Analysing Music Videos 4

Sia - The Greatest


Sia's music video for her song 'The Greatest' is a powerful music video which compliments the message that she is attempts to spread in her song. The music video was made as a with the main idea to help raise awareness to support the LGBT community and most importantly to show support and tribute to the 49 victims of the terrorist shoot attack in Orlando that happened on the 12th of June this year. Immediately this makes the music video stand out and differ from the usual music videos we see on a day-to-day basis.



The music video begins with an actress wiping her face with the rainbow flag which symbolises the LGBT community. She has a high contrast of lighting on here face, as only her face is half lit. This could highlight both the high good times and bad times that the community faces. Its is then followed by slow motion dancing which suggests the serious message of the song.

The lighting in the video is very low key due to the sad undertone in the song and to complete the eerie/weird look that the dancers were giving. The lighting was a dingy grey/black however towards the end when the dancers came all together we had green and red lighting in a dark room which helped make the dancers stand out and seem powerful and hopeful. This contributes to the message that the message Sia is portraying in her song.


There is very simplistic editing in this video. For the majority of the song, the use of tracking is used. As we reach towards the end of the music video, the techniques gradually get more complicated as different angles are used as well as a large variety of shots.

The music video seems to be set in an abandoned home. The protagonist dances around the building into different rooms and joins different dancers. Other dancers will be on the floor, looking half dead. There is not much in terms of what is in the Mise-en-scene due to focal point of the videos being on the dancers. However there was decorative furniture on the walls such as broken/wonky photo frames and clocks suggesting that there used to be people living there; the building had a purpose, this could link to the lives that was lost in the bombings earlier this year (tribute aspect).

Due to the actors/dancers being young in the music and the meaning of the song, it was unsuitable to use the male gaze as an aspect for this video. Moreover, this means that gender did not stand out in the video and was not used to entice people to watch the video/popularise the song.

However, the role of institution and audience played a large role into the video. Sia's record label RCA Records Label, have signed with pop artists such as Taylor Swift, Kelly Clarkson, Justin Timberlake, P!nk and Zayn Malik. It is noticeable that for the female artists that are signed with this label, their music videos focus on female empowerment,or have important storylines. Whereas the males have mildly sexualised music videos. In this case, "The Greatest" music video proves my point. Alongside this, Sia's audience got what they expected, as the video focused on the lyrical dancer Maddie Ziegler, and was set in an abandoned/empty house. The music video was given a twist with the other dancers and the lighting.

Richard Dyer The Star Theory

Richard Dyer- The Star Theory

Richard Dyer believes that a star is not a person, but is the construction to what makes the certain person 'famous' or have 'star quality' from a range of materials. For example, Ariana Grande has her high pony tail, Miley Cyrus has her twerking and Ozzy Osbourne has his rounded sunglasses. This is almost seen as the artists USP.

Audiences and Institutions

Institutions typically create similar 'stars' in order to appeal to audiences and guarantee success. By sticking to trends, record companies can generate money easier. They then can further profits, by sticking to the knowledge of trends and  have unique selling point and sell different merchandise for their aimed demographic. For example rock bands such as The Rolling Stones, Guns and Roses and Nirvana, often sell T-shirts, however, for pop bands such as One Direction, Little Mix and 5 Seconds of Summer tend to stick to posters and wrist bands.

Constitutions

Each celebrity/star builds themselves up the status and popularity ladder in different ways. The way they constitute themselves will effect the end result of their popularity and 'stardom'. However they use the same principles (e.g. showing off their talent) to become stars.

Hegemony

A star originally begins as a person, then transforms into a construction. The more we see the star in the public eye and provide audiences an idea, the more we begin to believe that the person is becoming a star. This is seen as a 'culture. Due to the person becoming a star, a fanbase forms and people begin to idolise the stars. The stars will promote ideologies. People will begin to copy their 'star quality', act the same as the star, share the same beliefs as the star or even do the same things as the star. This could have a positive affect. For example Beyonce Knowles Carter spoke about feminism in her album 'Beyonce', therefore inspiring thousands of young girls to stand up and believe in feminism. However, it can at times have an opposite effect, for example artist Lana Del Rey released a song called "high by the beach" which probably ended up encouraging many young people to get involved in drugs.

Reflection Upon Year 12

Reflection Upon Year 12

Controlled Assessment:

• Where were your strength in this unit?

In last years unit, I felt that my strengths were within the planning and the editing as I consider myself as a perfectionist and a well-organised person. 

• Where were your weaknesses in this unit? What problems did you encounter during production?

This unit particularly suffered throughout the filming process. I believe that this is because as a group we had to rely on others and I was not able to control the situations during the filming. The problems I encountered was that the process of filming was harder to control as we had to rely on others who were also at the time trying to focus on their own school studies. I also had problems with spreading out the workload evenly across the group, therefore, making it more stressful for other team members to complete some vital pieces of work. I also encountered problems with the software After Effects and tried to make the "CMBC Productions' introduction look as good as possible; however we ended up keeping it as a simple 'fly in' movement due to the lack of time we had left.

                  

• How do you intend to improve upon your areas in this year's production unit? and how will you overcome these this year?

I intend to plan further ahead and plan more precisely when it comes to the production. I also would like to make sure that all the records of the filming process and paperwork beforehand is all done on time to ensure a better/higher standard of work and more time to focus on other key concepts of the controlled assessment.

                   

                 

Exam:

• What were your strengths in this unit?

In the exam I felt my strengths shone mostly through the 'Institutions and Audiences' part as I worked hard on finding the information for my case study and studied the information that I was given particularly well.

• What were your weaknesses? How do you intend to work upon your weaker areas in this years exam unit?

