The Music Industry

The Music Industry 

The music industry is currently build upon the foundations of the companies and individuals who make their money through both the creation and sale of music. Consisting of both individuals & organisations, the individuals being the musicians who compose and perform their music or music written or composed for them; and the organisations being  :

The companies and the professionals who create and sell the recorded music, for example : music publishers, producers, studios, engineers, record labels ( The brand aassociated with the marketing of music recordings and music videos, (commonly a company) that will manage the brands & trademarks; coordinate the production, manufacture, distribution, marketing, promotion, and copyright laws and also conducts talent scouting and the development of new artists), retail stores, online music stores, and performance rights organisations (they basically deal with the copyright issues, and holders + parties who want to use copyrighted works publicly); The people that present live music performances for instance booking agents, promoters, music venues owners, road crew (The technicians & support personnel who travel with a band on tour), talent managers (Or band/artist manager helps the company or individual progress through their professional career in the entertainment industry), business managers, entertainment lawyers (people who provide legal services for the entertainment industry). People who broadcast music for example : satellite, internet and broadcast radio and then of course all of the journalists; educators; musical instrument manufacturers; tabloid writers, columnists, website designers and so on.

The modern day industry appeared around the 1950’s when records had replaced sheet music (printed as supposed to recorded) as the largest seller in the music business. This was when the term "the music industry" became interchangeable within the commercial world, with the phrase "the recording industry".

The majority of the musical market (for recorded music) is dominated by x3 major corporate labels:

1.) the French-owned Universal Music Group, - which is a major global music company owned by French media conglomerate Vivendi. Universal Music Group also owns Universal Music Publishing Group, which is the x2 biggest music publishing company in the world!

2.) The Japanese-owned Sony Music Entertainment - which is the largest global recorded music company of the "big three" record companies and is controlled by Sony Corporation of America, the United States subsidiary of Japan's Sony Corporation.

 3.) The US-owned Warner Music Group - Is a major global music and entertainment conglomerate based in NYC . It’s the biggest US owned music corporation globally & it is one of the 'big three' recording companies which are basically the three largest companies in the worldwide music industry. The company runs some of the most successful recording labels in the world, including : Warner Bros. Records + Atlantic Records.

In relation to the control of live music, the market monopolised by Live Nation who is the largest promoter of music and also the largest music venue owner. Live nation is an American entertainment company who formed from the merger of Live Nation and Ticket master. However because of digital distribution & the music video in the online age,  the largest  retailer of music is now i digital:Apple Inc.'s iTunes Store. (Though the x2 largest companies in the industry are Universal Music Group and Sony/ATV Music Publishing.) This newly popular means of distributing & marketing products has created a wide web for artists to spread their music & fan base at the same time as lowering their costs. 

 ß US market shares in the music industry

 ß World market shares in the music industry 

Record Lables - Financing, Management & control 
In terms of costs in the industry (of music videos that is) the artist/bands label (could be independent or an international one) will be the one who covers all of the direct costs involved in the recording & promoting & marketing of a band, which of course include their music video.Though this authoritative control over  artists success means that they often have to surrender all rights to the music they create, their style & their star image. The label then makes their profit from the artists  album sales, performances sales, download sales & merchandising sales and then will distribute a portion of this money back to the artist. Within the industry most recording artists have now become wholly reliant upon the support of record labels to broaden their consumer base into the mass market and sell as many of their albums as possible on the widest possible scale. (and to be promoted / heard on mp3, radio, ipod, youtube, TV, interviews, merchandise, positive media coverage, music videos etc). Artists are contracted with their record label and this either provides for the artist to deliver completed recordings to the label, or for the label to be involved with the recording process as well. They are also in charge of selecting producers, recording studios, additional musicians, and the songs that will be recorded. The relationship between record labels & artists is frictional and many artists  albums are completely altered / censored by the labels before they are released to the public for example their song lyrics will being edited, the albums artwork / titles can be tweaked and so on.  Their choices are based upon commercial success, something with can cause rifts between the label & the artists who wants to stay true to themselves. Though because of the technological advances and means of distribution & promotion via the Internet their  part is starting to loose its necessity. In recent years artists have become more easily able to freely distribute their own material through web radio, peer to peer file sharing, youtube, facebook, twitter and so on (for little cost or sometimes none at all). In fact some major artists such as Bigger artists such Radio are moving towards cutting out their label all together which of course if this becomes more common will cause major issues for the industry as a whole. 

