Vernallis analysis - Arcade Fire The Suburbs

          

Record Label - Polydor

The chosen Record Label for my artiste is Polydor Records as I believe that my artist is well suited to it, through its calibre of artists it is clear that they are able to work with people from all different types of genres and styles of music. Polydor Records is a British record label that is under Universal Music Group. It currently operates as a front-line label under the Interscope Geffen A&M label, which distributes Polydor's releases in the United States. The label’s current artists include similar artists to my artist Liberty such as: Duffy, Skylar Grey, Kate Nash and of course Lana Del Rey; proving it would be a great match.

Email to copyright holder

Dear Copyright Holder,


 I am writing to you today to request permission to use Carmen in my upcoming A-Level coursework. The track I want to use is the 4th track from the successful album Born To Die. With your permission this track would only be used in my A-Level media project, which involves myself creating a video and a magazine for the artist. I do not seek to any financial gain from this at all, as already stated it is only for personal education use. The song would only be released to the rest of my class, the OCR exam board and my media teachers. The artist and company would of course be fully recognized and given full credit throughout pre-production and in the final video itself. A copyright notice, with wording supplied by yourself can be included in the final records of this project.

 Yours faithfully,

Rhianna Biggs

Lana Del Rey- Carmen lyric analysis

Darlin', darlin'

Doesn't have a problem

Lyin' to herself

Cos her liquor's top shelf

It's alarming, honestly,

How charming she can be

Fooling everyone

Telling them she's having fun

She says, "You don't want to be

like me, don't want to see all

the things I've seen"

I'm dyin', I'm dyin'

She says, "You don't want to

get this way, famous and dumb

at an early age"

Lyin', I'm lyin'

The boys, the girls,

They all like Carmen

She gives them butterflies

Bats her cartoon eyes

She laughs like God

Her mind's like a diamond

Audiotune lies

She's still shinin'

Like lighting

White lightning

Carmen, Carmen

Staying up till morning

Only 17 but she walks the

streets so mean

It's alarming truly

How disarming you can be

Eatin' soft ice cream

Coney Island queen

She says, "You don't want to

be like me, lookin' for fun,

gettin' high for free"

I'm dyin', I'm dyin'

She says, "You don't want to

get this way, street walk at

night and a star by day"

It's tirin', tirin'

The boys, the girls,

They all like Carmen

She gives them butterflies

Bats her cartoon eyes

She laughs like God

Her mind's like a diamond

Audiotune lies

She's still shinin'

Like lighting

White lightning

Baby's all dressed up with

nowhere to go

That's the little story of the

girl you know

Relying on the kindness of 

strangers

Tying cherry knots

Smiling, doing party favours

Put your red dress on, put your

lipstick on

Sing your song, song, now the

camera's on

And you're alive again

The boys, the girls,

They all like Carmen

She gives them butterflies

Bats her cartoon eyes

She laughs like God

Her mind's like a diamond

Audiotune lies

She's still shinin'

Like lighting

White lightning

Darlin', Darlin'

Doesn't have a problem

Lyin' to herself

Cos her liquor's top shelf

This song is quite autobiographical as it tells the tale of the struggles that Lana went through as a young girl, Carmen is actually Lana.

"Darling, darling, doesn't have a problem. Lying to herself cause her liquors top shelf." She thinks that she's completely fine and that she has no addiction but in reality she's addicted to alcohol and needs help.

"It's alarming honestly how charming she can be, fooling everyone telling them she's having fun." Everyone thinks how she's that girl who's never upset and how shes always having a good time when Lana actually feels depressed and sad about how bad her life has gotten.

"She says you don't wanna get this way, famous but dumb at an early age."
Lana got addicted to alcohol at the age of 14 ("dumb at an early age"), got sent to boarding school to fix her addiction, then she ran away and technically lived on the streets. Everyone knew who she was because she would do whatever she could for money even prostitute herself sometimes.

"Buy her tonight, she's still shining like lighting."
I think this is the part when she prostituted herself. She's saying how people should buy her for the night while she's there .

