MASH-UPS Ithaca mash 65 years of rock music

Absolutely astonishing production by a UK lighting + music video studio, Ithaca (NOT the USA college) using a Facebook motif to cycle through 100s of great musicians (and Foos + Kings of Leon, but still).

YouTube.

SUMMER 2020 TASK 2 INDUSTRY RESEARCH

The following 2 posts are the main resource for this task/theme, 1 of the 3 basic research areas of the coursework (CIA - though with the added emphasis on media language and theory, this is more like MICA or TICA).

http://musividz.blogspot.lu/2016/04/industry-digital-streamed-past-physical.html

https://musividz.blogspot.com/2018/11/big-3-universal-boom-as-physical.html

The basic themes follow, but 1st some useful Ppts, which may be swapped out for updated versions over time:

Industry music bicep tbc from DB3igs

Merch metallica from DB3igs

MUSIC VIDEO HISTORY + PROTOTYPES
in a nutshell, read the Austerlitz book which is specifically on this point. There's an extensive history before MTV made them a default promo device, going back decades earlier than even the key archetype (The Beatles 1960s film A Hard Day's Night).

ANALOGUE FORMATS: RISE AND FALL 
show understanding of how the music industry has undergone changes before digitisation. Sheet music was the revenue driver a century ago, with gramophone records slower to become dominant. Vinyl became notably dominant with the rise of the teen as a distinct demographic with disposable income in the 1950s. Cassettes slowly rose as a rival from the 1960s, becoming the biggest format by the 70s/80s - especially when the Sony Walkman hit. Vinyl and tape sales slowly collapsed as CDs kickstarted the digital revolution in the 80s ... but have taken on hipster coolness and are ironically zeitgeisty - why?

DIGITAL MARKETS: CDs, CRAZY FROGS, PIRATES + NAPSTER, SPOTIFY... 
Carefully + specifically establish when + why the music industry's global revenues peaked, and why they began falling again ... until very recently they've finally began rising again. Consider the piracy issue, engaging with web 2.0 as you do. Explain how UGC eventually became a revenue-raising tool for the record labels. Look at the controversies over payment rates, and how radically they differ across platforms. Do a case study of 1 or more acts with music on multiple platforms (like my Bicep case study).

MODERN REVENUE DRIVERS: MERCH, TIX ETC 
While vinyl's high price means low sales do bring in useful revenue, look at how merch (analyse the range of items for some bands + how these usually reflect a wide audience IF they're for big or older/long-established acts like Metallica), live concerts (VIP tix etc), licensing (games, TV, film) + sponsorships now bring in most of artists' income.

BANNED IN THE USA: CENSORSHIP + REGULATION 
There is limited formal regulation, though the BBFC (UK) do have a voluntary system, and YouTube at least notionally apply an age-rating system - plus the parental advisory/explicit lyrics stickers in the US. Just like the film industry, the music biz has faced times of extreme governmental/political pressure fuelled by the press: the 80s metal/rap moral panic leading to hearings (and arrests for selling a 2 Live Crew record); the Dixie Chicks and Beatles record-burnings from different eras; the Gulf War radio blacklist of songs about war ... and peace; Elvis wiggling his hips; UK grime artists effectively banned by the police

OWNERSHIP: INDIES AND BIG 3 
Just how dominant are they? How can Indies compete? This is a very similar issue/debate to your AS film industry learning - online/social media + crowdfunding + self-distribution + self-marketing [AM's use of MySpace a great early archetype] are all important.

SUMMER 2020 CONVENTIONS TASK

I'll add notes + any documents in this post to make it easier to find than lengthy Teams threads, but the main hub post for your summer work is this post, which has been updated and tweaked across two years of use by A2 students: general conventions research guide post.

Here's a quick reminder of what that post breaks down ... in considerable detail!


...
There is flexibility built into this - you can present this as a number of individual case studies, addressing the yellow-highlighted points, + provide an overall summary through GC10. Or you can merge 1 or more theme. Or you can simply stick to the 10-post structure - so long as your analysis is detailed and spans multiple examples (a minimum of 10 mixed-genre general examples specifically referenced, each at least once in at least one category).

You would be advised to make some use of the very detailed post with a compilation of videos picked for specific useful features, each with further detail/analysis/pointers below, and in many cases additional separate posts too. That's this post, which, like the GCs guide, is included in the top links list for easy reference!

