Initial Research, Influences and Ideas: Inspirational Album Covers and Websites

The type of album cover and website i would like would depend on the genre of music i choose for my single. However i would still like it to be simple yet straight forward. Here are some that influenced my decision:

We Sing. We Dance. We Steal Things Album Cover (2008)

Yes! Album cover (2014)

Jason Mraz's website currently promoting Yes! album

As you can see Jason Mraz's album covers and website are both really simple. Since he is currently promoting his newly released album, Yes!, his website has the same colour schemes as the Yes! album to keep a synergistic campaign. The layout if very minimalistic, which i really like and has bold writing that still catches the audiences eye.

PTX album

Pentatonix's album cover and website is also very minimalistic. The album cover reminds of me piano keys as well the volume levels of sound on digital, subtly including that into the album cover. The colour scheme is once again being used in both website and album to keep up a known brand that their audience can relate to. I like the simplistic yet attention drawing website that is created for them.

Top of Pentatonix's website

Initial Research, Influences and Ideas: Audiences

I made a survey to give to general listeners of music to fill out. I've selected a few, which are shown down below.

After reviewing my survey results i have realised that young adult males mainly listen to electro music. This is possibly influenced by the frequently nights at clubs. Teens of ages 15-18 seem to listen to rock and pop, these are mainly the type of music on music shows.

However they all use the same medium to listen to music, the same technology; phones and ipods and computers.

Initial Research, Influences and Ideas: Influential Music Videos

I would like to make a music video that consists of both a narrative and performance. Here are some examples which have influenced my decision. A pop/rock/indie genre song would be my preference since it's easy to get into and it's also the type of music i listen to.

Ribena by Pegasus Bridge Directed by David Ellison 

Ribena is a music video that consists of 80% performance and 20% narrative. The narrative is already established at the beginning of the music video where the student is being told off by the teacher and runs off along with the others. This brings a great sense of youth and so does the bright colours used, which i really like.

There are some shots that i would like to use in my music video. This includes:

• Close ups of instruments

• Focus on band with different camera movements and framing. 

The music video is also quite humorous which i'd like to incorporate into my music video aswell. There is an inter-texual reference on 'The Breakfast Club' through the running in the corridors and the shuffling on the bench. Even the band shows that they have fun while performing

Running in corridor The Breakfast Club style

Shuffling The Breakfast Club Style

Going crazy on instruments

Drummer joining in with singing

The Beginning by ONE OK ROCK

This is a song for the live action of Rurouni Kenshin. Once again this music video is a mix between narrative and performance though it is strongly leaning towards performance. I really like the beginning of this music video, it starts off very calm and slowly zooms out of the singers face; slowly revealing the beginning of the song. Another thing i like about this video is the reference to the film it's for, there is the scene where the woman is standing staring off into the ocean in the exact way in which a character in the film down while waiting for her love to come back.

Whipping with his mic wire

The way they use the props in the music video is also very effective, along with the strong pulsing music, it adds a greater effect on the audience.

Different shots focused on singer

They also use consecutive shots of the singer but from different shots so he would be different poses.

Initial Research, Influences and Ideas: Music Industry

BBC 1 Top 10

Current Trends and Whats Selling Well

I looked at the BBC 1's top 10 charts and from that, I noticed that there is a variety of genres of music. They were all newly released singles. Some were from well known artists like Taylor Swift and The Script. The singles higher up in the charts have been in the charts for an average of 3 weeks, where as the one lower down have stayed for around 10 weeks like Nico & Vinz's 'Am I Wrong?'

Streaming music has been a big success to the music industry, because of streaming websites, the £1bn recorded music revenes in the UK in 2013 included £103m from just streaming subscriptions.
However this caused the sales of albums to fall. The overall value of album sales fell by 3.6% to £772.1m, single sales dipped 1.6% to 167.8m. This was the result of the 33.7% increase of subscription streaming  to £103m in 2013.

Gaps in the Market

In the music industry, there is a variety of artists. Many of the most successful ones are of the genres Pop and Rock, mainly male bands; these include One Direction, Arctic Monkeys, Maroon 5 and many more. The gap in the market would be female artists and indie artists.

Recently, Taylor Swift has been very successful with her music earning about $40,000,000 in 2013. Even now she's still hitting the charts with her new single 'Shake It Off'. Taylor Swift is not the only increasingly popular female artist, Meghan Trainor has suddenly become quite well known due to her song 'All About That Bass'.