"She says you don't wanna get this way, street walk at night but a star by day."
This is another part when she talks about how she sold her self as a prostitute at a young age.

"Babys all dressed up with nowhere to go, that's the little story of the girl you know." In this quote I feel like she's always looking for a party to go to and spend her time somewhere or the fact that she's walking on the streets all dressed up waiting for someone to buy her for the night.

"Relying on the kindness of strangers."
She hopes that someone would be nice to her and help her get her life back on track or give her some money so she can support herself. It's like a perspective from a homeless person kind of thing. 


"Tying cherry knots smiling doing party favors. Put your red dress on, put your lip stick on." Being able to tie a cherry stem into a knot is a sign of being a good kisser. Lana is saying how she's doing party favors probably such as hooking up with people and doing sexual acts or drugs for the money. Then she says how she's putting on her red dress and her lipstick, here she is saying how she's ready to go out and sell herself again or do whatever she can to get money.

"Mon amour, je sais que tu m'aimes aussi
Tu as besion de moi
Tu as besion de moi dans ta vie 
Tu ne peux plus vivre sans moi
Et je mourrais sans toi
Je tuerais pour toi."

Translation: “My love, I know that you love me too.
You need me, you need me in your life.
You can’t live without me
And I’d die without you.
I’d kill for you.”

Here she is talking about her addiction to alcohol and how much she craves it in her life and how she can't live without it.

The Female Gaze - Laura Mulvey

Is there a ‘Female Gaze?’

There is no secret that women are constantly being the object of desire through the use of voyeurism in music videos, however, it appears that males are slso experiencing it, suggesting that perhaps there is a 'female gaze’. For an example of how the male gaze exists within music videos I analysed “Anaconda by Nicki Minaj, I have found a contrasting music video from another artist which instead promotes female gazes. A key difference I noticed between how Nicki was presented in “Anaconda” when she was the subject of voyeurism and how the D'Angelo was presented in “How Does It Feel” was that females are presented as exclusively sexually whereas when a male is the subject of the female gaze he is presented sexually but in a strong and masculine way. This could reflect how women see men as more then just sexual objects and the natural gentle female nature, therefore that is also expressed through the female gaze.

 “How Does It Feel” – D'Angelo  

                        



Instead of a variety of locations and shots to keep the audience entertained, D'Angelo is highly sexualised to become an engaging piece of entertainment for the audience members to focus on. We watch him as he stands in front of a black screen and through the positioning of the camera the audience are forced to be taken in by it and by the art of voyeurism the audience both male and female are completely satisfied with the video despite a lack of narrative and contrasting shots.

 1) This video starts of with a very slow reveal of the artist through the use of extreme close ups, we are first introduced to the artists eyes, which are closed these aspects within this shot show the realism of the female gaze as if this was a video that  incorporated the "male gaze" the first shot would most likely be off a females body parts (breasts, but etc.)

 2) This extreme close-up was one of the most sexual images of this artist throughout the music video. The fact that this relitively moderate shot was the peak of the male’s sexual representation suggests that the female gaze is a lot more subtle then the male gaze. Although it is just of his mouth he is now sexually captivating the audience in the way that usually is the role of the female. 

3) Just like within the notion of the male gaze when the camera lingers on the female shape, in this close-up shot the camera is drawing attention to the male shape. Broad shoulders and a muscular upper body are symbols of the male body just as wide hips and a narrow waist are associated with the female shape, by focusing on these two masculine traits the video forces the audience to view the video through the eyes of a hetrosexual woman, telling the viewer to play close attention to the male body.

4) This last shot definitely suggests that there is a "female gaze" as the artist is completely naked and the camera movement is almost teasing the audience as it stops tilting just when it gets to this position, putting the audience in a position of a heterosexual female.







Here is a collection of album covers that would appeal to a female audience as they have sexualised men. However, through these images the male artists are shown as very strong and powerful as well as sexual unlike their female counterparts who just look like sexual objects whose only purpose is to satisfy their male audience.

The Male Gaze - Laura Mulvey

What is the "Male Gaze"?

