Music Video Brainstorm

This is a brainstorm created using bubbl.us. It includes our initial ideas that we drew from the song presented as a spider diagram for simplicity and ease.

Music Video Analysis - Bittersweet Symphony, The Verve

I have chosen to analyse Bittersweet Symphony by the Verve as my second video analysis because I wanted to analyse a song from the same genre as my chosen song. Both Bittersweet Symphony and Secrets are in the alternative rock genre and both make use of a cello to create unique and interesting sounds.

Bittersweet Symphony is the 1st single on The Verve's third album, Urban Hymns and it reached number 2 on the UK Singles chart. The song is 4.33 minutes long and is of the alternative rock genre similarly to One Republic. The song also in a similar way makes use of violins to give it a unique sound. These qualities will make it a good analysis to conduct for research regarding my chosen song. The video is in a pseudo-performance style as the lead singer is shown singing as he walks along a street but the rest of the band is not shown.

The video begins with a camera panning to follow the lead singer (Richard Ashcroft) as he walks onto a busy street. The unique sound of the violins fade in on the 3rd second eventually drowning out the ambient street sounds that could be heard before. This highlights how the character is thinking and how he becomes almost oblivious to the world around him as the song continues. He stops and turns to face the camera as it pans up to show his face. The camera moves slowly backwards as he pauses and looks towards it as if deep in thought.

Eventually, Ashcroft begins to move forwards, following the camera. The rest of the song continues as he walks along the street throughout which, he is shown to be completely uncaring and almost oblivious to his surroundings. Almost immediately as he crosses a road where he doesn't look, he is almost run over but he shows no reaction. He continues to walk down the street and doesn't move from his path regardless of who or what is in his way. The lyrics were clearly used directly when the video was being created, the third line of the first verse is ''I'll take you down the only road I've ever been down''. This is represented by the road he walks down and along with ''it's a bittersweet symphony, this life'' clearly set the theme for the whole video in the eyes of the director and the video reflects that in the singer's nature and actions.

Secrets - Video and Lyrics

Video



Lyrics:

I need another story Something to get off my chest My life gets kind of boring Need something that i can confess Till all my sleeves are stained red From all the truth that I've said Come by it honestly I swear Thought you saw me wink, no, I've been on the brink, so [CHORUS] Tell me what you want to hear Something that were like those years I'm sick of all the insincere So I'm gonna give all my secrets away This time Don't need another perfect lie Don't care if critics ever jump in line I'm Gonna give all my secrets away My God, amazing how we got this far It's like were chasing all those stars Who's driving shiny big black cars And everyday I see the news All the problems we could solve And when a situation rises Just write it into an album Singing straight to cold? I don't really like my flow, no, so [CHORUS] Got no reason Got no shame Got no family I can blame Just don't let me disappear I'ma tell you everything [CHORUS x2] All my secrets away (x2)

Our group is creating a mood board around these lyrics to brainstorm ideas which will be photographed and uploaded.

Audience Research

In order to create an effective music video that connects and draws in my target audience I have to research into who my audience would be.

My audience will mainly be the people who watch the music video on music TV channels so I looked into what music channels may show 'Secrets' on them. After some research I found that MTV Two plays alternative rock music like One Republic. On their website they say:

"The music channel with attitude for indie, rock and alternative music enthusiasts An interactive music channel playing diverse and cutting edge music. MTV Two is where the viewer defines the music programming - create your own hour of videos via the web. With a leftfield take on the world, it really is a channel created by and for individuals.

Target audience: 16-24 male"

Another channel that shows alternative rock, Kerrang! put their target audience at 15-35 male. These two channels are fairly consistent with each other and show an audience that I should be targeting mainly when creating my own video and when conducting research and getting audience feedback.

To appeal to this audience the musicians in my video will have to look 'cool' so that the viewers can look up to and want to be them. They must also have qualities to them that is preferred by this audience such as being relatively young (20s-30s) and dress in an appropriate way.

For example, bands like One Republic and Coldplay often involve the members dressed in a smart-casual way with fashionable clothing.

Music Video Research - Editing and Conventions

Editing and camerawork are two of the most important aspects when creating a music video. To create a good music video, the editing must follow the pace of the song and make sure that key points in the song are highlighted by the video, all whilst keeping the video looking professional and clean.

A help website called about.com has outlined some of the key difficulties people have when filming a music video. These include such editing techniques as excessive zoom and excessive special effects. Although both of these can be used well, in many videos these will look amateurish and unfitting. Other points outlined in the article include the use of adding post-production sound effects and that a well-done simple idea can be better than a bad complex one. A quote from the article's author defines editing well:

"Your footage might be great, but it'll only become a great video through editing. To do a good job you'll need patience, time and more patience. You'll need to decide the 'feel' and pace of the video. Will it be made up of long sweeping shots, or quick sharp edits? Do you want to follow the mood of the song and edit to the music or do you want the video to contrast with the track?"

Many music videos include an introduction, a scene that occurs

before the song begins to play (or during a song intro). These intros can last from anything between 5 seconds and 2 minutes. Although this is usually done in narrative style videos to set the scene, it has also been done in performance style videos too such as in 'crushcrushcrush' by Paramore. Other songs where that have an intro include; Stop and Stare by One Republic, Maneater by Nelly Furtado and Stan by Eminem.

A main aspect of developing a music video is to make it clear who is privileged in each shot. For example when the listener can hear a guitar during a solo the guitarist should be privileged in the shot or even the only person in the shot. Close ups of the instruments are common for these types of shots as they can show the skill and manual dexterity of the musicians which fans like to see. Most of the time, however, the lead singer is privileged in shots. This is to emphasize the lyrics and to show the singer meaningfully singing the words as well

as to create and uphold their own iconography as mentioned in Andrew Goodwin's 'Dancing in the Distraction Factory'.

Also in Andrew Goodwin's book, he talks about the relationship between the music, lyrics and visuals that make up a music video. He explains that "There is a relationship between the lyrics and the visuals, with the visuals either illustrating, amplifying or contradicting the lyrics". This occurs in every single music video. An example of the visuals illustrating the lyrics is in a song called 'Toxic' by Britney Spears. It shows Britney dropping poison into a man's mouth as the words ''with a taste of poison paradise'' are heard in the lyrics. Another example is a Coldplay video for 'The Scientist'. It shows the lead singer walking in reverse which corresponds to the lyrics, ''lets go back to the start''. An example of the visuals contradicting the lyrics is in the song 'Good Riddance' by Greenday. The lyrics are sarcastic and although the singer says ''I hope you have the time of your life'', he doesn't mean it which is shown in the video.

The book explains how the continuous release of videos from an artist throughout their career can tell a story of the artist and how they developed, this was defined as a meta-narrative. It is important that artists maintain this meta-narrative or 'star persona' in order to keep their fans happy with consistent material. If a band/musician makes a big change in the music that they create, it can potentially cause them to lose fans (although also has the potential to gain fans).