As for indie artists, more and more people have started listening to them. 'Hipster' is a term used for the fans that listen to indie music and they tend to look for things that are trending or that will become a trend. An example of a recently uprising indie/acoustic artist is Passenger. After his release of 'Let Her Go', his musical talents have been recognised by others and his name has become more well known.

There are still many gaps in the market waiting to be filled but so far the ones that need to be filled are female indie/acoustic artists.

Initial Research, Influences and Ideas: Suitable Tracks

After looking at some tracks, I've come up with a few songs that I think are fairly suitable to make a music video for. These include:

Outside by My Body Sings Electric

I chose decided  songs to be suitable due to the upbeat tune. Since i wanted to make a music video that includes both performance and narrative and i could imagine part of the music video being recorded in the studio with the band. The theme is about a man trying to convince a woman he likes her and it'll be all fine, as shown from these quotes: 'We'll act on love, we'll be just fine' 'but i need you to understand'. 

Lyrics are here for further analysis if used

Monsters by Katie Sky

This song has a really song theme of making everything better. I chose this song because we could make use of lyrics to subtly but literally act them out. 'I see your monsters' 'I'll chase them away'. I think it would be quite fun to make a music video for this as well.

Lyrics are here for further analysis if used

Initial Research, Influences and Ideas: Record Labels

Top 3 Record Labels in the Music Industry:

There are 3 major record labels that overrule the music industry. This includes:

Sony's Sony Music

Universal's Universal Music Group

Warner Bros' Warner Music Group

Since these three record labels are so big, the genres that they cover are in a huge variety so they have a wider audience to target. They are all also able to promote their artists in the entertainment industry since they have a big connection with their main companies(Sony, Universal and Warner's Bros).

Looking more closely at the brief, i researched the independent record labels based in the UK.

XL Recordings:

XL Recordings was established in 1989 as an independent British record label. They have a variety of genres that they work with including electro(The Prodigy), alternative(Radiohead) as well as hip pop(Dizzie Rascal) and many more.

Odd Child Recordings:

Odd Child Recordings is a UK based vanity record label owned by Simon Cowell's record label, Syco. This label was founded by the artist Labrinth in 201. The genres that it supports include soul, R&B, trap and dubstep.

Domino:

Domino is an independent record label founded in South West London in 1993. It produces music of the genres indie pop and rock, an example is the very popular Arctic Monkeys.

My Music Consumption

Music is involved in my daily lifestyle. Every time I go out I would listen to music to make myself feel accompanied; when I'm at home by myself, I would play music out loud and sometimes when ~I can't get to sleep, I would listen to calming music to make me relax. Especially since i have a Spotify account it's easy to listen to any songs on demand without having to go through the efforts of downloading music. I own a few albums but I generally only listen to music video Spotify or Youtube.
I don't really tend to listen to music with my friends before within my friendship group, I have a different taste to them, though we do listen to some of the same music, but I tend to listen to it when I'm by myself. I mainly listen to pop rock, but I have a wide range of music that I also enjoy. Sometimes I listen to Japanese and Korean music, they tend to have quite quirky music videos. Whenever I listen to music, it tends to make me feel calm and relaxed. Sometimes it cheers me up, sometimes it makes me feel really nostalgic of memories, but most of the time, it keeps me company. Everyone nowadays are more antisocial because they have their headphones in on public transport listening to their daily playlist.

One Track From My Childhood

Whenever my family would drive around in the car at night, my mum would put this song on, it would really calm me put me to sleep. My music taste from my childhood was mainly based of what my family would listen to, especially my mum since she had an interest in english music like Celine Dion, she would buy their CDs and have them playing in the car.

One From My Early Teens

Jason Mraz is one of my favourite artists, this is the first song that i ever heard by Jason and i've been in love with his music since.

One That Means A Lot To Me

It's hard trying to find one song that means a lot to me, i have quite a few songs that mean a lot to me. This song actually helped me get close to someone special to me, without this song i probably wouldn't get to know such a wonderful person. Since we didn't listen to many similar things, this band was one of few that we both listened to. Unfortunately the band has disbanded which is very upsetting.

When i was young i was very influenced by the charts and by my surroundings, but now I tend to listen around the music I already enjoy, mainly indie pop rock, but when I'm watch TV or if I hear a song I like outside, I would look it up online and possibly start listening to it.