Before you access my notes, see if you think you can think of useful points from the clips in this compilation (the basis of that post):


...

...

TIK TOK New media old attitudes as glam censorship uncovered

TikTok 'tried to filter out videos from ugly, poor or disabled users'.

TikTok’s moderators were instructed to exclude videos from the For You feed if they failed on any one of a number of categories, the documents show. Users with an “abnormal body shape (not limited to: dwarf, acromegaly),” who are “chubby … obese or too thin” or who have “ugly facial looks or facial deformities” should be removed, one document says, since “if the character’s appearance is not good, the video will be much less attractive, not worthing [sic] to be recommended to new users.”

TWITCHING The post-viral gig has no live audience

CV-19 is chewing up and spitting out the blackened hulk of live music culture like a Texan cowpoke with a hunk of chewing tobacco.

There have been various responses to a scenario that robs musicians of their main means of making a living (including the flogging of merch at these gigs). Nothing to do with the industry, but I loved the Italian guy blasting out the Angel of Death riff to a bewildered elderly neighbour from his balcony.

Just a tad more pertinent than that stupendous Slayer simulacrum (a tricky triple sibilance one that) is the ingenious effort of a metal band with a sold out venue for their album launch - with all ticket holders now barred.

So, they set up 6 cameras with Ethernet ports hooking them directly to an editing board and broadcast live on gaming platform Twitch to 13,000 frustrated metalheads, a total 30,000 viewing the performance within a day, and a YouTube upload imminent.

So, CV-19 could be the grim big-R to much of the music industry, especially at the Indie and self-distributing end, but these guys exemplified the there's always a way attitude that is an outlook worth looking at.. 

My chapeau is doffed to these resilient gents.

https://www.popsci.com/story/technology/code-orange-metal-streaming-twitch/

FEMALE music video directors

A day late for Int Women's Day, but a few links if looking for inspirational names, and maybe just a nice way to come up with videos to research when exploring the format's conventions/media language. Some of these (Claudia Mate) are foremost pioneers of the new technologies that will surely be basic elements of the promo video format by the time you're your parents age...

Of course, be mindful that some of their work might be fairly explicit, especially within hiphop and 'R&B'. Female directors are no more of a 'type' in music video than they are in film.

My main touchstones for auteur brilliance in the field are male - Antoin Corbijn and Spike Jonze. I'm always happy to learn from student work...

https://www.vibe.com/2018/05/karena-evans-nine-other-female-music-video-directors-you-should-know-list

Some interesting videos mentioned in this article - Christina Aguilera's Fighter video is a classic example of the very contrasting readings likely from a feminist as opposed to post-feminist viewpoint. Blurred Lines is another one; ill-judged?

Sophie Muller directed for One Direction, but also Annie Lennox - who I've blogged on before. Lennox is an inspirational figure, attracting tabloid fury for her shaven headed look a decade before Sinead O'Connor would likewise refuse to play the expected glamour game. Hannah Lux-Davis is associated with even bigger names, but I note she's worked with Halsey, whose electropop visuals tend to be interesting!

Sanaa Hamri is known for her intense colour pops, something we've been discussing recently in GCSE!

The number one on the list above also appears in this list...

https://www.indiewire.com/gallery/new-female-filmmakers-2019/

Want more? Well, 51 is a good start...

https://en.m.wikipedia.org/wiki/Category:Female_music_video_directors

I'd like to think there will be a name from StG on there one of these days, whether an Evie, a Sophie or someone of a more recent/current vintage!

INDUSTRY 2019 big 3 65% share DIY 4% streaming 56%

Great article as usual from a fantastic source. I've put the 3 key figures in the post title, but there's more useful detail within.

Read that straight after a Blabbermouth article about the shameless audio corp that is modern Metallica, who continue to leave no stone unturned to grift a dollar. It's quite the zeitgeist moment: nearly 60 years since the Beatles' official fan club was sending out an Xmas flexidisc exclusive to fans, subscribers to a new Metallica club will get exclusive access to vinyl with unreleased recordings.

