How Youtube has globalised the importance of music videos.

Founded in 2005, by Steve Chen, Chad Hurley, Jawed Karim, Youtube has been the biggest development of the internet to hugely increase the importance of Music Videos to the global chart success of all Artists.
The invention and globalisation of Youtube has meant anyone around the world with internet access can view all videos put onto the website, making music videos almost compulsory to the sucess of a song. Songs gaining  Top 5 chart positions generally gain youtube hit/views of over 30,000,000 in the first year of release, a high indication of the globalisation effect youtube has for Music Artists around the world.

With the development of activities and tools on the website, such as the 'like' and 'dislike' button, as well as the 'favouriting' button, artists relasing music videos through Youtube can get a fair indication of how successful the song and music video is or will be.

With Youtube having many links to most social networking sites; Facebook, Twitter, Bebo, the instant a music video is uploaded to youtube it can be shared on all the listed social networking sites within minutes, making it promoted with the target audiences imediately after release, unlike previously when music fans had to wait for a song to be played on radio or music television channels.

Video Analysis of Jessie J - Who You Are.

Who You Are - Jessie J.

Jessie J is a fairly new recording artist who has had chart success since 2009, and is signed to Island Records, although she was previously signed to an independent record label. She is known for writing most of her songs, having strong lyrical meanings; which comes across strongly in this song/video. The genre of her music is categorized under Pop music, with several of her songs being dance/ electro-pop tracks.

‘Who you are’ was written by Jessie and produced by Tony Gad, the lyrical meaning of the song is based on a trip she had to Los Angeles when she was sent by her record label  to many different producers and song writers and lost some control over her own music. The lyrics ‘don’t lose who you are in the blur of the stars’ relates to her feeling of not wanting to loose he own style and who she is through success of her music; wanting to remain grounded.

 The first shot of the video is a medium close up shot of the artist; it is also an establishing shot of the bedroom, the only location used for all of the shots in the video. The gesture of the performer is looking down, expressing a sad mood, which straight away conveys the tone and mood of the song and lyrics.

The pace and editing of the video starts slow, keeping the same pace as the song with longer time between shot changes; The focus of the camera is still, and the shot size stays on a mid-shot of the performer- where she is communicating the emotion of the song through direct eye contact with the camera. The artist uses lip synching for the majority of shots throughout the video, matching it with the slow pace of the song: The movement of the performer is also edited with slow motion effect on several shots. However, as the pace and beat gradually builds up in the song, the wind starts creating activity in the background, that has been still for the previous duration of the video. The Artist continues singing with the shot size remaining on a medium close up, as there is movement in the background of the shot.

The shot then changes to a long shot of the artist sat on the bed cross legged; this gesture/posture conveys the vulnerability in the song even from a long distance. The lighting throughout the video is a dim, light that conveys a calm atmosphere; the source of the light appears to be from a bedside lamp, as this the only light source in the long shot. The shot then cuts back to a mid-shot, with the artist back at the desk. There is no continuity editing and as the pace of the song increases fast pace editing is used with several reverse shots; from mid-shot to close up and reversing shots, which continues for the chorus. As the pace of the song reaches it height, the camera cuts to several long shots of the artist sat at different places in the location (the bedroom), the camera cuts from a close up of the artist to a pan slowly left to a long shot of the artist sat against a worktop/shelf, again not using any continuity editing.

The way in which the concept of the video is very simple and uses mostly medium close ups, is an idea that has influenced my own ideas, as it enables the video to convey the tone of the song well.

Possible Song's for video

Although i am unsure yet of the music i will use for my video, i have several possible songs i may use. I highlighted the lyrics that i think have strong imagery and culd give me ideas for my video if i choose one of the songs.

 i am considering using is Nicola Roberts - Take a bite.. I think the lyrics have aa strong messgae and create bold imagery which would be effective in a music video. As the song has no video it would give me an advantage to creating an origional video, so this is a possible song choice for my video.

NICOLA ROBERTS - TAKE A BITE

You always seem to want to take a pop
Like a bully by the corner shop
All over me like a polka dot
You treat me like someone I'm not

I'm gonna blow up, I'm gonna blow up
Do you enjoy winding me up?
I'm gonna blow up, I'm gonna blow up
I'm gonna blow up, I'm gonna blow up

Get your teeth round this open wide
Eyes bigger than your belly tonight
If you think you're hard take a bite

You push and push and push, pushed me to fight
Everybody's got a limit alright
So put 'em up, put 'em up, take a bite

Just because you're twice the size of me
Doesn't mean I'm scared of World War III
Sit back and grab a cup of tea
I'm gonna kick your arse now in 3D

I'm gonna blow up, I'm gonna blow up
I'm asking pretty please
I'm gonna blow up, I'm gonna blow up
I'm gonna blow up, I'm gonna blow up [ Lyrics from: http://www.lyricsfreak.com/n/nicola+roberts/take+a+bite_20976127.html ]
Get your teeth round this open wide
Eyes bigger than your belly tonight
If you think you're hard take a bite

You push and push and push, pushed me to fight
Everybody's got a limit alright
So put 'em up, put 'em up, take a bite

La la la la la la la la la

So I was just a shy girl from Halton Brook
I'd always write all my dreams down in my story book
We didn't have many pennies, used to sit round the telly
Never been wrapped up in the way I look

So when I got down to London, had the press on my case
Coz I didn't walk round with a smile on my face
Called me a rude ginger b*tch and say I bought bigger tits
They're gonna eat all their words, they're talking absolute shit

Get your teeth round this open wide
Eyes bigger than your belly tonight
If you think you're hard take a bite

You push and push and push, pushed me to fight
Everybody's got a limit alright
So put 'em up, put 'em up, take a bite

History of Music Videos

The evolution of music video production, technologies and the industry have progressed through several stages since the first signs of the music/industry started in the mid 1800’s; Illustrated songs, Talkies, Soundies, Musical Shorts, Musical Film, Extended narrative Videos and Music Videos.

