Music Marketing pt 1

    Behind the Scenes

    As part of the Aice Media course, we were split into groups and assigned a music marketing project. Together we researched recording companies along with two case studies each of the artists that these companies produced. The work was distributed evenly between all four of us with each of us researching one artist. There were little to no challenges when it came to the research as each of us were able to find a surplus amount of information on our artists, which consisted of The Killers, Fall Out Boy (both part of Island Records), Arctic Monkeys, and Animal Collective (both part of Domino Recording Company). Researching these artist allowed us to gain a deeper understanding on how someone can market their products, in this case how these artists market their albums, for example, during the release of their album Mania in 2018, Fall Out Boy released their own sets of fidget spinners, a product popular to their target audience of 11-15 year olds at the time. 

When we finished the research portion of the project our group began discussing techniques and ideas on how we’d market and film the music video of the song we chose “The Man”. One of the group members, Logan, brought up the idea of twisting the lyrics of the song into an empowering narrative where the main subject of the video is a woman dressed in more masculine clothes and breaking gender norms by being “The Man”. Though this was a great idea after talking it out with the group we came to the conclusion that it could be misconstrued as the opposite of empowering through the idea that women can only be powerful if they fit into more masculine roles which is nowhere near close to the message we originally wanted to send. After this we decided to take a different route and use the lyrics in a more literal sense. In these lyrics there are a lot of symbolism about The Man being a King and after a small joke about dressing up as a king for the music video we concluded that it would actually be a really fun and interesting idea. And so by sticking to this King theme, M’Lady was born. 

After our main theme was settled the group began focusing more on the marketing side of the project. We began with the simple, such as creating a social media presence for M’Lady through Instagram, Twitter and Youtube. After this we created an original website where people can learn more about M’Lady such as their history, songs, music videos, upcoming tour dates, and lastly a gallery of M’Lady’s best moments. Two logos were also made with the theme of royalty, one being the official logo of M’Lady and the other we decided would go on a t-shirt, creating M’Lady’s first official merchandise. Lastly we discussed aspects of the music video itself, where we talked about different scenes and a storyline for the video. We plan on filming shots of our group member Logan dressed as a King and following him through ironic and funny tasks such as helping ducks cross the road and knighting a dog. 

Representation Analysis

Representation in the media, or rather lack of, has been a large issue that has not been addressed till very recently. The definition of representation is the portrayal of someone or something in a particular way, and throughout the past years, the media has had a terrible run with it. By either ignorantly representing certain groups or not representing them at all, the media created long-lasting negative effects on their audiences. Today I will be analyzing two ads and how their representation may affect their audience.

"Spray More- Get More- The Axe Effect" 

The first advertisement is from Axe Body Spray. Essentially the ad consists of women desperately running through an island to reach a man who is spraying the product on himself. To begin, this ad has major issues in both the representation of women and the representation of races. After rewatching the video several times one can accurately say that there are only two POC women visible throughout the entire production. This is a terrible representation for two reasons. The first is the inaccuracy of the amount of POCS compared to the number of white people. Though people of colour are a minority, they're not a minority of two to hundreds of white women. The second one is that by only including two people of colour, the producers of this are basically stating that white women are more desirable to men since in this ad the purpose of the women is to appease the man. This purpose displayed also plays part in the issue with representing women. With the slogan, "spray more-get more" this ad dehumanizes women to the level of a spray, an object. This sends a message to viewers that this belief, that women are on the same level of objects, is okay. 

"Close the Loop"

On the other hand, the second ad from H&M displays amazing representation. It promotes diversity while also breaking gender roles and stereotypes like men not being able to wear skirts, and how there certain colours for each sex (pink for women and blue for men). It promotes breaking fashion norms and trends, such as wearing red when you're a redhead and wearing brown shoes at night. And even though the topic of this ad isn't race and ethnic diversity, this H&M add still hired actors with different backgrounds and cultures, creating an accurate representation of the world and the people in it. The effects this ad has on its viewers is that it's okay to be you, and that social norms shouldn't stop that, and of coruse the aim of the ad which is to recycle your clothes.

Adventure Genre Research

 Adventure Is Out There!

Adventure films are one of the highest-grossing genres in the world. With 63.57 billion dollars in total box revenue (1995-2020), adventure movies are the most popular movie genre in North America. The popularity of these films originally arose in the 1940s with movies such as Captain Blood and The Adventures of Robinhood, as since then many subgenres were created, one of them being "swashbuckler", in other words, adventure films characterized by sword fighting.