(The major record labels)

Audience research & questionnaires

              

Today we explored the demographics and psychographics of audience sub-genres. It was really interesting to branch away from categorising an audience as simply ‘male & female’ or ‘young & old’ and explore In a greater depth the structure to which our society is built up upon and so many elements contribute towards forming an artists fan base. Firstly the demographical features – their social class, ethnicity, age and gender (all quite routine features) , or example the demographic of typical top 40’s commercial boy band like ‘One Direction’ for example would primarily be : young girls aged between 8-16, lower - middle class, white . Additionally we can categorize our target audience by exploring their behavioral attributes ,like for example loyalty and usage habits and also the firmographic variables such as their industry, seniority or status and functional area). Though the psychographics or ‘life matrix’ I find to be most compelling as it explores which variables string the audience together by the connection of their personalities, values, attitudes, interests and lifestyles (a psychographic could explore the age of a person relating to so much more than a number!). A really interesting example I found comparing the two main categories – demo & psycho is in relation to the post war baby boom of the generation born between 1946&1964 . AS the traditional approach to defining this "Baby Boom Generation"  relied upon both demographic variables (classifying the individual as a "boomer" based on age) and psychographic variables (such as their attitudes and behaviors & liberalities following the austerity of war). This knowledge enabled us to design questionnaires that would actually be genuinely useful in determining a target audience for our music video's & packages, and help us determine the features which would be critical to include when storyboarding, planning, shooting and editing. We decided to individually construct questionnaires and then group them together in the GEAR team in order to combine the most interesting demo&psycho questions that could help us to narrow down our audience sub types and thus build up a clear structure of who we were marketing towards ( looking at both primary & secondry & tertiary audience etc groups). 

The Scientist Video Analysis

Similar Indie Rock Bands - The Arctic Monkeys

The Arctic monkeys 

The Arctic monkeys are also a indie rock band (Alex Turner Jamie Cook Nick O'Malley Matt Helders), who formed back in 2002, have released x4 major albums, are actually one of the first groups to come into the mainstream of public attention using Internet through fan-based sites (rather than from the band), initiating new possibility of using online technological forums for mass marketing. They fall into the indie genre, but have a more 'pop' like style that alternative bands in this genre, they are noted to be one of the most prominent bands in the post-punk revival (post-punk revival was a development in alternative rock which arose later in the 20th century, where rock bands drew inspiration from the classic sounds of garage rock and New Wave - from the 60's & 70's), and have developed into an extremely successful commercial group.

Though their music falls under the genre indie rock although they have changed this sub genre of rock and have expanded and altered their sound & style with each of their four albums - one of their key features.  Their lead singer  Turner creates their iconically regional and  intricate lyrical sound, sung in a strong Yorkshire accent, and the  lyrics of their songs create the focal point for examination, change & nostalgia   - music with meaning, not just for commercialism . They have developed from desert rock and psychedelic rock sound, into love-themed ballads and desert rock and into psychedelic rock sound - these subtle changes have been the result of a popular progression in the bands popularity & have altered dependent on environment, production management & influences. 

  Arctic Monkeys

  The Vaccines 

- Both groups of four young men, similar musical sound, similar dress style (scruffy indie casual) - though you can notice the regional differences. 

                                   

Album Art Analysis

Inspiration - from other media texts

Even though it isn't a music video in developing our idea for our own production we drew many elements from some pieces of advertising as well as of course other artists music videos.  I personally really liked the concept of the John Lewis advert "Never knowingly undersold". Throughout the ad a couple from two different eras (one modern day, one from 1925 - the year the store was opened) go on a journey / have a relationship with one another, through the use of split screen; ultimately they end up together (or it is proposed) at the end of the clip.  In particular what I really liked about this style was the interesting mis en scene that made each era distinctive & visually pleasing & understandable - the costume choice, the building design, the posters, the cinema architecture, the transport, the street feature, the interior design of the bedrooms, the technology, the bicycles,  and so on (similar to the intertextuality within music video that adds an extra sense of pleasure for the viewer). This is something I really want to embody in our piece, this attention to detail - the little features that the viewer spots and can identify to a particular time period. In addition the love story idea - the exaggeration of space & romantic distance through playing around with chronology & history - something which I feel will make our video  have a much greater sense of depth. 

Another advertisement we drew inspiration from was 'John Lewis''s 2010 campaign - 'She's Always A Women'. We liked the idea that this one girl is growing & developing throughout the piece with a familiarity from a continual thread. A concept in particular which we want to borrow is the repetition of using the 'door' (or another object) in order to flip the linear structure; we want to use this idea in our video in order to connect our different eras & show a clear flip from each time period. We liked their concept of playing with time in order to create a personal & literal journey - something which we wish to convey to illustrate our unique vision (& transformable style) of the lyrics from 'If You Wanna' by 'The Vaccines'. The use of the symbolic 'red' top to connect the sequence is also something we will want to incorporate - keeping one element the same in each different era we jump to in order to develop a sense of continuity & a story line - embedded with performance sequence & shots which are more abstract and harder to follow as a viewer (in order to uphold the conventions of music video & create a piece which differs from that of a structured film which endeavours to keep the audience fully aware of the happenings and leaves less room for interpretation) 