Lets just hope they're not from the studio sessions of their woeful last 30 years...

https://www.musicbusinessworldwide.com/the-global-recorded-music-business-generated-over-50m-a-day-last-year-and-more-than-2m-of-it-went-to-diy-artists/

CONVERGENCE MARKETING Ozzy website retro game

Ozzy's career tracks back to blues band Earth in the late 1960s so he has accrued an age diverse following, maintaining a credibility and aura of cool that attracts a large youth audience on top of his long term fan-base.

The age profile largely skipped the over-45s that are fairly core for Ozzy (who built a new teen following in the 80s with his solo success after being kicked out of the mighty Sabs), but the free 8-bit retro game playable through his website is a great example of smart marketing exploiting the potential of convergence - and reminds me of the Cornetto Trilogy's equally smart use of a similar strategy. A decade ago!

Modern console games, at the top end, have production timescales (years) and budgets ($100m - >300m) directly comparable to the tentpole (or blockbuster, to use Elberse's term).

Nonetheless, just like VFX/SFX and cinematography (helicopters displaced by drones), convergence means formats, genres and post-/production techniques which define the spectacle of the box office giants are available at the bottom and lower end of the scale.

Just look at the striking range of digipaks, websites and music videos, not to mention blogs and alt vids, produced by students at StG (and IGS previously) using cheap or free tools like Wix, blogger, FCPX and free plug-ins and TrueType fonts from the likes of DaFont.com. 

Sean of the Dead and Hot Fuzz had Space Invaders and Pacman versions on their promo websites (produced, unusually, not by the distributor Universal/StudioCanal but by the main production company Working Title through its main website developer RedBridge).

Just like the Ozzy game today (and his new album has been a huge success, so it's working!), this reflects a smart modern four quadrant approach. The 8-bit style has retro appeal with such games going back to the 80s and 90s (while Pacman and Space Invaders go back to the late 70s and 80s arcade machines). Such appeal doesn't just narrowly exploit direct identification (uses and gratifications), a much younger demographic also find appeal, through fashionability, irony, hipsterism, lo-fi - there are many possible explanations and labels which partly intersect with Simon Reynolds' influential 'Retromania' book and concept.

The multi-layered nature of the semiotics of these retro games includes another easily overlooked layer of the 'endless chain of signification', or signifiers, that Baudrillard proposes with his reality-questioning simulacra theory - we're all in The Matrix now, endlessly reconstructed, immersed in and perceiving through a semiotic soup of media signifiers and intertextuality.

Roll back 15 years as the smartphone concept began to evolve and millions were paying £2-3 (and equivalent currencies) to download 8-bit 'polyphonic' ringtone versions of the latest pop chart hits, and restyled classics - even sparking its own original music with the Crazy Frog phenomenon. That market spanned tweens to mid-30s. Entirely new sounds for the youngest users, but offering nostalgia for the games played by the older users (or 'consumers' to use that classic denoter of passive audiences) simultaneous with novelty through their converged devices.

So, Ozzy's simple lo-fi game works for the youngest to oldest end of a potential fan-base, exposed to plentiful lo-fi games built in to phones, linked to platforms like Facebook (Angry Birds!), on cheap 'emulators' which make 80s, 90s and noughties games from long defunct platforms like the PlayStation predecessor Sega MegaDrive and Spectrum 48k (it had 48k...KB... of memory - beaten by the Commodore 64!), and accessing these through tablets, phablets, phones - and computers of course!

It offers direct nostalgia for different generations, whether for the original games or the later intertextualised but new polyphonic ringtone market.

And one final way in which this generates appeal, or functions as a marketing tool. Alongside escapism, another uses and gratifications category (and you could work in all four), like Kim Kardashian's massively money-spinning freemium hit Kim Kardashian's Hollywood, it offers identification through faux agency - you be Ozzy! 

The existence of this game reflects how nostalgia has a notable role in the current zeitgeist, whether experienced as direct fond remembrance, hipsterism like the vinyl resurgence among the young, irony or the rejection of slick high-budget productions - and there have been multiple music genres over recent years based on using retro kit. Utter garbage to my ears, having grown up with bands like Depeche Mode and followed their development, using ever more sophisticated kit and techniques. But thrilling, novel and somewhat rebellious for a younger audience who have grown up in a converged era where an expensive 80s synth can be found as an option on Garageband or a phone app.

