iTunes is likely to be the main distributor however other stores would be used. An artist website would be likely to be used to promote the music, production, video and tours and therefore the video would most likely feature here. Hard copies of the album would not likely be funded as with modern technology the album is far more likely to be sold online. The music video would feature on YouTube as well as any advertisements for the video prior to similar music videos. Television channels are likely to promote the album, where as chart show and music television are more likely to promote the music video itself. _____________________________________________________________
I decided to look into the cultural responses to the music video 'Born Free' by MIA
I know that this music video caused a lot of controversy due to it's strong cultural message and so I conducted some research into the messages behind the video and how people reacted to this video.
The music video above is a violent, short-film style video for the promotion of MIA's single 'Born Free'. The main story line features policemen conducting raids on a run-down block of flats, looking for young men with ginger hair only. These men are violently captured against their will and put in buses to be taken away. The red-headed men, including young boys are then brought on the buses to a desert, and told to run for their lives into the sunset over bombs that are underground.
Unsurprisingly, there was a rather shocked response to the out-right violence featured in this video and it was removed from YouTube the same day as it was released, reinstated with an age restriction. However, a few days later it got taken down 'for good' however later re-appeared under the age constraints. The video featured scenes of nudity and brutality. Although the message and general idea behind this story is very relevant and viable, it breached the terms and condition about levels of violence.
MIA said that it was not an attack on a particular political situation, and the idea of the video relates to a lot of real situations of conflict, war, and ethnic cleansing. It sparked emotions online as it was said to have a lot of political resonances to things like Guantanamo, Iraq, and the Taliban. The video cleverly doesn't feature one ethnic group being rounded up and instead uses hair colour to distinguish between people and decide their fate - which is very relatable, powerful and moving to watch as it highlights the unacceptable and violent behaviour in real life situations that are a reality.
However, the controversy was that this video was released at the same time the law was proposed in Arizona that the police could detain anyone suspected of being an illegal immigrant. Therefore, not only did the violence cause controversy, this also sparked heat among news organisations and politicians who saw this as a direct response.
This video caused a lot of shocked responses due to the violence and brutality conveyed by the footage. We therefore need to ensure in our music video that we don't relate any of the material to cultural issues and debates, as the response is questionable. We are confident in our production that it will not cause any offense, however we need to ensure that we do not make any in-deliberate references or gestures to any cultural, political or lifestyle issues in order to be safe.
Having already addressed the cultural issues that surround music videos, I thought it would be best to look into feminism, and how music can influence feminist responses. In order to do this, I analysed the record-breaking music video 'Wrecking Ball' by Miley Cryus.
This video was released by Miley Cryus, and within the first 24 hours of it's released it exceeded views of 38,000,000 views. The music video begins showing an close-up shot of Miley crying into the camera, questionably reflecting her emotions about her current relationship that is speculated to be rocky. Then, the music video suddenly moves to show a very literal demonstration of her lyrics. The dominant props on the video are the 'wrecking ball' and also the walls being demolished in the background; reasonably relating to the title of the song. However, the controversy is introduced when Miley sits in various states of undress, and at some points completely nude on this 'wrecking ball'.
The video heavily symbolises objectification and sexualisation, her emotions and behaviour are being controlled by a male, which says something in itself. She is portrayed as weak, and defenseless. Miley herself is not a bad singer, so the reasons behind why she feels like she has to get completely naked are not evident.
Miley has come forward and tried to defend her actions in the video, claiming several pragmatics behind her actions on camera. However, this video struck up a negative feminist response. video became most viewed video on YouTube in only 13 hours, so what does this say about the sexualisation and objectification of females? It is questionable whether this video was so popular and successful because of the nudity and sexual themes promoted by Miley, or because of the song itself. If this video is successful because of things like the nudity it features, this sends out a very negative message to young girls and women. Miley is basically promoting the idea that for young women to be noticed and be successful they have to sexually objectify themselves - and in this case it appears to have worked.
This poses a huge worry for feminists, as she is not gaining respect from men, is represented as inferior and is successful because of the way she sexually objectifies herself not because of her music abilities or knowledge.
In our video therefore, it is important that we represent both males and females in an equal manner and give them equal power in their relationship as not to suggest dominance and control on a high level by either gender. We need to make sure that both the male and female characters are shown to have the same levels of control at different points in the video. This could be an issue we need to address in our video as the female is represented as quite vulnerable and the male has power over her, however we feel that by in the end the female walking away from the male and the male being pictured in a negative light, this will equalise this power between them as well as reflecting reality.
We have planned in our filming for the use of the 'male gaze', and although this is argued to oppose feminist views, we will make sure that it is put into context within the story line and so it is clear what is going on and the female character isn't pictured as inferior in any way.
