Deadlines/Brief

Music videos are so 80s/90s, right? They belong with the era when MTV screened wall-to-wall vids instead of 'reality' TV? Try telling that to the millions who bought Gangnam Style; were they really simply loving the music? 1.6bn (and still climbing) have viewed the video on YT, not to mention the many re-makes (school eg, eg2), viral ads + celeb link-ups (even political protest in Seoul) - and it doesn't matter how legit it is, this nightmare for daydream Beliebers is making a lot of money, even from the parodies + dislikes. All this for a simple dance track that wouldn't have sounded out of place in 1990 ... but had a fun vid. This meme itself was soon displaced by the Harlem Shake. Music vids even cause diseases it seems!
This blog explores every aspect of this most postmodern of media formats, including other print-based promo tools used by the industry, its fast-changing nature, + how fans/audiences create/interact. Posts are primarily written with Media students/educators in mind. Please acknowledge the blog author if using any resources from this blog - Mr Dave Burrowes

Monday 20 July 2015

IDEAS The horror of boybands...

A quick illustration of how wide your options are for music videos...

  • two iconic US 90s boybands have announced they're teaming up on a...
  • horror film production?!?!
  • could be smart ... boybands primary audience = female, horror primary audience (although the gender gap is actually narrow) = male ... widening the market for these 'brands'?
  • whilst not as old as acts from the 60s/70s/80s, such artists today would rely mainly on appealing to a 'mature youth' (25-44) female (and 'pink pound', ie male gay) audience
  • keeping back catalogue sales ticking over is easier if you can attract an additional, younger ... new audience, female tweens and young teens being the dominant consumers of pop, and shapers of the charts
  • so...if you were managing these acts, a new video with a campy horror theme, including an affectionate nod to Thriller, might be a smart way of building interest through the pre-production period (keeping gore to a BBFC 12 or, at most, 15 rating - although the uses and gratifications audience theory does include 'aspirational' as a key driver, and t(w)eens certainly do access 'older' age-rated media)
  • the music video format being highly postmodern in its typical media language, elements of parody and utilising the media language of other media is not uncommon, while convergence between music and cinema is a loooooong-established idea
Read the article on this announcement here.

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