Potential Parodying

Parodys

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Music Video Inspiration

Sleep texas

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Target Audience

As the song was brought out in 1975 most people who know it would be aged around 50. This is the age we are basing are target audience around, however due to the song being used on various adverts it is widely known by people of all ages.

We conducted a focus group with 20 of our parents and their friends, who are the target market and asked various questions about what kind of music videos they like.
Here are the results:

Q. Are you male or female?

Females - 12
Males - 8


Q. Do you prefer your music video to be funny or serious?

Funny - 17
Serious - 3

Q. Do you watch music videos?


Yes - 4
No - 6
Sometimes - 10

Q. Do you like pop rock/classic rock


Yes - 17
No - 3

Q. What do you prefer in a video?


Performance - 3
Narrative - 4
Both - 13

Q. What music video's are memorable to you?


(Is this the way to) Amarillo - Tony Christie, Dancing in The Street - Bowie/Jagger, I Want to Break Free - Queen, Thriller - Jackson, Hit Me Baby One More Time - Spears, Take On Me - Aha, Hello - Richie, Sleep - Texas

Conclusion


In conclusion our video has to be funny and combine both narrative and performance. I also looked at the memorable videos they suggest and noticed many had funny elements, or included dressing up.

Background of Song and Artist

Make Me Smile (Come up and see me) was released in 1975 and was a number one hit for Steve Harley and Cockney Rebel. It was released as a single, and was on their album The Best Years of Our Lives. Since 1975 it has been re-released 3 times, 1992, 1995 and 2005. It has also been covered by more than 100 other artists, most notably by Duran Duran and Erasure.

It is Steve Harley's only number 1 song to date, however he did have a hit with a cover of Here Comes The Sun. He also released Phantom of The Opera with Sarah Brightman, as he was going to play the role of the Phantom until he was replaced by Michael Crawford.

Genre Research

According to Wikipedia the genre for Make Me Smile is Glam Rock. However other websites class it as pop rock, or sunshine rock.

Below is a link to Tom Clothiers blog post which talks about the genre's mis-en-scene. We done this in a group together.

 http://tomca2jca.blogspot.co.uk/2011/09/genre-research.html

Interviews

Copyright

Because the song we have chosen is not original we have to be very aware of copyright.

In the music industry license and copy writing crimes are becoming more frequent and carries serious fines with it. Due to this it is important to attempt to get permission to use a music track.

I have sent a letter to record label EMI as they own the rights to the song. Unfortunately I am likely to hear back however it is important to show you have sent a letter anyway.

Company Logo

As a massive fan of the band Queen we have called our company Mercury Productions. This is because the late singer, Freddie Mercury has been such an influence on my passion for music.

There is one iconic image of Freddie at Wembley in 1986, in which we have edited for our logo.

The original picture (above). Our logo (below). The picture has been edited so it looks more like a statue and I believe the font either side shows the company is very modern.

Andrew Goodwin

Andrew Goodwin was a media theorist who identified 5 key aspects of music videos which the audience look for. They were Thought Beats, Narrative and Performance, The Star Image, Relation of Visuals and Technical Aspects.

Thought Beats 
This is known as seeing the sound in your head.

• Look at the music itself, structure of the song. Chorus's and verses.
• Voice of the song. The artist may have a unique voice, like Paloma Faith, and may for identifications. The voice can be classed as someone's individual instrument.
• Mode of address, songs are stories and the artist is the storyteller

Narrative and Performance

The audience normally understands part of the song, and makes the rest up in their head. Music videos need to be easy for the audience to watch and narrative and performance need to work hand in hand. The audience need to believe the video is real, even if lip syncing is being used.

The Star Image

A idol or star needs to be created so people can relate to them and increase popularity. A character is created and fans normally are loyal. This makes it easier to maintain a high sale of songs even if the lyrics aren't deep. Examples of stars are Michael Jackson, Lady Gaga and Elvis. They have huge stage presence and many fans due to this.