Laura Mulvey who invented the 'Male Gaze' concept
The 'male gaze' is a concept proposed by Laura Mulvey. She suggested that the male gaze occours when the camera is centered around a sexual/attractive feature of a females body. This objectifies and degrades woman to a certain extent, and so although we are using it to make certain themes and feelings obvious to the audience, we need to make sure it is within context and not on a frequent level.
_________________________________________________________________ KEY Each colour text corresponds to a location The blue text indicates areas shot on Brighton Beach The purpletext indicates shots located in and around the house/local area (Burton Latimer) Thepinktext indicates shots located at the party/club 00:00-00:04: Panning shot of locations e.g. beach 00:04-00:20: On the beach, introducing characters
00:04-00:08 introducing bella
00:08-00:12 introducing lee
00:12-00:16 Bella crying
00:16-00:20 Lee looking sad
00:20-00:35: group shots
00:20-00:25 waking up and packing
00:25-00:30 packing the car
00:30-00:35 motion scenes in the car - outside and inside
00:35-00:42: Bella singing up until 'never want it to go'
00:42-00:47: Nice gesture from lee to Bella
00:47-00:50: Opening door to flowers on doorstep
00:50-00:58: Car
00:50-00:54 hand on gearstick
00:54-00:58 Bella singing into the mirror
00:58-1:00: Clock Scene 'hungry for what was to come'
1:00-1:04: Bella singing on the beach 'now I'm longing for the way I was'
1:04-1:08: Pulling up to the beach
1:08-1:12: Shot of the beach
1:12-1:16: Getting the stuff out of the car
1:16-1:20: Casual beach shots
1:20-1:28: Argument leading up to lyric 'if your love isn't strong'
1:28-1:35: Back to back scenes: sitting back to back and Lee looks at another girl
1:35-1:58: Crowd shots, slow motion dancing and general party environment
1:58-2:20: Looking across the room, Lee is flirting with other girls, Bella storms out
2:20-2:28: Walking along the A14 Bridge - focus on the traffic - cars slow motion
2:28-2:36: Shots of Lee
2:36-2:44: depth of field shot of Bella walking behind Lee
2:44-2:51: Early morning bed shot, Bella gets out, from above, white bed sheets
2:51-3:06
2:51-2:56: Holding hands shot, played in reverse (editing)
2:56-3:06: Bella singing 'say you'll save me'
3:07-3:14: Shots of Bella looking sad/depressed in different places
3:14-3:21: Carousel setting/cafe Lee choses not to sit next to Bella
3:21-3:24: Really fast flicking between scenes
3:24-3:29: ^ this carries on with Bella faded on top singing
3:29-3:36: Bella dancing on her own in the middle of the crowd/people
3:36-3:42: Bella arguing on the street with Lee
3:42-3:49: Bella on the beach singing up to 'would it ever be enough'
3:49-3:59: Bella confiding in somebody else, Lee sitting on his own
3:59-4:06: Bella and lee holding hands walking forward, zoom into hands and play 2nd half backwards (editing)
4:06-4:14: Bella walking away on the beach, panning shot to reveal lee
4:14-4:23: Bella's crying shot played in reverse (in slow motion) so that the tears go up - she has been saved by walking away.
_________________________________________________________________ This following is information and feedback from the tutorial that has taken place with teachers this week:
Our storyboards are strong and varied, now we need to begin work on a shot list
We should begin research into ancillary tasks
we need more research on external factors of music videos e.g. feminism and culture
We made this video detailing a time line of the most important events we thought contributed to music videos as we know them today. This is important research as it enabled us to find out the key aspects of a music video and how they developed. This would therefore indicate what features of a music video are most important and also it gives us a background knowledge to the subject we are working with which is important to making a successful music video.
I think that it is important for
us as a group to focus on the shot-list and storyboard aspects of this action
plan and prioritise them as they are necessary and essential in order for
filming to begin. We therefore decided that in the next week we will create a
storyboard detailing each second of the music video to be as prepared and
organised for filming as we can be and this will hopefully reflect in the
quality and quantity of footage we collect.
Here is an updated upload of the track we are using for the production of our music video. It is considerably shorter in time but we feel that this wont hinder our production, it will instead enable us to enhance the quality of footage we get as we no longer have 5 minutes of footage to collect. Also as you can hear, the flow of the song has not been noticeably interrupted due to the precision of the cutting...
The original track ‘Don’t Save Me’ by HAIM was 5 and a half
minutes long. As a group we decided that this amount of footage would be
unrealistic to collect and edit to a good standard within the time frame given.
Also, we noticed that a lot of the lyrics were repeated and so cutting them out
would not hinder the meaning or message of the song and our storyline would
still fit effectively if we were to cut them out. Therefore we decided that
this was the best option, and went about cutting the music clip down in various
places using Final Cut Pro. In the end we cut around 50 seconds of music out of
the video, but we made sure that the flow of the music was not disturbed and
the areas that were cut were not noticeable.
Here is the music track being cut in Final Cut Pro
