Lyrics Analysis

 Lost in skies of powdered gold

Caught in clouds of silver ropes

Showered by the empty hopes

As I tumble down, falling fast to the ground

I know I'll wither so peel away the bark

Because nothing grows when it is dark

In spite of all my fears, I can see it all so clear

I see it all so clear

Whoa-o-o-o, Cover your crystal eyes

And feel the tones that tremble down your spine

Whoa-o-o-o, Cover your crystal eyes

And let your colours bleed and blend with mine

Making waves in pitch black sand

Feel the salt dance on my hands

Raw and charcoal coloured thighs feel so cold

And my skin feels so paper-thin

I know I'll wither so peel away the bark

Because nothing grows when it is dark

In spite of all my fears, I can see it all so clear

I see it all so clear

Whoa-o-o-o, Cover your crystal eyes

And feel the tones that tremble down your spine

Whoa-o-o-o, Cover your crystal eyes

And let your colours bleed and blend with mine

But I'm okay in see-through skin

I forgive what is within

Because I'm in this house

I'm in this home

All my time

Whoa-o-o-o, Cover your crystal eyes

And feel the tones that tremble down your spine

Whoa-o-o-o, Cover your crystal eyes

And let your colours bleed and blend with mine

These are the lyrics of the song. As you can see, the use of words such as tumble, falling, fears, dark etc is common, giving it a dark and isolated feel. So I want to incorporate this in my video. I could film something in an isolated room to give it a dark room, or maybe use a black and white filter to darken the image. 

The song, when I checked on websites is apparently about growth and how their hometown has changed in many ways. They use lyrics such as "peel away the bark" "nothing grows when it is dark" as if they were using a tree as a metaphor. The melody is full of sounds of drums and so it gives a big build up to the end, with a small moment near the end when it quietens. So my main theme for my video could be growth. 

First I thought of possibly portraying a person growing old showing young babies to old people. But then I considered the people I knew who could help and decided not because I don't know anybody with babies and didn't know any elderly people who'd be willing to help. Then Ms Amanda, our media studies teacher suggested filming people playing games such as jenga, and filming the build up to winning. Using the suggestion as my base, I thought I finalised my idea to filming an artists painting "the" painting. It would give a deeper sense of darkness because artists paint in isolation. And the lyrics sound very artistic so I think it would fit very well.

Music Video Treatment

I did a presentation in my class about my music video treatment. And the main feedback I got was that I should go and reconfirm my location and see if it is really ok. I was also asked whether or not I will able to manage the drawing of eyes on my eyelids. I may have to practice soon so it wouldn't end up looking messy. It may be difficult to get rid of too, so I will need to concentrate.

Some of us in the class had really detailed, specific information about all the scenes. However, my video will be much simpler than them so I am happy with my idea and treatment.
I was the only one with a very low budget as well, but again I don't need my video to look fantastic, and I want it simple to attract younger audiences that could relate to it's imperfection.

Survey Results

I did an audience survey to determin what type of audience will be my target audience, and to see what they really want to see from a music video. I was able to get answers from quite a few people, and from both male and female so I could get an easy idea of who will want to watch my video.
Many of them who answered liked indie/rock/alternative music and it is the genre of my music video so once again, it has helped me a lot.

Audience survey

Create your own user feedback survey

Audience Research

Textual analysis of a music video

Andrew Goodwin's theory of music videos

Moodboard

Created with Padlet

Uses and Gratification theory

Six Shot Task

Difference between indie and major record labels

Creating our Logo

This is an example I looked at; Island Records. I like the simplicity to it but how different it is from other logos. Common logos tend to have a very large letter or abbreviasion to give an impression for the record label, but in this case it is more the image rather than the letters that make an impression. I also looked at Apple records which mainly did Beatles’ music. Once again I like how an image is representing the logo rather than the letter because it is easier to remember and not boring. However, apple records is unique because logos hardly ever use real images. They are usualy cliparts. Neither of them are clear whether or not they represent indie or rock music or even music at all. Therefore that’s onething I’d like to think about when I make mine.

 

The ideas I had for y record label were Rouge/Cassette/Tape/Mixtape. As you can see, I had thought about the tape a lot. And decided to chose mixtape in the end because firstly, if I were to use rouge, the colour I used would’ve probably been red, as rouge is red in French. However, red wouldn’t stand out on a CD back cover, so I decided not to use it. Tape would’ve been confusing with sticky tape and cassette sounded too old school whereas mixtape sounds slightly more modern than cassette. No one knows what a cassette is nowadays, whereas they still hacve an idea of what a mixtape is. Here are three of my ideas I have. I tried all of them because the one on the right I thought was too big, so I made it smaller by inverting half of the font so I can lower the text down slightly and that’s what I’ve done for the top lefft image. I’l ave these threeon my list and seee how it goes when creating an album back cover and see which balances better.

I wanted people to look at my record logo and tell immediately that it was a music logo and nothing else. And I’m sure I’ve done that well enough.

Music Video Director – Sophie Muller

The reason why I chose Sophie Mulller is because many of my favourite songs and music videos were directed by her. I had never heard of her before, but now that I've researched about her music videos I see many conventions of her music videos. And many of them I really like so I would like to include them in mine.

This project enabled us to see conventions of our genre of music videos and how we could incorporate it in ours. I think I'll try the idea of having two styles, the dark and the bright but fit in one music video. I like the contrast it all makes.

Copyright Task

label: Republic Records

address: 1755 Broadway
city: New York City
state: New York
zip code: 10019
phone: 212-841-5100

Dear Republic Records,

I am writing to ask permission to use the song “Crystals” by Of Monsters And Men for my A2 level media studies coursework.

I am a student studying in Bangkok, Thailand in Traill international school. Our A level media studies coursework include a creation of a music video, an album sleeve and a digipack using a modern song. In my case, I’ve chosen to use Crystals.

If you are kind enough to give us permission, the track will be used for educational purposes only and shared only amongst  classmates, and friends we will gain feedback from.

Thank you very much for your time.

Yours sincerely, Eri Connors

Codes and Convetions of indie folk rock

Choosing my Genre + Track

Track: Crystals

Artist: Of Monsters And Men

Genre: Indie, folk rock

The reason why I chose this song is because it isn’t a typical song that you hear in the charts, and the lyrics aren’t so simple. The more simple the lyrics are, the more typical the narrative will be and that’s not what I wanted. I wanted a song that could could convey many meanings and therefore create a more imaginative narrative. I always wanted to create a music video of an indie song and I didn’t know many female singers in that genre. So among my very limited choices of songs, I chose this. I had other songs on my list such as Sugar Pill by the Japanese House, or Not Your Way by Misterwives, however both of them were either too unique our I couldn’t think of a good narrative to suit it. So I chose this song