Content:

Adventure films are distinguished by the protagonist's journey and pursuit of the unknown. Facing obstacles and barriers, the protagonists have to overcome their challenges in order to reach their end goal. Commonly throughout adventure films, the protagonists tend to be successful in their escapades by the time the conclusion arrives. These films take place in exotic locations or those that add history to the plot, but no matter what the setting is, it always plays a large factor in the movie. Violence in these films, if there are any, are usually less graphic as compared to other movie genres as they tend to insinuate violence rather than specifically showing it.

   Example: In the movie Up , the protagonists travel a great distance through various exotic settings in order to arrive at "Paradise Falls" which was the protagonist's main motivation throughout the film. 

Production Tecnhiques:

As said before, the setting in an adventure movie plays a large role in the overall finished piece. It is arguable as important, if not more, as the characters themselves. Because of its importance, along with the fact that as the protag's journey goes on the setting changes, most adventure films utilize establishing shots in order for the viewers to easily understand where the scene takes place.

Example: This establishing shot from Harry Potter and the Philosopher's Stone is used to mark a new chapter in the protagonist's story, indicating that the following scenes in the movie will take place at the school.

Scores are also commonly seen throughout adventure films. Scores aid in evoking the specific emotion directors of a film want the audience to experience. During high action scenes, there will be music that increases the adrenaline, during intense scenes music may aid in increasing an anxious feeling. Scores also make the audience relate a specific song to a film, which many times evoke the feeling of nostalgia for those rewatching.

Example: The score for Jurrasic Park became popular after the film's success. This resulted in the Jurrasic Park theme being universally known by many.

Adventure movies most commonly have an uncontrolled mis-en-sence, as production usually strives for a realistic view of a protagonist in a journey. Other techniques used for realism in adventure movies are seen in other genres such as sound effects, natural lighting, environmental sounds, etc.

Marketing:

Adventure films have a large demographic. Originally, the target audience would be men but as the years went by this expanded. Because of its lack of graphic violence, adventure films have a wide viewing audience, including men, women, and children. Like other genres, these movies are mostly marketed through trailers and posters. Trailers tend to include some establishing shots along with shots of the protagonists in action. Posters tend to feature the main protagonists in a collage style.

Samples:

The film Pirates of the Caribbean: The Curse of the Black Pearl (2003) is the first film of the Pirates of the Caribbean series. This film is one of the examples that fall under swashbuckler in the adventure genre as throughout the movie it highlights several sword-fighting scenes between pirates and sailors alike. POTC features young Will Turner, played by Orlando Bloom, on a quest to save the woman he's in love with, Elizabeth Swann (Keira Knightley) who was been kidnapped by pirates. With the help of Captain Jack Sparrow (Johny Depp), Turner is able to help Swann escape, as arguably Elizabeth did a lot of the saving herself, while also breaking a curse of the Black Pearl, which was a large aspect of their journey. With the popularity of this film, the score became iconic throughout the media, specifically, He's a Pirate Suite, which is now known as the theme for POTC. This song was commonly used during thrilling scenes which creates excitement and boosts adrenaline. As seen above, the poster follows the common poster theme for adventure movies with the collage-like design.

The film Lord of the Rings: The Fellowship of the Ring (2001) is also the first film of the series based off of the first novel. In it, we follow the journey of Frodo Baggins (Elijah Wood) and friends, such as Gandalf (Ivan McKellen), Legolas (Orlando Bloom), Aragorn (Viggo Mortensen), and Sam (Sean Astin) on the quest of destroying a ring powered with evil. Though in this first movie the protagonists didn't finish the quest as of yet, it did conclude in a lighter and happier tone compared to the rest of the movie. Like POTC, LOTR also has a score, which was produced by Howard Shore, which also became well known in the film industry. The film focused a lot on realism despite its supernatural content by location filming and relying on natural lighting. Sound effects were also used to enhance moments in the film such as steps on the ground when running and the sound of an arrow flying past. The poster also fits the adventure theme with a collage-type design.

Other Adventure Films:

The Chronicles of Narnia: The Lion, the Witch, and the Wardrobe (2005)

The Matrix (1999)

Raiders of the Lost Ark (1981)

The Princess Bride (1987)

The Mask of Zorro (1998)

Introduction

Hi! My name is Isabella, I'm a Junior in high school and currently enrolled in Aice Media. Here I'll be documenting and uploading projects for the course!