The male gaze is a theory first introduced by Laura Mulvey. The expression refers to how the audience of a film is forced to ‘view’ characters through the eyes of a hetrosexual male. Features of the male gaze include a cameras focus on the shape or curves of a woman, imitating the wondering eyes of a captivated hetrosexual man, women being presented as objects of desire and either through narrative or camera shots in terms of angles etc being portrayed as inferior. Although Mulvey's theory was based on films, the idea of the male gaze and voyeurism can also be found in many music videos, particularly within the Hip-Hop/R&B genre where women are seen as sexual objects. An example of how the male gaze is evident within female rap artists Nicki Minaj“Anaconda.”

           







Here is a prime example of the "Male Gaze" at large. This is Nicki Minaj's single cover for her latest song "Anaconda."


















The videos narrative completely supports the male gaze and the notion of looking. Despite Nicki Minaj being the main artist in the video, she is has been sexually objectified through the camera angles. Although the entire video echoes Laura Mulvey’s ‘male gaze’, there are some moments that really highlight the idea of the audience having to view the video through the eyes of a hetrosexual male, which I have screen-grabbed and displayed below.

This screenshot shows the main artist, as well as a group of female back up dancers, doing provocative moves, to appeal to the yes of heterosexual men. Nicki Minaj's objective for this song and video was to empower curvy women through the lyrics and by "shaking her moneymaker."

The positioning of Nicki Minaj is quite animalistic, moreover her chosen stance highlights her assets. Due to her chosen position she is setting herself up for sexual objectification created through the male gaze.

Male gaze through camerawork

When it comes to “gaze” there is certain relationship with the camerawork. There are different kinds of shots that could be used to show the gaze. The examples are shown below with where the shots are mainly used in Nicki Minaj's 'Anaconda' video  Medium shots (Nicki on the floor sticking her bum in the air) Close-ups (body parts in particular) Long shots (loads of female dancers, dancing provocatively) Tilting from legs to head (showing the female body)

Below is a collage of different album covers that conform to Laura Mulvey's theory of "The Male Gaze."

Dancing Animals Edit

The task set was to create a music video from the dancing tiger and shark footage. I had to find the track to accompany it, choose from the available shots and then edit the video by adding effects. This was good task because:

• I  re-familiarised myself with Final Cut 
• Learnt how important cutting to the beat is "MTV style Editing"- Vernalis
• Learnt how to edit to the beat by using markers
• Through the editing I was able to create a narrative

Voyeurism- 50 Cent Candy Shop

In an interview with 50 Cent he stated: "I attempted to be as sexual as possible, from a male perspective, without being vulgar or obscene".

                           



Goodwin’s theory of voyeurism refers to the idea of expressing sexuality in media texts through the notion of ‘observing’ . This idea is mainly aimed towards male viewers, (this links into the male gaze) as we are invited to look at the female artist or characters in a sexually objectifying way, this is often executed through camera framing, angles and the use of mis-en-scene. For example Goodwin suggests that females can be objectified by revealing parts of their body e.g. breasts and buts and by wearing revealing clothes with camera angles such as low angle shots and close ups used to emphasise this. Goodwin’s theory is certainly evident in most of the music videos seen on music channels such as MTV and Kiss. From watching videos I've noticed that they all follow the same idea of featuring a sense of voyeurism.  A good example of how voyeurism is used within modern day music videos is the 2009 song Candy Shop by 50 Cent ft Olivia as there is a clear sense of voyeurism in some of the scenes. Like, many hip hop artists, 50 Cent conforms to conventions of hip hop as this video includes the following typical conventions:

• Video vixens
• Sports car
• Sexual connotations
• Provocative clothes

This screenshot depicts a clear example of a sense of voyeurism for the viewers as well as the characters as their is a live feed of them being intimate with each other in the back ground, suggesting that they are also voyeurs.






The female characters within this video have been highly sexualised through their provocative movements and clothing, used as a ploy to entice the audience. In the above screenshot we see the female character on the bed


Below are 3 screen grabs highlighting 3 shots/moments that demonstrate voyeurism.