That faux agency is also comparable to the faux personal engagement of social media, whether that's the employee written postings of stars or the hidden hand of big 3 record labels behind the seemingly organic rise of artists like Lily Allen (back in the MySpace era - the Arctic Monkeys are arguably an example of 'authentic' growth through it) and Billie Eilish (SoundCloud and YouTube).

And - final point - disruption means that it's not just the production of the Ozzy game that's relatively cheap and affordable, but also the distribution. https://www.blabbermouth.net/news/play-ozzy-osbournes-new-8-bit-legends-of-ozzy-video-game/

The link above is how I encountered it, via my Google news feed on my Android phone (my initial no-frills draft of this post is being slowly tapped out on my phone through the Blogger app to boot). The article has the Ozzy site's hyperlink embedded - and that is all that's needed to effectively distribute the product. The audience to a large degree will work as distributors, sharing that link. From the Ozzy end, there's no need to pay for ads to promote the game (part of the album promo campaign) as it will spark e-zine features like the one I read, and I probably will share the link with a few folks I know.

I've taught tweenagers who have produced some impressive games using the free web platform Scratch. I've met a 20-something at a Photoshop course who made a work placement into a career by pitching to produce the social media for one of many record labels long ago bought up by the big 3 and resurrected for a reissue campaign.

What you can do through your Media coursework can be a hell of a pitch for a place on a competitive uni course or straight into a job/project. Or, as with the 2020 student productions for unsigned/Indie electropop artist Aem, 'actual' media and branding, not a simulacra. That Ozzy Osbourne website game is emblematic of the opportunities out there for creative, media/tech-literate folk with a bit of drive...like you? Whether for music, film or simply 'corporate' (for brands, businesses), there's a huge market out there for smart marketeers.

LYRIC VIDEO Motley Crue generate cheap PR

As flagged up soany times, here's a fresh example of how multiple video formats are a cheap means of generating media coverage.

In this case there's a further tie-in to a major movie too, where it's featured in the soundtrack, but regardless the simple fact of releasing a lyric video for a 30 year-old track gets it a headline in Blabbermouth (for example), a metal e-zine, which in turn popped up on my (and presumably MILLIONS of others too!) Google news feed.

Total marketing spend? Peanuts.

A further point - there are LOTS of record labels out there, many half forgotten semi-dormant subsidiaries of the big 3, who might be highly receptive to a pitch to get a batch of lyric, unwrapping, visualiser, TikTok videos...

https://www.blabbermouth.net/news/motley-crue-releases-2020-lyric-video-for-kickstart-my-heart/

GERMAN YOUTUBE CHANNEL GLOBAL MARKETING FORCE Story of Colors

Sad to see the Americanised spelling used, but then that can also be taken as indicative of a globalised outlook that has seen a German new media outlet become globally influential and have labels clamouring to have their artists record a session.

https://ffwd.medium.com/how-colors-became-the-music-industrys-tastemaker-db50dd143bc8

FUNDING mama MIA sparks Patreon age

MIA launches crowdfunding drive to avoid platforms that 'sell data to Cambridge Analytica'

https://www.theguardian.com/music/2020/jan/31/mia-crowdfunding-new-music-patreon?CMP=Share_AndroidApp_Gmail 

STREAMING WEB 2.0 MARKETING MYTHS the Billie Eilish story

Intriguing source - a weekly-updated blog on streaming and the music industry. And very provocative analysis - NB: uses strong language.

There's a familiar ring to this tale of a plucky young upstart using new media (SoundCloud) to create fan buzz leading to media buzz. A decade or so ago it was Lily Allen and MySpace. The blogger presents a compelling, detailed case that Eilish's downhome brand is just as fake, corporate generated as was Allen's - in both cases their appealing narratives of the little guy ... gal made good masking corporate marketing teams in control from the off.

In the case of Eilish it's specifically Apple, and the blogger argues they're using this smartly created hype and buzz to promote the dying CONCEPT of the album, so much better for monetising purposes than randomly dripfed singles.

Check it out:

https://www.getrevue.co/profile/pennyfractions/issues/penny-fractions-billie-eilish-the-exception-that-proves-the-rule-205262

UGC 2.0 fans remaking tracks from studio leaks

The professionalism of UGC is exploding to the degree that fan-made tracks are exploding online with the fan-base unable to denote such tracks as such, but rather as official tracks.

