GENRE ANALYSIS
For my final major project, I will be creating a music video. The genre of music I am planning on choosing is going to be pop/rock, as I want the video to be very fun, upbeat and colourful. As my inspiration for my music video is Miley Cyrus I am going to analyse three different music videos which feature the same music genre as hers. This will help me gain an understanding of all the similar elements in them which I can use in my one.
Pop/rock might seem like an overly vague designation -- after all, rock & roll was catchy and melodic long before it was thought of as pop music. Pop/rock's primary focus was on the melody to be as big, catchy, and instantly memorable as possible. In general, pop/rock is catchy and energetic enough to appeal to younger listeners, but clean and safe enough for adults as well. Pop/rock produced some of the biggest stars of the '70s, such as Elton John, Peter Frampton, Paul McCartney & Wings, and Fleetwood Mac; it continued on into the '80s with Billy Joel, Bruce Springsteen, Hall & Oates, George Michael, and many others.
Analyse three videos
I have chosen three music videos that give me inspiration for my music video which I am going to analyse to see different techniques. These include 'what the hell' by Avril Lavigne, 'Midnight sky' by Miley Cyrus and since you've been gone by Kelly Clarkson.
Avril Lavigne is a star icon who is looked up to by many young adults, teenagers and woman. When her fame peaked the most in her 20's, her target/mainstream audience of young adults and teenagers could relate to her, and Avril Lavigne could relate to them.
The Avril Lavigne music video for 'What the hell' features similar things I want to incorporate into my video. The first thing is the genre of the song which pop/rock and the vibe of the video is exactly what I want to go for. The hair, makeup and outfits match what I want the performer in mine to have. This video is a mixture between performance and narrative where there is a basic storyline throughout and then at the end she is performing her song to a crowd.
At the beginning of the video, it has different clips of Avril in a bed. The clips are still images and the camera has been moved around the room but still facing the same subject. I really like this as it leads up to the start of the song. I want to do this but have my actor start out in a bath and waking up as the song starts. Avril sings the lyrics throughout the entire song and I would like to incorporate this is in mine as I think it ties all of the storylines together with her emotions.
Midnight sky has given me a lot more inspiration as this is the song I would like to make one to. I think the colours in the video really stand out which is one thing I would like to include. This song is only a performance video as Miley performs her song whilst in different set locations. The locations are all very vibrant and wild. The use of outfits, hair and makeup play a key part in this music video as they match the background and ties all the different scenes together. Her style has been thought about a lot and adds to the aesthetic appeal of the video. I am going to take inspiration from this when I film mine and plan the outfits out. I want there to be a lot of variety of backgrounds and scenes which this video also has, The worst thing I could do when completing my video is for the viewers to have a lack of the viewer's interest. I always want them to be engaged, which changes of scenery and styles can do. This video is very aesthetically pleasing too which also helps in the sense of keeping the video modern and satisfying to watch.
This was the first music video that Miley directed herself and you can tell as she is showing her true identity and personality. I feel like the message in this video is about Miley embracing her new Self and becoming stronger after going through a breakup. The low angle shots express this and the camera looks up to Miley, which gives her power and makes her very superior. This is an angle I would like to use as it will make my actor look very confident whilst filming.
Since creating this music video it has given me an understanding of what shots work, how much footage I need to film, good techniques to use when editing and many more. As this music video was quite disturbing and eerie, I would like to change up the style and go for a more upbeat and cheerful video. I feel like this would be good to have experience shooting videos that are opposites as they won't be the same.
This is the previous music video I created a few projects ago, where I created a narrative style video to the song Bellyache by Billie Eilish. Shooting this video, it has given me a lot of inspiration about shot types I would like to include, such as dutch angles, slow mo's, wide-angle shots. The main focus of the video is the huge contrast in clothing and style that the actor has. She starts out looking very innocent and young dressed all in white and then completely switches up to an all-black outfit with dark grungy makeup and 'goth' like clothes to create a sinister and mysterious feel to the second half of the video. I really enjoy watching the second half as it is quite an unusual look and makes it a more interesting video to watch. I really like the idea of my actor wearing, edgy, punk and unique clothes to really catch the audiences attention in my upcoming music video. I also think this will make it look more professional as it won't be basic everyday clothes that would make the video look dull and monotonous.
