Music Video: Introduction

 This week's work requires Media Factsheet #69: Music Video. You'll need to log in to Google using your Greenford Google account to access this. Read the factsheet and answer the following 10 questions:

1) What is the purpose of a music video?

The purpose of a music video is to sell products, the most obvious

of which is the song featured in the video.

2) How has the digital age changed the production and distribution of music videos?

The music industry has come to realise that attempts to

monitor sites like YouTube are time consuming, expensive and often

futile. As a result, most record companies now allow their artists’

music videos to be online but under controlled conditions.

3) Which three major record labels are behind VEVO? What is VEVO and why was it created?
Universal Music Group (UMG), Sony Music Entertainment (SME) and EMI. It was created to highlight current popular music videos and also bring light to upcoming artists
4) What are the key conventions of a music video?

• A link between the visuals & lyrics (complement, contradict or amplify)
• Genre characteristics (heavy metal in industrialised settings; rap music in urban street contexts etc.)
• Contain intertextual references (references to popular culture)
• Contain notions of looking (e.g. screens within screens)
• Include objectification of females (e.g. male gaze)
• Include demands of the record label (close ups of lead singer, symbols or motifs associated with the band / performer etc.)
• Video will be performance, narrative or concept based.
  

5) How can narrative be used in music video? Give an example of a music video that uses a narrative.

Eiffel 65 - Blue (Da Ba Dee) [Gabry Ponte Ice Pop Mix] 

6) What examples are provided in the factsheet for intertextuality in music videos?

7) Why do audiences enjoy intertextual references in media products?

8) Read the music video example analysis on page 3 of the factsheet. Select a music video of your own choice for each of the following headings and explain how each one links to the heading:

• Conventions (movement/narrative/artist)

Take on me - Aha

• Intertextuality

Without Me - Eminem

• Representation

YMCA - Viliage People

• Audience

Teenage Dirtbag - Wheatus

9) Watch the video for Ice Cube's It Was A Good Day (1993). How did this video set the conventions for later hip-hop music videos?
The idea of a group in a typical music surrounding the artist.


10) How important do you think music videos are in the marketing and promotion of music artists today? Are music videos still essential to a band or artist's success? You need to form your own opinion here.

I think that music videos are still important today because we have access to the internet through digitalisation and are much more active on it, music videos can come to us far easier through things like YouTube and other social media platforms like twitter and Instagram that would otherwise be overlooked in traditional media like TV.