Music Video Directors

Douglas Hart (The director of some of  'The Vaccines' music videos )
His style is based around 'alternative rock' - fragmentation of shots, creative use of lighting for effect & colour, band performance shots, quite quirky and interesting (almost weird) to watch, variety of shot lengths, montage. 
He was the first bassist (a musician who plays a base instrument) and founding member of the band 'The Jesus and Mary Chain' (he played with the group from 1984 to 1991) Whilst playing in the band he began to start directing music video's for other groups of a similar genre & then founded his own company (he's directed over 80 videos) EG: 'My Blood Valentine's' "You Made Me Realise"  'The Horrors' - "Sea Within a Sea" and some of the 'The Stone Roses' videos.

http://www.youtube.com/playlist?list=PLA16546A082A90D19 - his directorial videos 

Melina Matsoukas - (who directs a lot of Rhianna's video's & is Rhianna's favourite director )
She's an American music video director & graduated from the American Film Institute, (New York University's Tisch School of the Arts), and her graduation thesis there was about music video. Her work is bold and described as "chalk full, she uses a combination of either bright & brash colours or saturated & sharp black and white images, smooth spotlights, +  tasteful retro video models." Matsoukas believes that expensive equipment isn't needed, even when creating a really high quality video. 

She feels that  "A good video has the right visuals, a well conceptualised story and should be exciting and elicit reaction" and also said that (in terms of the music video industry)"I love it. The quick turnaround, the creativity." 

Some of her work:


"Because of You" - Ne-Yo
"Green Light" - Beyoncé
"Upgrade U" (co-directed by Beyoncé Knowles) - Beyoncé feat. Jay-Z
"Tambourine" - Eve feat. Swizz Beatz
"Give It to You" - Eve feat. Sean Paul
"Bleeding Love" - Leona Lewis (UK version)
"Hold It Don't Drop It" - Jennifer Lopez
"Sensual Seduction" - Snoop Dogg
(2007 ^)

"In My Arms" - Kylie Minogue
"Just Dance" - Lady Gaga feat. Colby O'Donis
"Return the Favor" - Keri Hilson feat. Timbaland
"Thinking of You" - Katy Perry
(2008 ^)

"Not Fair" - Lily Allen
"Work" - Ciara feat. Missy Elliott
"Million Dollar Bill" - Whitney Houston
"Hard" - Rihanna feat. Young Jeezy


"Rude Boy" - Rihanna
"Put It in a Love Song" - Alicia Keys feat. Beyoncé
"Rockstar 101" - Rihanna feat. Slash
(2010 ^)

"S&M" (co-directed by Rihanna) - Rihanna
"Move Your Body" - Beyoncé
"I'm Into You" - Jennifer Lopez feat. Lil Wayne
"We Found Love" - Rihanna feat. Calvin Harris
"You da One" - Rihanna
(2011 ^)

Marc Klasfeld is an American music video director who has worked on well over 200 music videos for various well known artists - for example Katy Perry, Jay-Z, Red Hot Chili Peppers, Nelly, Foo Fighters,Avril Lavigne, and Aerosmith (many with multiple MTV award wins and nominations). In addition he is the founder of Rockhard, (a music video production company) who has produced videos for mainstream artists such as Justin Bieber, Lady Gaga, LMFAO, Britney Spears, Aerosmith, Prince, Mariah Carey, Kelly Rowland, Jessie J and many more.

Klasfeld has a versatile nature and his directorial productions are all very much based upon performance & have a definite focus upon the artists (band or singer), he often shapes his videos towards the star & is much more about selling the star & song than any meaning or deep emotion. His narratives usually revolve around the artist rather that a dual narrative using different characters, creating the sense that the artist is narrating the story personally & directly to their mass market fan base. His work does vary and some of his pieces have a much more serious tone & style, whereas others convey comic/mocking/humorous themes. He often uses parody's, and intertextual references in his videos, and most have quite 'busy' vibes - don't rely on the simplicity of a performance but a mixture of narrative and performance,  creating a visually chaotic & interesting effect (bright shape & variety of scenes + costumes + characters). He often relies upon the use of bright lighting, multiple shots, extensive close up's, coloured tints & close ups of instruments. 

Pulse 'Fred & Nick'

 They are a directorial duo who are part of 'pulse' (Pulse Films is a talent management and integrated content production company that creates content across many different platforms) and have directed a wide range of music videos, in the style of 'live &documentary' (for artists such as: Coldplay, White Lies, Elbow, The Maccabees and Laura Marling). One of their most famous videos ( and award-winning) was the 'Gentlemen Of The Road' series for Mumford and Sons which consisted of four cinematic short films that changed the bands status forever from one who toured in a transit van to a group who were selling over 3 million albums worldwide. They aim to capture the essence of the bands they work with and exert their energy & passion through their videos - Their emotions, their honesty, their vibe, simplicity. They usually use a mix of strong visuals of a conceptual performance, and create very edgy but clever & indie style videos - playing around with shot lengths & editing speed for effect. ( you get a really good sense of the bands ethos & 'team' spirit from their style of video. 


 http://www.pulsefilms.com/talent/frednick/