Relation of Visuals

There are 3 ways music videos promote a song, illustrate, amplify or disjuncture.

• Illustrate is the most common, it is when the video matches the meaning and genre of the lyrics.
• Amplify is when effects are constantly repeated and manipulated, therefore drummed into our memory
• Disjuncture is when the meaning is completely ignored.

Technical Aspects

Everything from sound to mis-en-scene, shots to special effects, are included under this. They are used to create dramatic effects, maintain professionalism and keep the video entertaining.

Music Video Analysis

Music video analysis

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Hypodermic Syrige

The hypodermic syringe is a theory that media "injects" information into us, and we take it in. It is also known as the "Magic Bullet". It was more widely believed in the 1930's behaviourism philosophies, however is not well believe now due to advancements in research. The theory is that media will effect how we live, an example of this is children with violent video games. People, especially newspapers, suggest the more violent games affects children's aggression and they will go commit crimes similar to the games because of this. A real life example of this is the case of Dustin Lynch. The Grand Theft Auto game was accused of training him to murder JoLynn Mishne because he was "obsessed" with the game. The problems with the theory is that is sees the audience as a whole, not as individuals, and of course individuals interpret media in different ways. 

Song Choice

We looked at many songs from different genre to see what would suit us best.

We first looked at "You say it best when you say nothing at all" by Ronan Keating. The problem with this song is that I would personally have to be in the video and unfortunately people wouldn't be able to take me seriously in a role such as that. That wouldn't fit with the genre of the video if people found it funny.

We then looked at "The Sun Ain't Gunna Shine Anymore" by Frankie Valli and the 4 seasons. This was because it would of been interesting using different camera shots to have me on screen multiple times. However this song did not have a music video, and nor did other songs from the same era. This meant it would hard to research similar videos.

We have decided to choose "Make Me Smile (Come up and see me)" by Steve Harley and Cockney Rebel. We chose this song as it is very upbeat and quite fun. The original music video for the song was just the band playing it live in the Top Of The Pops studio and we felt it deserved a better video, especially when there was many other decent music videos at the same time. I am excited to see where this project leads.

http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=qpJ0cyXbMbI&feature=related

Researching Music Videos

To get some idea's for music videos I looked at some of my favourite ones. This gave me idea's on genre, styles and what is conventional.

The first video I looked at was (Is This The Way To) Amarillo, by Peter Kay and Tony Christie. This is famous for being made for Comic Relief and for being very funny. Peter Kay is known for being a funny man, and suits the genre for upbeat fun songs, much like myself. The video contains Kay walking down corridors singing into the camera when iconic British celebrities appear behind him, including Ken Barlow, Queen, Sir Jimmy Saville, Shakin Stevens. Because he keeps going down different corridors with different celebrities it keeps people watching as they want to see what happens next. It would be nice to do something in my video which makes people want to see what is going to happen next.

The second video I looked at was Dancing in the street, by David Bowie and Mick Jagger. This is famous for being very cheesy and very funny. Like Amarillo it was also done for charity, the charity being Live Aid. The video is set in an abandoned warehouse, and contains lots of jumping about and "dad dancing". The singers do a lot of singing and dancing into the camera. The video is iconic for the good humour and the fun factor. Something I am personally wanting to bring to my video.

Skills/Targets

During AS I learnt many skills in media as it was a new subject. I never really used a camera or edited before, and never thought about genre and conventions.

I thought I adapted very well and would like to keep learning new skills with this project. For my AS project I created a film opening. This meant I had to learn different shot types, music/sounds, lighting etc all to suit the horror genre. I also learnt how to edit and use websites such as Tom's planner and SlideShare. I hope to build on my knowledge and experience to improve for this A2 project.

Targets for A2:

• Get a better understanding of editing, use more effects, learn other techniques etc
• Improve on team work
• Learn how to use photoshop

Time Plan