In 1894, Edward Marks and Joe Stern, Music publishers for ‘Sheet Music’ hired an electrician and several performers to promote their song ‘The Little Lost Child’. George Thomas, projected several stages of still images onto a screen by using a magic lantern to create a ‘live’ playing effect. This was the first step towards music production, as illustrated songs then developed into Musical Short Films, also known as talkies, in the mid 1920’s, which were often six minutes long. They featured vocalists, bands, and dancers. The first example of this is Spooney Melodies, released in 1930, which is known as the first ‘Musical Video Series.’

Music in the 30’s was not a part of a large industry, artists didn’t have a strong fan-base, although records were produced and consumed. The music industry began to come to life during the development of narrative films in the 50’swith videos such as Bill Haley’s ‘Rock Around The Clock’ in 1955. One of the most influential artists of Music as a phenomenon was Elvis, who played a character in his narrative videos, and became a huge musical success, influencing the start of Rock ‘n’ Roll as a global genre, in the late 50s/ Early 60s.

A large development to the music industry was the start of Radio 1 in 1967. Radio 1 became a milestone in the development of music videos, (along with the start of MTV in 1981) as they created a base for audiences to hear new music and hugely benefited artists in the promotion of their music releases. The 60’s become one of the most influential periods to the music industry, with the start of Rock n Roll, Radio stations, and significantly the development of manufactured pop stars. The music industry became controlled, as artists were no longer writing their own songs, and being manufactured by professionals. They were used as the ‘image’ of the music and only performed the music produced for them. This was to create artist that ‘fitted’ with the genres that were most popular top the industry at the time. This created the first real signs of a fan-base following. The largest indicator of this, in the 1960’s was The Beatles, who became a global phenomenon, with mass following. This meant their narrative films were heavily pressured to be trend setting, influencing the importance of narrative films for promotion of songs.

As a band that were not manufactured or controlled, The Beatles wrote and produced all their own music, they also broke the conventions of narrative performance films as they chose not to perform as a character, like artists such as Elvis did, but instead played themselves as performers, in films such as ‘A hard day’s night’.

This broke the barriers between artists and audiences as fans could relate to them, and created a direct relationship between the two institutions, and the Beatles became focused don targeting and appealing to a large Teenage based audience. As they gathered global successful, their narrative performance films began being showed in cinema screenings as concerts were not frequent and many people could not get to see them perform live, and therefor relied on their films. 

By the late 1960’s, colour began being used as a feature in music films. The Beatles, having had massive success could afford to film in colour and filmed their narrative 1965 narrative performance video ‘help’ in colour. Although the film was performance base like the Beatles always did, there was camera editing, a lack of continuity editing and a montage feature was used to make thee film advanced and slightly ‘unrealistic’/ abstract effect.

The technicality of editing in the short music films became more advanced with elements of abstract editing and concepts. As the 70’s came around, music videos further revolved with the use of lighting effects. David Bowie’s video in 1972 used red lighting and on –screen effects to create a ‘futuristic’ theme to the video and song.

In 1975, Queens ‘Bohemian Rhapsody’ spent 9 weeks at number 1, as has been classed as the first real and successful Music Video. They fitted an operatic theme in the song with the video, with the use of lighting, close up shots, smoke, lower angles to make them appear powerful and overlapping/fading scenes. 

Taking a further leap, the 1980’s saw the global success of bands such as ‘Wham’, who introduced the concept of narcissism and voyeurism, and the image of a’ million dollar lifestyle’ all of which were portrayed in ‘Club Tropicana’, influencing more music videos to promote the ‘Hollywood lifestyle’.

By the time of the late 80’’s the videos had become significantly important, if not more important than the song to the success of the artists, as it became more clear how global success was achieved through video promotion, and artists became reliant on their music videos.

In the 90’s however, music videos began breaking the rules of ‘safe’ videos and sexuality and religious opinions and beliefs were portrayed by the artists. An example of this is George Michaels ‘Sleighhammer’ in 1986 and REM’s ‘Losing my religion’ in the early 90’s.

As music videos moved into the 21st century and pop/ r&b music became ‘the’ popular genre, the technologies for creating advanced and technical videos became more accessible and special effects (slow motion, swipe screens, advanced lighting effects, etc.) were used by the majority of artists. By this point, music videos were being played no longer on only MTV, but several other music television channels - throughout the days, which began to make music videos heavily influential to the global success of the artists and the overall chart positions/success of the songs.

Brief Specification

I will produce a promotional package for the release of an album, creating a new identity/branding for an original artist or band, which will include a music promo video. It will also include a cover for it's release as part of a Digipak, along with a magazine advertisement for the Digipak.