This is a low angle shot of the women dancing, this is an example of "male gaze" because we the audience are forced to look at these women's buts whilst they dance in a sexually provocative way. Moreover, the choice of costume also adds to this idea of women being objects to satisfy men as the main female who's singing is wearing cherry red hot pants whilst her back up dancers are all wearing bikini tops, leaving very little to the imagination.

This is an example of voyeurism as this is a shot viewed form 50 cent, as he is on the balcony looking down on these women as they dance. A feminist critic would infer that this could be symbolic over his power over women, a she a man is looking down on the woman thus giving him more status and power.

This shot shows two women being really sexual and provocative in a bathtub  as one of the ladies is pouring chocolate on the other one, this time it is the editing that helps to create a sense of voyeurism as this has been slowed down to be even more erotic and sexual for its audience.

Disjuncture - Bound by Kanye West

Disjuncture is a theory to describe the visuals of a music video bearing no correspondence to the lyrics or meaning of the song. The affect of disjuncture will often leave the audience confused but if done well it can give the song a deeper meaning that the audience may have not initially realised. Disjuncture is often used within electro-pop/house music videos as their is very often little/no performance shots of the artist so the narrative is the main focus of the video with the song simply acting as background music. Disjuncture is also used when an artist wants to stand out from the crowd with a video consisting of unique visuals that don’t particularly relate to the lyrics. An example of how disjuncture is used within music videos is Kanye West's Bound.

Above are a few screenshots that basically some up up the randomness of this video, there is no real narrative or sense of characters.

Amplification - Wrecking Ball by Miley Cyrus

Amplification is another one of Andrew another Goodwin identified conventions of a music video’s. This is when the visuals are used to enhance the meaning and effects of a song by constantly reinforcing the lyrics or message of the song. By amplifying a music video the artist is taking the lyrics and making them even stronger by creating visuals that not only support the song but it a, so enhamces the ovrrall message thus making it more powerful. Amplification is often used within music videos if an artist is trying to get across a new star image to their audience or if they want to make a weaker song more successful. An example of how amplification can be used within music videos to echo a artist’s star image can be found within “Wrecking Ball" by pop star Miley Cyrus, who uses amplification in many of her videos as, like many srtists, she as well as her type of music has changed and matured with her, resulting in her image constantly changing.  Amplification enables the director to become an artistic force in the construction of the music video as the direction doesn't have to be as literal and naturalistic as it does in an illustrative video.

"All I wanted was to break your walls" this line is clearly amplified by the use of visuals, below are screenshots demonsrstrating this.

The visuals shown here therefore help amplify the song meanings of emotional destruction by providing the audience with a strong visual image, of a metaphorical broken girl, literally destroying and wrecking walls as a result of the pain that the person she's singing too caused.

"I came in like a wrecking ball"  this is another example of aplification in this video as MIiley is literally coming into scene on a wrecking ball.

Illustration - Take a Bow by Rihanna

Andrew Goodwin identifies illustration as visuals that are used to represent the lyrics or message of the song. By illustrating a music video you are essentially showing the audience what the song is literally about. Illustration is often the most used method of linking lyrics with visuals used within music videos as it is the most basic and ensures the meaning of the song is not missed through a distracting music video. An example of how illustration can be used within music videos to represent lyrics can be found within Rihanna's Take a Bow.

"You look so dumb right now, standing outside my house"
this line is clearly illustrated by the fact that the male character aka the artists boyfriend is standing outside her house

Talking 'bout, Girl, I love you," "You're the one"

Intertextuality - Pink "Raise Your Glass"

Goodwin showed intertextual references to be a major theme within music videos. References that can be retrieved from other music videos, films, TV texts and even public figures. They provide the audience with further gratification and pleasure, as if they're able to work out the intertextual links they will feel a stronger connection with the artist feeling they are in on some sort of private joke or secret. Artist’s can also use intertextuality to help compare themselves to an event or public figure that will help them emulate the star image they want their audience to see them as. A great example of intertextual references being used within music videos to help star develop their star image is Pink's "Raise Your Glass."

