident in rap music where men watch the overly sexualised women. And in pop music women dress provocatively.

This music video is a prime example of what Laura is saying, this is dismemberment, the focus of the video is the women and especially their particular body parts, namely their breasts and their buttocks. 

This is a very popular music video and it shows women in a very sexual light, they are dressed very provocatively and this is for the male gaze, sex sells and this video capitalises on that idea.

Analysing Media Language in Music Videos

1. Vernalli’s ideas on editing and camerawork: The continuity that is expected on movies or other types of videos is not the same in music videos; the focus is on the artist or the performer so the cuts are made to suit that. And edits are usually obvious to draw attention to what’s on screen. There might also be a base track, to keep coming back to after cuts are made. And the camera may move in time with the music, like cuts to the instrument being played for e.g.

2. These are two videos that illustrate this point:

Andrew Goodwin

His ideas are that music videos or rather pop videos are very different to things like movies, they are not linear and can be really anything, and there are three types of videos: Illustration is when the video follows the song. Amplification is when the video deepens the song itself and finally Disjuncture is when the video has nothing to do with the lyrics of the song at all. Most music videos nowadays present women in a very sexual way especially in hip-hop and heavy metal. Music videos come in many shapes and forms each to meet their target audience while trying to mass appeal too. The main focus of a music video is to give exposure to the singer and they are there to be sold.

Andrew's idea of overly sexualised depiction of women on music videos

This highlights Goodwin's idea of disjuncture, the video has nothing to do with the song itself 

Analysis of a Music Video: Big Sean – My Last

I think this video is a perfect example of a typical Hip-Hop music video for many reasons and also not just of its genre but a good music video full stop, it is a prime example of a modern day music video. The main purpose of a music video as stated by many people in the industry is to promote the artist, so what this video does is just that, the artist (Big Sean) is on screen almost all the time and the only time he goes off screen is when his co-star is on it. It promotes him and also what he is wearing, which is an example of a clever marketing strategy, he advertises his clothes and his wealth at the same time, this is used to create an image of the artist that the record label is trying to create, and make him a brand. In the music video there are a lot of women in it, and Big Sean is the narrator as well as a participant in the video. This music video is an example of an illustration video because it follows the lyrics and shows them on screen. It is typical of a Hip-Hop video because he is showing off his wealth and bragging, as well as women everywhere, there for the men to stare at or enjoy.

What is a Music Video?

Wikipedia: A music video or song video is a short film integrating a song and imagery, produced for promotional or artistic purposes. Modern music videos are primarily made and used as a marketing device intended to promote the sale of music recordings. Although the origins of music videos date back much further, they came into prominence in the 1980s, when MTV based their format around the medium. Prior to the 80s, these works were described by various terms including "illustrated song", "filmed insert", "promotional (promo) film", "promotional clip" or "film clip".

That is the definition that Wikipedia puts, what we did in class was try to determine what it’s purpose was and why it was made, what we came up with was that it was there to promote the artist and to help sell the record, because if people see the music video and like it they’re more likely to buy it.