PROMO PACKAGE Slayer digipak, vinyl, figurine + promo videos

I mention beer as a great example of merch below - you can buy both Slayer and Iron Maiden beer in Luxembourg (Auchan), and Motorhead, plus some other branded wine/spirits if I recall correctly. That this is now a common strategy, especially in heavy metal, can be seen from a simple google ('heavy metal beer'). See this Pinterest for a gallery (pic, right comes from it):

A salutary lesson - I'd tapped out a lengthy post on a smartphone using the Android app ... only to see every word blink and disappear (possibly because the broadband connection flicked off). If using this very useful tool, its worth saving a few times to avoid the risk of this...

NB: As the article link contains a filter-unfriendly term, its below the read more line; the videos featured in the article contain uncensored strong language.  

Multi-editionalising has become the norm, certainly for rock/Indie acts

Here's a new example of a converged, web 2.0 promo package featuring a digipak, vinyl and download options, a range of videos/vodcasts, and even an expensive, limited edition figurine (which clearly anchors the core target audience as being male, and a significant chunk of this being older males, more likely to be able to afford such items!).

The Metal Eagle Edition of Repentless is also available. Made of aluminum alloy, measuring 15” X 17” X 3” and weighing in at a hefty 7.8 pounds, the Metal Eagle Edition will house a deluxe digipak of the new Repentless CD plus bonus material detailed below. The limited (only 3,000 copies worldwide) and numbered Metal Eagle Edition will be a direct-to-consumer item and available exclusively via the Nuclear Blast mailorder online stores.

You really should take note of this - regardless of how simple your brief might be, your ads should reflect not just a digipak but the wider range of options we expect to see today, and you could usefully (and very simply) spin off digipak designs into vinyl editions - after all, the digipak is in large part mimicking vinyl sleeves.

Thrash metal icons Slayer are signed to an Indie label, Nuclear Blast, who astutely exploit the potential of online tools to engage with the existing fanbase and target a new audience for their acts.

Blogging on AUDIENCE

I'LL UPDATE THIS THROUGH THE NEW SAMPLE BLOG TIME PERMITTING...

I've covered aspects of this in many posts - use the Q3 links list, and look at past egs linked in Q3 guide for example; try a search, or use the tags cloud!
A complementary guide, including a Word doc with step-by instructions, is available here.
You can also access PowerPoints on audience theory here, and links to other audience-related posts on the ProdEval blog here. 
This 2015 A2 example is a good reference point: you can see a video questionnaire, and this being delivered to a class, teachers etc, as well as audience feedback on rough cuts etc.
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This post looks at one of the better examples from 2012 and considers any issues that prevent it from being assessed as excellent (criteria: 'research into a similar target audience')

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U+G: when fans turn on artists

Michelle Shocked has seen her fanbase all but disappear this week after apparently issuing stridently homophobic remarks onstage (she rejects the claims). The Guardian article below looks at other cases where this happens (they could also have mentioned Megadeth, whose vocalist Dave Mustaine has taken to issuing right-wing statements since becoming 'born again', but then they're not a very Guardian band!).
Useful to consider in the light of theories such as McQuail's uses and gratifications, and the whole idea of fans forming part of their identity through their musical allegiances.

Michelle Shocked her fans – but she wasn't the first musician to do so

Dixie Chicks, Morrissey, Donna Summer, Moe Tucker and Eric Clapton all faced a backlash when they surprised their audiences with unexpected views

Michelle Shocked: and she did. Photograph: Rex Features/Startraks Photo

Guitar-strumming Michelle Shocked used to be beloved by beardy folk fans and granary lefties. So it came as a curveball at a gig on Sunday night when she put down her acoustic guitar, pushed aside the mung beans and delivered an astonishingly anti-gay rant that claimed "same-sex marriage will be the downfall of civilisation". And which city did she choose to air these "robust" views? Only gay capital San Francisco.
Yet Shocked isn't the first musician to, well, shock her fans by revealing surprising views ...

Dixie Chicks

Dixie Chicks performing in 2003, when they were monstered by the US right for gently criticising George Bush. Photograph: Mb Charles/Retna UK The mild-mannered Texan country trio were monstered by the US rightwing and blacklisted by American radio after gently criticising George Bush in 2003. On tour in London shortly before the invasion of Iraq, lead vocalist Natalie Maines said: "Just so you know, we're on the good side with y'all. We don't want this war, this violence, and we're ashamed the president is from Texas." Public protests saw their CDs bulldozed into the ground. The band later posed naked for the cover of Entertainment Weekly with slogans such as "Traitors",

Trent Reznor on digitisation's impact

[17.9.12: added further quotes from David Byrne (Talking Heads) article at the bottom, which raise the pyschological impact of music consumption and fandom]