Here it shows Pink paying homage to the renown "We Can Do It" poster of "Rosie the Riveter" by doing the action, the feminists salute.

Iggy Azlea- Fancy ft Charlie Xcx

Here are screenshots illustrating the intertextual reference of Iggy's video as she is holding a similar pink fluffy pencil as the character from Clueless.

Iggy Azalea is another example of a pop star that has used intertextuality within their video. The chosen text that has inspired this video is the hit 90's movie Clueless, below is a list of some similar qualities within this video that replicate the film such as:

• Costumes-  both Iggy and the main character from Clueless have the outfit decider machine that chooses the yellow plaided skirt suit.
• Scene location e.g. classroom and sports ground
• The way her name is introduced is in the same format as the movies title.
• Actors within the video resemble the actors in the film

The artists main audience are young people, teenagers till young adults therefore choosing to base her video around an iconic 90's film, from which the era most if not all her target audience were born in, was genius as it is something that links them together, as they would all know this film. Therefore, she has targeted a piece of pop culture that her fans would be familiar with and has possible expanded her audience to people who are just fans of the film, which makes this a very clever marketing technique.

Conventions of a Music Video

The music video often tells a story either that features in the lyrics or is suggested in the lyrics eg boy leaves girl. This type of narrative is often directed like a short film, with a beginning, middle and end.

Mise en Scene-

• Visually stylish – ‘artistic’ mise-en-scene 

•  Unusual costumes

• Unusual props

• Cars

• Hair

• Multiple locations- linked to the genre

• Expressive lighting

Camera angles and shots-

• Experimental use of camera/editing (hand held camera, distortion of colours) 

• Close Ups of instruments

• Long shots of the band

• Extreme Close Ups of mouths and eyes

Editing-

•  Can use lots of jump cuts 

• Lots of use of digital effects

•  Cutting related to the rhythm of the music 

• Intercutting between performance and images or story 

• Cut to the beat

• Montage editing

Camera movements-

• Panning shot

• Rapid movement

• tracking shot

• Crane shots

• Tilts

• Illusion of speed being created

Sound-

• Song mainly foregrounds the video

• Occasional diegetic sound

Other Elements-

• Incongruous elements

• Iconography

• Intertextuality

• Voyeurism

Evaluation of Preliminary Task

Evaluation of Call Me Maybe Lip Sync task

This is the preliminary music video that I shot and edited. The chosen song was Carly Rae Jepson's Call Me Maybe as this was a song that we all felt comfortable with miming to as we all were familiar with the lyrics. Due to this being a task set in lesson, we were unable to plan the execution of our video, which resulted in us just making it up and going into the video with no clear vision or understanding. This is definitely something that I've learned from and will change when I shoot my final music video.


This task proved to be a lot harder to shoot and edit then I initially thought it would be as I realised how accurate you have to be as the slightest inaccuracy can completely ruin the look of the music video.


Considering this was only a practice exercise, I am happy with the overall result I achieved. I think the lip syncing is successful the majority of the time however there are a few moments that
are slightly out of sync with the track which obviously wouldn't be acceptable for my final project.

As Carly Rae Jepson's song is quite a fun, young and up beat song, my main brief for the video was for the actors to have fun and enjoy themselves, hence why i used a lot of scenes from out takes in the video to harbour the youthful fun vibe of my actors.








This is a screenshot demonstrating the editing process, the little pink blobs are markers which helped me to edit to the beat. I also used the markers to match when the singer on the track sang certain lines so I could match it up with my actresses lip sync.

Call Me Maybe preliminary task

CD Cover Collage

Below is a collage of CD covers from artists that I like and covers that I found intriguing and interesting.

From looking at these covers I've noticed a few similarities and generic conventions:

• Most of the covers just have the artist on the cover
• Most of the covers just show the artists face
• The use of Close Up's show the stars as quite vulnerable- to connect with their audience
• Hints of colour are used to make titles or themes of the album stand out.