Last year, I believe I didn't perform best to my ability as I dedicated more of my time on other things that wouldn't matter as much in my exam and I did not ask for any extra help or work after lessons. I intend to start this year afresh and put more effort into my work as I become more and more passionate about the subject each day that goes by.

Targets:

My targets for this is to become more focused on the subject and to try and do extra work and research around the subject. I would also like to portray my work to the best of my ability and work harder as a team in team tasks.

Analysing Music Videos 3- The Male Gaze

Ariana Grande - Side To Side - Laura Mulvey's Theory

In this music video, the male gaze was obviously the main objective. From start to finish, we constantly see clips and imagery of half naked women dancing or working out which have sexual connotations. From looking at the comments on the music video, it also seems clear to the audience that this was the main focus of the video too as the top comment was exactly about how the whole video mainly focused on the half naked women.

Laura Mulvey in her theory suggests that women are "denied identity, relegating them to the status of the objects to be admired for physical appearance". She also mentions how women are now see themselves in a secondary males perspective due to the increase of popularity with the idea of the male gaze. This obviously leads to women objectifying other women, thus making it a social "norm" which is an ideology that many would frown upon and disagree with. The music video Side To Side by Ariana Grande supports Mulveys ideas and theory can be applied to the video.

Ariana Grande is seen as a well known idol to young girls in this day and age based on her feminist beliefs and her status. However the video for her latest song seems to objectify her and focuses mainly on her appearance, instead of her voice. This completely supports the Male Gaze theory. From 0:25 onwards in the video, the group of girls who seem to be 'working out' with high heels and minimal clothing, a face full of make-up and hair done to its best potentional. The focus is apparent as the women are constantly being viewed from different cuts and angles. The whipping of their hair, the camera angle from them working out from behind. This has no relation to the song and so therefore was not necessary to be in the video. This was all done purely for the male audience, however, this seems to a big focus and mechanism to lure audience in. The audience falls under this "hypnotic state" and end up forgetting about the song itself.

On the flip side, when the other artist, Nicki Minaj, is introduced into the video (2:10), she is seen surrounded by men, who are moving like dolls. This implies that she is in control men and is seen as supreme; whereas Ariana Grande looked as though she was aspiring to get the male attention. However, Nicki also supports Mulveys theory by dressing to appeal to the audience and dancing in a sexual manner.

Furthermore, the music video contains scenes of women wearing bikinis and dancing sexually in showers. Again this has no relevance to the music video, and was placed between cuts just to hoist in the male viewers. The male gaze is powerful technique which is too commonly used by artists in their videos, and Laura Mulvey's theory was completely proven right by this example.

Example Of a Star

Example of a Star

There are many different stars in this day and age, all of which have a different personality and persona. In order to gain success, it is key for the individual/group to stand out and make an impression. Richard Dyer's Star Theory believes this to be true.

OZZY OSBOURNE

       

Dress Sense and Style

Ozzy Osbourne has always been a star who has had a distinct look about him for a long period of time. He has always been known to have long hair, circular tinted glasses, and wear eyeliner. Due to his band being a heavy metal rock band, it is important that he adheres to his rock&roll persona and look the part of his band and brand. The immediate impression that we gain from Ozzy Osbourne is that he is wreckless and a bit of rebel as he stands out from the crowd and does not conform to social norms. This is all appealing to the audience as it keeps his followers guessing what Osbourne will be up to now. Keeping it exciting - what next?

Ozzy osbourne takes on his role of being a rock icon seriously. He has kept his style over the last 40+ years which signifies that this is him, he doesn't care what the outside world thinks. Osbourne has also influenced many others in past decades and still to this day has a large influence on how people dress. For example model and actress Cara Delevigne wore a very comparable typical Ozzy outfit which obviously goes through her fanbase, making a further impression to a wider audience about Ozzy's style.

Product Image and Appearance

Osbourne's image has always been tinted round glasses accompanied with dark purple/blue/red but mainly black clothing and religious or big chunky jewelry, not to mention the constant use of swear words. This links to the heavy metal genre that Ozzy is linked to, regardless the slight changes and adaptations that the genre has made, Ozzy Osbourne still fits into the stereotype of heavy metal icon today. The heavy metal genre conventions has always been linked with religious imagery which Ozzy is of course well known for. Even though most of the time the heavy metal genre has a stigma attached to it with being seen as satanic, Ozzy juxtaposes the image by wearing the cross and helping the image of his band. The chunky and staple accesory necklace adds a more 'punk effect' to his look ensuring he sticks to his unique public image.

Props

During performances Ozzy Osbourne didn't (and still doesn't) tend to use any props. He just kept his performance simple and it was usually him that was providing all the entertainment by either running round the stage topless and often intoxicated. This, in turn, makes it that much more interesting. However, after the 1982 incident, people tend to throw fake bats on stage, and Ozzy used to take pictures with fake bats too, just to make light of the incident. This obviously isn't what makes Ozzy a star according to Richard Dyers theory, however, it did bring more attention to Ozzy and that was what he was also mainly known for.

Audience and their perception

Different audiences perceive Ozzy in many different ways. Obviously due to stigma that many people have attached onto the heavy metal rock genre that Ozzy is notoriously known for,  many people didn't like him or his band Black Sabbath. People were often offended by the music or saw the genre as a cult/satanic. There was also a historic Rock incident in 1982 on tour that shocked millions people in the world that also turned many against Ozzy Osbourne. It resulted obviously in more people turning against Ozzy. On the other hand some people kept on supporting the artist and accepting his little quirks and odd behaviour. Ozzy even had his own television show with his family called "Meet the Osbourne's" which made the nation absolutely fall in love with Ozzy once again as he is hilarious and very real. Ozzy is still making an impression on todays society, even though he is no longer as big as he was before. Ozzy Osbourne is still considered a star.