Billie Eilish research
Demographic
Billie was born on December 18, 2001, in Los Angeles, California. She was born into a family of musicians and actors. She grew up with her elder brother Finneas who is also in the music industry and helps her produce many of her songs. Billie Eilish main genre is Pop and some alternative rock. Billie is known as a modern-day pop star for her iconic songs and music videos.
Billie Eilish image is very unsettling and edgy and For example, her song Bury a friend is strange and is known for being very unique. Most of her music videos are known for being quite gruesome and creepy. In my opinion, the music video is almost like a horror film and I think the concept of the video uses symbolic conventions that would be in a horror film. Another example of a scary video of hers is the song Xanny.
Billies main genre of music is Pop and her main targeted audience is young adults. In terms of the demographic of the audience, 65% female and 35% male. Furthermore, about 75% of her audience are 34 years old or younger. Nearly 70% of her audience are females which is a huge comparison compared to the 30% of males.
Researching into Billie Eilish's demographic, genre, music videos and background has helped me understand more about her image and the way she produces her songs and videos the way she does. Her style is very different compared to the other artists that I researched and I liked this as her style of music in my opinion is more interesting. The reason I wanted to create a music video for one of Billies songs previously is because of the story behind the song and also how catchy the song is as well. 'Bellyache' is one of the first songs to really start her career and from there she became very famous. The song is more of a Pop song disguised with a dark message behind it. When this song was released, Billies style of music was not as dark as it is now, which shows that the unsettling side to her music was going to come out. I really liked the fact that the song was quite fun and upbeat at the chorus but also slow and sad at some points. The contrast keeps the song interesting and I also want to portray this contrast with my actor's style of clothing and personality. After watching a few of Billies more recent music videos I noticed the outfits, hair and makeup and are all very dark and edgy which I want to do for my video and take inspiration from her herself.
MILEY CYRUS ARTIST RESEARCH
Miley Ray Cyrus is an American singer, songwriter, and actress. She is well known for her distinctive raspy voice, and her music spans a range of styles, from pop and country-pop to hip hop, experimental and rock. She was born on November 23, 1992, in Franklin, Tennessee, U.S. At the start of her career, she mostly started singing country and pop and then embraces her rock and roll heart in her latest album 'plastic hearts'. The genre of music I planned on choosing was always going to be pop/rock, so I figured Miley's recent songs were a good fit.
Demographics is segments of the human populations broken down into categories such as age, gender race. A demographic is important when creating a product as you will need to know the specific target audience that will be consuming the product, you will need to aim it at. The target audience can also be broken down into Psychographics which focuses on the audience's personal life such as income and hobbies rather than the general attributes of a person.
Miley's music was mostly pop music and was targeted at teenagers and young adults. She was most popular among millennials than any other age groups. 80% of her audience were women and 20% were men, meaning that there was a huge gender gap and more women were a fan of his music. As Miley is the 11th most popular pop star there wasn't one particular race and ethnicity that listen to her as everyone from around the world knew who she was also from her career on Disney Channel as well. As her audience is in the younger generation, this means that they wouldn't necessarily have marital statuses and annual income and would most likely be living at home, studying.
CONTENT RESEARCH
Music videos
RESEARCH EVALUATION
In conclusion this research has really helped me understand similar style music videos to the one I would like to create. This has given me more inspiration about the look of my video since watching Avril Laenges and Mileys videos. After researching about the music videos it has really helped me decide on the style I want my actor to have to match the aesthetic of the song. I created a research tracker to show all the topics and site links that I used when getting my Research. This is to prove where the research has come from and what we learned from that research.
