All artist have a star image that they use to pre-mote them selves. This helps the audience to be able to identify what kind of artist they are and the genre of music they create.
Artist usually have a marketing strategy that they use to attract audiences. An example of this would be Lady Gaga's very eclectic fashions styles. In Our artists case, her hair seems to be the same style in all pictures that are taken of her. This gives the audience something that they would be able to identify about her.
Her Style of fashion is similar in each picture above. It comes across as 80's retro/indie. The bright colours give her a positive and fun look, none of the facial expressions that she shows are moody or defensive, all are very welcoming and fun. Within all of her images she represents herself as all of these things linking them through intertextuality using the same types of poses, facial expressions and movements in her images and music videos. In most of the images she has created a sexy and sultry persona for herself by using these key features of her body.
"Edits in a music video come far more quickly than that of a music video... Music Video editing bears a far greater responsibility for many elements than does a classic hollywood film editing" - Carol Vernallis
Their are lots of very short, quick edits in music video. These build up a montage and very often tell a story of the video. It progresses the narrative. This can be seen in music videos such as Lady Gaga's 'Telephone'.
By using quick cuts and edits, montages are formed that can introduced the audience to many things such as, introducing the Mise - en - scene.
Throughout this music video many different types of codes and conventions that are commonly used can be identified.
Lady Gagas's telephone video is a perfect example of this.
The beginning of the video is opened by a montage of en scene shots, all of a prison. Focusing on the barbed wire a code for a dangerous enclosed space. a desolate place. Like the common convention the film title name of the artist and the video appear, making a reference to contemporary hollywood films, preferably action, with the non diegetic beat very low and basey. As we are introduce to montage, Diegetic music is being played of police sirens. A common convention of an action film, parallel this are a variety of establishing shots of the City and the jail. As we are introduced to the star of the video, (GAGA) she is shown in a very perogative and sexual outfit made of clack leather. She escorted to her cell but two female guards, of who would resemble, in the public eye, stereotypical female jail cops.
As they walk the small sounds that are made seem to make a huge impact on the scene. The foot steps of the beat are heightened, the sounds of flesh on metal, the costumes worn by the jail birds are all references to sex and the enticing of sex to the audience. The audience are made well aware of this from the very beginning, As gaga is walking down the row between these women we are put into her shoes in a point of view shot. All the time titles are appearing making the audience aware that they are not watching just a music video but a short film. As she is stripped of her clothes we are shown an establishing shot of the courtyard and the residents of the jail within it. Within this scene allot of product placement is used for brands such as Virgin Media, and Coke Cola. All the way through these scenes the regular quick cutting of shots is still used, but not as much as when the music comes in, following the style of a classic hollywood film rather than that of a main mise n stream music video. The narrative continues of gaga simply getting into the routine of prison life. The colors through out are vibrant making curtain features such as there red lips and hair alot more saturated than the Mise-en-scene around the, grey , blacks and whites etc. The costume of all of the character is the opening sequence are all very sexual and sultry.
Once gaga picks up the phone the narrative and the music become involved with each other. and obviously from the moment the music starts the music video editing and special effects really start to appear. For example on the lyrics "What, what did you say honey your breaking up on me!" A action loop occurs. The medium shot repeats the section and distorts her body movement as if she were the telephone line breaking up. The Convention of a dace routine within a music video finally makes an appearance. A shot of the Girls and gaga dancing in the same row that we were shown at the beginning of ten video.
The dance routine is a of shots from pan to close up and medium. It also is edited to make it look like the a CCTV Camera. We then see a montage of shots of Lady gaga in Warning tape doing sever poses. This reverts back and forth for a few shots. Eventually she is released from person and we are introduced to her counter part, Beyonce. In this short clip we intertextuality has been used making reference to Velma and Louise. Sexual content is used in this scene between them with Beyonce feeding gaga a phallic food of sorts. The We are introduced to a second narrative that is associated with Beyonce's character , i the scene where Beyonce is talking to her 'lover' the narrative cuts to gaga in the kitchen where more postmodern intertextuality is used. The ingredients that she is putting into the food is listed in the screen like a video game referencing to things like 'Big Mommas Kitchen', a game played on Nintendo DS. These techniques make the audience aware that they are watching a a short film, the produces what the audience to be reminded of this constantly. The entire way through the video the clips cut back and forth to different scenes. All of these clips have Sexy, tight costumes. This seems to be the main theme of the video. Towards the end, a clip of gaga in a magazine type split scene. Again a form of intertextuality that remind the audience that they are watching a music video.
Changes in the music industry are very common. It is consistently changing to fit the needs of the audience.
The arctic monkeys started the internet revolution by using viral advertising to their advantage. By using the Social networking site myspace, they managed to distribute their music to many different types of audiences, making their music known. Another artist that did this was Lilly Allen. After thousands of followers on myspace, she accumulated enough press that enable her to to number one.
The internet has made it available for everyone to download music through sites such as 'Napstar' and 'I Tunes'. Gnarls Barklys 'Crazy' was the longest running number one in the official download chart running 11 consecutive weeks, and became 3the first number one in the charts to become number 1 simply through down loading.
Although the internet has helped various artist expand the sale of their music and helped independent labels and their artists become more popular, the internet has become a big problem for the BIG 4. EMI, Sony BMG, Warner Music and Universal have experienced huge decreases in sales for music down to illegal download through sites such as Lime Wire and through torrents. Although this has effected the main companies the industry has found a new way to use this to their advantage. By creating more videos for songs, artists upload their videos onto youtube and Vevo, advertising themselves for free, meaning that people can send their videos and music to friends via Facebook and twitter, meaning a higher demand for gig tickets and merchandise therefore making the money up that they would have lost through illegal downloading.
Many artists are trying new ways to pre - mote themselves and the internet is always coming up with new ways to do this.
Myspace - Myspace has become a platform where unsigned artist have the chance to showcase their talents by uploading MP3 versions of there own music. It works as both a blogging site and a social networking site allowing other social networkers on the same network to follow and talk to each other, meaning that this specific site has become a main contender for Viral Advertising. It allows the user to customise their own page to fit their genre of music which makes it easier for the audience to identify what kind of music they are listening to, and can update followers on Gig information and picture/video updates.