Contrarily, of course, artists are also taking on amateurish aesthetics for part of their online AV output, with visualisers, lyric videos, unwrapping videos and more (including common social forms, a big driver of this).

Convergence works two ways....

Chopped and screwed? How studio leaks are creating a new DIY rap music

https://www.theguardian.com/music/2020/jan/03/chopped-and-screwed-how-studio-leaks-are-creating-a-new-diy-rap-music

UK INDUSTRY rises back to 2006 levels but CD falls

UK music purchases hit highest level since 2006

https://www.theguardian.com/business/2020/jan/01/uk-music-purchases-hit-highest-level-since-2006?CMP=Share_AndroidApp_Gmail 

ALBUM SLEEVES RIP 4AD legendary designer

Immediate NB: the recently deceased designer in question, Vaughan Oliver, used explicit images in a small number of his works.

The point of sharing this is more for a reflection on what's lost with the shift to streaming - and helps to explain the utterly contrary surge in vinyl across all age ranges.

By chance I read a book on the label 4AD a few months ago, one of the kings of 80s/90s uncompromising indie, home to the likes of The Pixies and Cocteau Twins, artists who would've been suffocated and transformed at a major label.

I'd argue that it was another 80s/90s designer, Peter Saville, who helped make UK label enduringly iconic, who produced sleeve art that has broken through into contemporary mainstream culture. I see simulacra of his most famous Joy Division cover in many unexpected quarters these days. 

There are so many other legends, notably Hipgnosis, and the album art of the likes of Iron Maiden continues to be a core part of their brand identity and appeal, directly linked to massively successful merchandising.

So ... when you come to meet the challenge of creating album art will be aware of the design innovations of the creative giants that strode the psychic realm of the imagination before you, producing nuanced, provocative pieces that would give a Freudian psychoanalyst nightmares?!

Couple of initial links: 

Lost worlds of sex and magic: Vaughan Oliver's album sleeves for 4AD

https://www.theguardian.com/music/2019/dec/30/vaughan-oliver-album-sleeve-design-4ad-label-pixies-cocteau-twins?CMP=Share_AndroidApp_Gmail (NB: contains one explicit image from a Pixies album cover)

Peter Saville on his album cover artwork

https://www.theguardian.com/music/gallery/2011/may/29/joydivision-neworder?CMP=Share_AndroidApp_Gmail 

ALT VIDS 4K remasters

Not really an 'alt vid' but something I blogged on years ago just caught my eye.

What's early 80s Xmas classic has been remastered to 4K, perfect for all those big screen TVs out there. Having worked on a cover video recently, this is quite an upgrade on the 480p version that was previously the official upload!

Long tail theory/Retromania indeed...

https://youtu.be/bwNV7TAWN3M

Here's another that caught my eye - Motley Crue's Looks That Kill ... '2019'. A smart promo boost for their just announced reformation and huge American stadium tour! The song dates back to about 1983, and also had sub-HD options only until now. 

The music video is getting a new lease of life in parallel with back catalogue albums as YT especially is the music player of choice for gen Z'ers, too skint or tight-fisted (or plain entitled?) to pay a monthly tenner for ad-free Spotify.

Mötley Crüe - Looks That Kill - 2019 (Official Mu…: https://youtu.be/A5_f_uOKcB4

MERCH Metallica tie-in with surfing fashion brand

No sooner was I mentioning what a great merch case study Metallica make when I spotted this latest addition...

https://www.loudersound.com/news/metallica-pay-tribute-to-surf-icon-andy-irons-with-new-clothing-range

MERCH Metallica figurines

Yet another example of why Metallica make for a great case study (at the genre neutral, or general conventions, level) - news of yet more merch, collectable figurines, need catnip...

https://www.blabbermouth.net/news/motley-crue-metallica-sex-pistols-rage-against-the-machine-block-figure-toys-available/

ALT VIDS tour teaser behind the scenes

The album teaser and special edition unwrapping vid are now, alongside the lyric vid and visualiser pretty common - and I'd imagine this next format will become ever more common too.

It generates shareable social content and e-zine articles like this one (and of course this blog post too!).