This is a lengthy excerpt from a 2012 interview - NB: including some crude language - but one that's well worth perservering with. You should be able to find some great quotes that will help you to discuss the impact and effects of digitisation, and how the music biz has been transformed, with the album-centred financial model replaced by a mix of online (from Spotify, YouTube etc micropayments to pay-what-you-want offers to the increasingly central role of concert tickets and merchandise) and concert/merchandise revenue.
Full interview at http://blog.tunecore.com/2012/01/trent-reznor-interview.html

JP: And I’m wondering, what drove that decision? I certainly have my own opinions, but I’m no artist, you are. You make culture, and the rest of us are the ones that are lucky enough to hear it and make it mean something to us, so: Why did you choose to leave the infrastructure and the machine that allowed you to get to the point that you’re at where you could do the things that you’re doing?
TR: Well [pauses], that time would’ve been about two thousand…eight-ish, somewhere in that neighborhood, and, the true reality of that situation was: the record deal that we had signed years and years before had escalating advances based on the current state of the industry when that was negotiated. Meanwhile, the industry has collapsed,

M.LANG: Focus on singer; CCTV style

The drummer's face is less important than his instrumental prowess. Note too the low-key lighting, customary for rock/Indie (glossy, high-key for pop)

Its one of the most immediately apparent Cs+Cs of m.vids: the focus on the lead singer, through frequency of shots plus framing. The Evanescence What You Want (embedded below, but you can also watch it sans ads at http://loudwire.com/amy-lee-interview-evanescence-return/) is a classic example:

Whilst we get a few shots (MS through to LS) interspersed of band members, often at high angles which obscure their faces and put the focus on their instruments, we never go more than a few seconds without seeing the singer, Amy Lee. She is mainly shown in CU to MS, though some LS included to highlight the band and the excited crowd, a key ingredient in many performance-centred vids.

Predominately CUs to MS of the singer, tho' some LS/MLS are framed to show aud/band

Fans + band both in shot, tho' note the central framing of Lee

The focus-on-singer is taken further by having the singer perform the fictional or dramatic role which we crosscut to; she's running (note the use of coloured contacts as a small but key component of mise-en-scene: this carries connotations of animal/beast, or supernatural) ... and that's pretty much it! This being an emo/goth/metal/Christian metal (there is debate over label applies!) band, moody night-time urban settings, including a bridge (connotations of depression, the suicide impulse?) are used. The band's music is mournful but aggressive, and many commentators would note that many forms of rock music carry out a cathartic function by speaking directly to (especially) teen/youth audiences about tough times and experiences; general alientaion, but doing so in a musical format that enables a physical release of pent-up emotions, and a sense of fellow-feeling/not being alone.

THEORY LINK: The Uses + Gratifications model; especially relevant to discussions of Audience

Band branding is a matter of balance though: a band who are exclusively linked to the image of a singer may suffer issues of credibility. So, while the looks and body of Amy Lee are clearly strongly highlighted throughout this vid, we do, towards the end, see the other band members briefly enter this fictional part of the vid (whether concept or narrative I couldn't say without studying the lyrics).

These sequences are linked by helicopter shots of a city at night: connotations of Gotham City?!

Another band whose vids showcase this tension between highlighting the most marketable component of the band whilst striving for the credibility so critical within the broad rock and Indie genres: Guns 'n' Roses. At their 80s/90s peak, every band member was world-famous, but now its become the sole property of the original singer, W. Axl Rose. Its fascinating to see how 'the band' came back into focus over the years as the marketeers tried to balance out the need to foreground Rose with the need to convince fans that this was a tight unit, a credible, authentic band. One of the iconic images of their ealrier period was of guitarist Slash guitar soloing on a mountain top, seen through a helicopter shot, part of what was then the most expensive music video ever made, November Rain - their videos had to reflect the exceptional fame and standing of the band members, not just the singer.

Heteronormative: crude male gaze

G'n'R are also a useful example of the second point: how 'looking' is handled in vids. Mostly we see a very direct gaze to camera, part of the mode of address making a direct link to the audience. But we also see this notion of looking deconstructed, often in quite a postmodern fashion. G'n'R's Welcome to the Jungle vid features Axl Rose playing himself getting off a bus in LA as a straw-chewing hick (reflecting his actual backstory) ... but he stops to look in the window of a TV store, where every TV is playing a video of ... Axl Rose, performing with G'n'R!

Thats Axl on the TVs...and Slash the passed-out bum outside!

Here, with the Evanescnce vid, we see another very common meme employed: much of the footage of Amy Lee running is distorted and rendered as CCTV. This clearly signifies the zeitgesit: 'we' (in the West) are accustomed to being tracked by cameras in much of our daily lives (there is CCTV in F6, the F-Hall etc!). This device carries connotations of criminality: through Crimewatch and the likes we associate CCTV with criminal behaviour. If you watch Misfits you'll have seen this used. BUT ... aren't there also connotations of the singer's feeling of claustophobia and pursuit at the hands of the very fans being targeted with this video?
ALWAYS  look out for and give consideration to the use of looking/gaze in any vid, including your own!!!

Here's an interesting example of how a vid can be used to signify the personal disclocation of a singer, through the prism of Beavis and Butthead...