A music promo is a video that bands use as a promotion of their latest song and aims to increase sales and the bands image, whether it is an album or just a single song. The purpose of a music promo is to advertise the band/artist but also to promote a band/artists latest single or album. The promo can consist of a performance and/or narrative. A music promo is very useful for the artist as it can easily be recognized and remember able from others and makes the audience interested in the video and not just the song. The video motivates the song and could give the lyrics a narrative. We included humour as it is pleasing to our younger target audience and disjuncture (Intentionally ignores the content of the song and genre of the music and tries to create whole new set of meanings) as the majority of music promos don’t follow this style so it will stand out as ‘random’ from a serious music promo.
A performance music video only focuses on the band them playing the song. The performances location can range from somewhere Urban or Rural, in the public or with a live audience to give off the effect that it is filmed live and the viewers are actually there looking that the band playing. We decided to use performance in our video as this follows the typical conventions of a rock band playing live to please our target audience as they are able to see the artists up close playing the instruments putting them in the shoes of a live viewer in the audience.
A narrative music video features no live performances and focuses on a theme for the song. This can include linear where it has a chronological plot from start to end or non-linear where it is in a non-chronological order and includes flashbacks, ellipsis and a montage. Narrative can either have illustration where the promo follows the ideas of the lyrics and follows the true meaning, amplification where it uses an idea from the lyrics and develops it with the links and finally disjuncture. This is where the promo has no links to the meaning of the song and appears to be abstract which could create completely new meaning behind the song for the audience to guess.
An example of a song with full narrative is Cold Play's 'The Scientist' where there is no instruments during the video and the narrative tells a story but in reverse which is very unique as the audience ask questions throughout and slowly get revealed as the video progresses.
We decided to choose disjuncture as we wanted it to be something different that the audience would normally see to stand out and create new meanings behind the song. We took inspiration from the band ‘Red Hot Chili Peppers’ with their song Can’t Stop as this didn’t have any clear meaning and became nonfigurative to the audience and we liked the conventions used in their song. Most videos use a mix of performance and narrative because it creates interest for the audience as the lyrics create a meaning for the narrative and the audience want to see the artists in person playing the instruments (typically at the main chorus.)
Promos can be viewed almost anywhere as technology has advanced. Smartphones and TV are some convergence examples of everyday items people will use and come across visual music. Media convergence is the merging of mass communication outlets – print, television, radio, the Internet along with portable and interactive technologies through various digital media platforms. Media convergence allows mass media professionals to present information and entertainment using a variety of media. The promo creates links and makes the public keep thinking about it throughout the day and eventually give in to listen and purchase the product as it becomes addicting to listen to.
We chose the indie rock genre as it is very popular amongst teenagers today and fits in with our generation of music and I have listened to a vast amount of indie rock songs to gain inspiration from and there is a wide range of bands that date back to the 1980’s who have performed indie rock.
Conventions of the rock genre:
We researched the rock genre and came across a number of conventions that link to it. We found that the typical costumes of the artists are dark and rebellious; they are aggressive with their gestures as they sharply move their arms around and their facial expressions are very serious and dark. They are usually loud to suit their rebellious behaviour and scream into the microphone. The typical themes of their songs included death, anti-mainstream and hate.
Performance and Lyrics:
The typical lyrical content in alternative rock genre is about several different things happening but the main focus of the lyrics is centring on lifestyle that the artist has a concern for e.g. alcohol, drugs etc.
Performance is commonly a lead singer(s) miming out the lyrics of the song while the band plays the instruments in the background to mimic a live performance. To get the live audience effect, they perform live and replay the song over the video to give the impression that they were performing live the whole time for the best music quality in a studio.
Location:
The locations we chose were decided through conventions to match a rock genre promo where the audience can get a feel of a ‘live band performance.’ We went to the ‘Old Coach House’ pub in Market Deeping to perform on their stage where other bands have performed before. This was perfect for us as it allowed a simple background of a white wall and enough space to setup instruments and for the camera to move about to take a number of different shots from close ups to long shots of the whole band. The pub allowed us to perform on the dates set and lighting was a minimal with simple lights on the celling. We also chose to film close by the pub at a rural park for the narrative side of the promo. This is good because being around the public had been used in rock promos and adds a realistic feeling to watching the video as it matches the disjuncture of the shots. The park is also a huge field so there were plenty of spots to film different shots in one space so we didn’t need to switch locations constantly. The instruments enabled the audience to realise which member is who just by looking at the instruments.
Camerawork (performance):
The camerawork in a rock music promo tends to be close ups as the most common type of shot. This is to allow the audience to see the instruments and the singer close up for a live performance effect and they can see the facial expressions from the artists. The long shots are of the whole band playing from a live audience’s perspective typically on a stage. There are lots of cuts depending on the tempo of the song to make it more interesting and cutting to the beat to be effective. There are shots on the audience watching to get the viewers to act similar to them by screaming or jumping about. We used some typical close ups of the singer an instruments and long shots of the whole band paying to get the live performance effect.
Costumes/props:
We decided to go with typical conventions of a rock promo where we dressed up in casual teenage clothing including jeans, collared shirts and black coats. We wanted to create synergy amongst each other by wearing similar clothes which can be recognised by the audience. We used instruments in the promo. This is for the performance side of the promo to give a ‘live audience ‘effect’ as if the band is actually playing the instruments and make it more appealing to match the audience’s expectations and follows the typical rock video performance conventions.
Editing:
We viewed a range of music videos similar to our genre and found that all of them had cutting to the beat spot on for the best effect. We took this into consideration as along with cutting to the beat, we found they all had short shots with only 3 seconds max. So it went with the cutting to the beat every rift.
Influence:
When searching YouTube, we came across a very dominant video called ‘Can’t Stop’ by Red Hot Chilli Peppers. This video followed our ideas of disjuncture with their variety of props and editing skills. We also found their background very effective as it was just a white screen; it allows the audience to only focus on the singers and the narrative. The shots are very ranging from close-ups to the singer to long shots of the whole band at once making this video fascinating at all times as there is always something going on. The editing was very well done as clips were cut in sections and randomly placed throughout the video and it was cut to the beat flawlessly. This video is something we wanted to replicate in the narrative through the props and background to the cutting to the beat. The style of the editing and recreating the narrative is challenging, it allows us to expose new skills through editing and camerawork.
No comments:
Post a Comment