What Is A Music Video - Miss Miller.

MAGIC! - Rude 

A music video is defined as a short film integrating a song and imagery. the majority of modern music videos are used as a marketing tool with the aim of promoting the artist and song. This is evident within MAGICS Rude as the video has clearly been created to publicise the artist as this is their debut single therefore they want the audience to remember the artist. To achieve this they frequently show the a artist make it evidently clear who is preforming the song.  Another purpose of this video is to help build a relationship between the artist and their target audience. A artist would look to achieve this because it would mean that they would create a specific fan base who continue to buy their music as they have formed a bond with the artist. This would be extremely important for a brand new artist, such as MAGIC, as they need to immediately create a audience who will buy their music. To build this relationship with the audience the singer is shown to be repeatedly rejected by the father of a girl he wishes to marry, this causes the audience to sympathise with the artist and makes him endearing.

This video has two main styles performance and narrative. It is referred to as narrative based as the video follows a storyline in which the lead singer is asking for permission from a father to marry his daughter and keeps getting denied but despite this he persists and asked her anyway. But within this narrative there is also a performance element in which the artist can be seen singing during the narrative scenes and also separate, performance only scenes, in which the whole band is playing their instruments. I believe that the artist used this particular style of music video because the narrative keeps the audience enticed  as well as linking to the lyrics of the song, and the performance based element links to Goodwins theory and makes it evident who is performing the song. The narrative style also helps the audience form a relationship with the artist as this particular narrative always the audience to feel sympathetic towards the artist and maybe even relate to him. These use of styles is conventional to the 'pop' genre in which this song belongs to because this genre appeals to a young audience and the narrative which features within this video is rather basic and easy for the young audience to understand. The performance based element also keeps them entertained and they become familiar and recognise the artist. Cinematography plays a huge role in showing the main performance based section as a long shot is frequently used to show the band performing. A long shot is used because it successfully shows the whole band performing as it has to be far away to show both guitar players, the singer and the drummer within one shot. It also makes it look as if you are a fan in the crowd and you are watching them perform live on a stage as they are positioned as though they are performing and thats how far you might be sitting when watching them perform. 

The genre of this particular song is rather unclear as it belongs to the pop genre but is heavy influenced by the reggae fusion genre which MAGIC are known for. This made this video very hard to create because they had to acknowledge the codes and conventions of both these genres and either conform to them or challenge them. I believe that this video challenges the conventions of the pop genre because they're videos are still heavily influenced by the reggae fusion genre. I think that this video challenges many conventions of the pop genre because usually videos within the pop genre have a happy and cheerful message but within this video the narrative expresses a contrasting message because this video shows a the lead singer repeatedly getting told that he doesn't have permission to marry this mans daughter, which portrays a rather dark depressing message. The fact that the narrative follows this particular storyline is also rather unconventional to the dance genre because the pop genre has a target audience of young children and therefore they have no knowledge of mature issues such as marriage and therefore may be rather uninterested in the video because they don't understand it. Despite this, this video does follow some conventions of the pop genre as songs and videos within the pop genre are usually based around love and this video does evidently follow this convention as it is based around love but contrasting to this pop love songs usually have a more happy perspective on love unlike this particular video. Another convention which they have challenged is the micro element of costume. Within the video the focal character and lead singer can be seen wearing very casual clothing during the majority of the video, this casual clothing is also replicated by the other three members of the band. This specific type of clothing is unconventional to the dance genre because stereotypically within this genre the artist wears big, flashy clothing which has numerous bright colours on it and looks rather expensive. This contrasts the costume seen within this video as the artist can be seen wearing dark skinny jeans, a leather jacket and a t shirt which is a very basic outfit and also mainly black. The artist may of chosen to  challenge this convention because it helps form a relationship with the audience as they can replicate that outfit and maybe even already have it which means that the artist is presented as just a normal person, unlike other conventional pop artists who wear costumes which their target audience cannot afford and replicate. 

When releasing content artists usually target a specific audience, this is because they can then directly appeal to a set audience consistently if they recognise a audience and manipulate the video to ensure that it appeals to this audience. This video is no different as it also targets a specific audience; this particular video targets the mainstream audience of 5-18 year olds who are mainly girls and fans of the pop genre. To appeal to this specific audience MAGIC had to use numerous elements to ensure that the audience remain interested in the video and they enjoy it. One of the elements which was key within this video in doing this is the performance based part of the video, this specific style of video appeals to this target audience because it has more of a happy and cheerful feel when they seem them performing. It also means that they don't have to be following the depressing narrative and can instead just be enjoying them performing. Another element which is used to appeal to their target audience is editing; this video uses a specific form of editing in which the screen shrinks slightly and becomes slightly blurred, with a specific filter and then it cuts in and out with numerous blotches on the screen. This creates the effect that it has been filmed along time ago because it looks as if the camera is of poor quality and is slightly damaged. This specific type of editing appeals to MAGICS target audience because it looks as if the artists have filmed it and are reminiscing upon good memories. This is appealing to this specific group of people because looking at the artists good memories makes the video seem more happy and joyful with positive energy which is what a younger audience enjoys.

This research into what a music video is will help me a lot when planning my own music video because i now recognise what the purpose of a music video is and therefore i can aim to achieve this purpose. It has also helped me understand how i can achieve this purpose as i have much more knowledge on how to target a specific target market and how i can use the codes and conventions of a genre to appeal to this target market.