Bottom line, it helps spread the word that a tour is taking place...

https://metalinjection.net/av/motley-crue-def-leppard-poison-tour-behind-the-scenes-featurette-released

MERCH Depeche Mode link with fashion brand

These guys make such a good case study - long history of amazing videos, especially with Anton Corbijn; exemplary use of social, including the successful fan takeover of their FB during the last global tour; which was reflected in the convergence of their one-off cinema performance movie, directed by Corbijn, in November 2019 (which grossed around $3m from its one day release); and now, to add to their extensive merch range ...

... a tie-in with a cutting edge fashion brand.

Something to think about when putting together your store simulacra and seeking to generate social media content...

Perfect example of course of how an artist also generates publicity...

Noah Releases Capsule Collection with Depeche Mode

https://www.gq.com/gallery/noah-depeche-mode

HISTORY Megadeth invented band websites 1994

Rather intriguing tale of how a couple of hardy souls pitched to Capitol Records doing a revolutionary web campaign for an album, back when the global web audience was about 20m and a modem was required to get a 14.4kb/s peak connection...

https://youtu.be/iMmz2HzsSvI

MERCH Metallica add socks for middle-aged fans

Of course the term middle-aged won't appear anywhere near the marketing for this, but that's surely the idea for a band who started making a noise in 1983?

They've made further headlines in 2019 for their whiskey and beer lines. The Metallica money-making juggernaut rolls on

https://www.blabbermouth.net/news/metallica-teams-up-with-stance-for-line-of-socks/

CONVERGENCE BIG 3 Sony PS5 horizontal integration push

https://bgr.com/2019/10/24/ps5-leak-sony-music-soundtracks-death-stranding/

PITCH DEVELOPMENT - BUILDING A CHARACTER

You need to be really clear on (especially, NOT exclusively!) the fictional protagonist (or Proppian archetype of the hero... Campbell's 'hero' who, reflecting the 'monomyth' - and to a degree Todorov's theory of narrative structure [NEW equilibrium...] will go on a quest, the hero's journey...).

A moodboard will help enormously with this, which can be a mix of objects, people and more. Try this simple exercise...

List 5 films/TV s/he watches; 5 gadgets; 5 items of clothing; 5 places s/he's been to; 5 drinks/foods they like; 5 random further details (eg family, friends, quirks, talents, job...).
Now add any 3 images which represent their binary opposite (which might help start developing further characters + flag up things to avoid in costume, body language, mise-en-scene generally...)

NOW can you sum up the character in a couple of sentences?

SUGGESTED POST TITLE
NARRATIVE - visualising the characters [or a sep post for each main character]

FORMAT/PRESENTATION
A Ppt could be a convenient, quick way of doing this (1 heading, 5 images per slide), though adding images into a single Word doc without any accompanying text as an ADDITION would be simply smart - killing two birds with 1 stone, with apologies to our avian friends...

REFLECTING KNOWLEDGE/UNDERSTANDING OF THEORY
Note my brief usage/application of basic narrative theories above - the more you do this, the simpler such concepts will become for you. I only learnt them myself through repeated application!!!

THEORY CHALLENGE
Can you further apply more advanced theory like Hebdige's concept of subcultures, or (and these link together well!) Pierre Bourdieu's notion of cultural capital?

CHARACTER COMPARISON
As you review each set of answers, have a go at expressing the ideas as 1+ existing people/characters (eg the Mr Robot lead with a dash of Graham Norton - a brooding, ultra-talented (area?) individual with a camp side, fondness for pop culture as well as 'high culture'. Can you now create an additional moodboard?

STREAMING HAS SQUEEZED BACK CATALOGUE 90pc of streams for post-2000 recordings

This is an interesting corrective to both the infamous long tail theory (comprehensively trashed by Anita Elberse in Blockbusters) and the rather more convincing gist of Retromania, Simon Reynolds' reflection on the impact of converged technology in flipping the music market from its dominance by whatever was temporarily, currently popular.

The figures are astonishing - 73% of all listens are for releases since 2010 with a further 15% for 2000-2009 releases. 

For the student video-maker it does flag up the need for creative music video to boost back catalogue performance - a live Led Zeppelin video and a Rolling Stones lyric video being seen as archetypal examples of the approach of adding new visuals to older tracks.

https://www.billboard.com/articles/business/streaming/8533315/catalog-music-labels-market-older-music-streaming-singles