Fiest Digipak

The name of the artist on the digipak is Fiest, this connotes an indie type nature as this is a made up word, already she is not conforming. Fiest also sounds like ‘feisty’; the choice of this name could be a suggestion of the singer’s personality and nature.

The font on the front cover is best described as standard and simple. The lettering is neat and dominant against the white background as they have chose to have black lettering. This continues the black and white theme of the digipak as the images are mostly black and white and the backgrounds are white throughout the digipak. The physical appearance of Fiest on the front cover is highly ambiguous. She appears to be topless but it is hard to tell due to the heavy shadowing, Fiest seems to be doing this to continue the simplistic theme rather than being sexual. Due to her side on pose, the audience doesn’t get to see her full profile, this could be to suggest that there is more to Fiest than this album can imply. The close up shot allows us to take in as much of her as the image allows, Fiest is being ambiguous and challenging us to interpret the image.

Fiest is the dominant image throughout the whole digipak; she is the unique selling point as she is a solo artist. By combining a selection of unique images, Fiest is appealing to her target audience as she appears to be interesting. She also has to be dominant as she was propelled to fame by an iPod advert; she has to be recognisable to the buying public. The upside down image of Fiest suggests that she is more complicated than the front cover image suggests. The record company would have added this image like this due to her indie genre which is all about doing things in a new and different way. The other dominant image is of string, this features on the front cover image and then twice in the digipak. This could be to suggest that everything is somehow connected; however there can be various interpretations, Fiest probably wanted it this way too.

The title of the album is The Reminder; this is because Fiest offers nostalgic music due to her heavy 70’s influence. Fiest is reminding her audience of how music used to be. This is reinforced by the heavy use of sepia and also the Polaroid type shots; Fiest transports us with this digipak. The 70’s feel is continued due to the dominant colours, the black and white images and the sepia tones give the digipak a vintage feel. However, the pieces of string, which are also dominant, are primary colours; this could be to suggest a modern take on the past.

Fiest’s album was produced by many people including, Gonzales, Ben Mink, Renaud Letang and herself. All of the producers are Canadian like Fiest; this would appeal to the audience as it seems the album is heavily influence by her native country. Gonzales is also a recognisable artist as he found fame from an advert just like Fiest. The album won’t have an ‘LA finish’, this is good news for her indie fans.

Fiest’s record label is Cherry Tree, a major label focused on new talent. Their parent companies are Interscope and Polydor for the US and UK respectively. Fiest has the potential to be distributed on a mass scale if the record company chose to. She is also part of Arts and Crafts, an independent Canadian label. Again Fiest has remained true to her roots and seems to be heavily influence by Canada.

Fiest fits into her indie genre due to her artistic take on the digipak. The Polaroids, sepia and black and white images are major favourites of her indie fans. Her target audience would be indie 20-30’s year olds due to the heavy 70’s influence and nostalgia that she offers.

Emails

Planning with Kizzy

• Kizzy and I met with Mr Hitchenson to discuss using the instruments for October 16th
• Kizzy spoke to Mr Lee about using the school on the Saturday
• After dicussing the situation with Mr Lee and Mr Nugent, we discovered that using the school on the Saturday may be a problem, however after a series of emails we found that we could use the School's Drama Pod rather than the Theatre as previously planned.
• Kizzy and I send a message to the members of the Facebook Music Video Event to confirm or deny their place so we can estimate the number of people.
• We went to Watney Market on Friday 15th to buy props from a card shop, after buying streamers and party poppers, we then went to Sainsburys to buy balloons.
• After school on the Friday, me, Kizzy and Tu-Ann stayed after school to make banners and confetti for the video.
• Later that evening, I collected some 1950's clothing from my Media teacher.
• Saturday 16th, everyone met at school at 1:45 to set up the Drama Pod. This included collecting and setting up the instruments and microphones, blowing up the balloons and decorating the Pod to look as 1950's as possible.
• Our actors arrived at 2:30 and started to having their hair/make up done.
• Filming started at 4:30 and continued through to 6:00
• After filming we put away our props and tidied the Pod.

Photo's from video shoot (Before)

Photo's from video shoot (After)

Vampire Weekend CD Cover

The name of the artist on the cover sleeve of their album is Vampire Weekend, this suggests that the band is of an indie genre rather than mainstream.

The font on the sleeve is best described as standard; it is a ‘Times New Roman’ type font and would be typical of a Word document. The simplistic style is amplified by the choice of white for the lettering. The simplicity extends to the back of the sleeve as the font becomes navy against a white background.
The front cover does not feature Vampire Weekends image, it does however consist of a mid shot photo of the 1980’s model Ann Kristen Kennis. Just like other models photo’s, Kennis is standing front on to the camera so her full profile can be seen. Her face seems expressionless and she is wearing a Ralph Lauren Polo shirt. Just as Vampire Weekend themselves said, the cover can be interpreted to have many meanings and is open to interpretation just like the ‘Rorschach Test’. The choice to have an unknown model on the cover connotes the individual styling of the band, Vampire Weekend are not conforming by having seemingly unrelated cover art. The choice to have the 1983 shot of Kennis was because the band enjoyed that people got mad at a ‘white blonde girl in a Polo shirt’, however, the choice caused problems for the band as Kennis decided to sue them for $2 million.
The title of the album is ‘Contra’, again this open to various interpretations. On the surface, the choice appears to be because of the track ‘I think UR a Contra’ on the album, bands tend to get their album title from their songs. The meaning of ‘Contra’ is ‘against’ or ‘in opposition’, this suggest the band is trying to be abnormal in its approach in a bid for originality. It has also been said that the album name is homage to the 1988 Nintendo game ‘Contra’. People have gone as far to say that the title is a reference to the Nicaraguan Civil War as the Contras opposed the Sandinistas. This is due to the phrase ‘complete control’ in ‘I think UR a Contra’, with this being a song on The Clash’s Sandinista! album.
The album is produced by Rostam Batmanglij, he is also the backing vocalist, keyboard and guitar player in the band. This appeals to the audience as they would that they are experiencing true Vampire Weekend music as no producer has interfered with the band. Batmanglij has a vested interest in the band so the sound will be as true to the band as possible. The record label is XL Recordings who are an independent British Label who also have Adele, Jack Penate and Thom Yorke signed to them. Again this connotes individuality but also suggests Vampire Weekend are mainstream as the other artists made indie music yet have mainstream fame.
The artist fits into its genre of indie rock as they make no attempt to conform to the norm. This is signified by the choice of an olden image of a woman who looks like she would listen to Vampire Weekend. Typical attitudes of the genre is to attempt to break the social mould and be original, Vampire Weekend have done this with their artistically based cover art.
The target audience for this CD is young adults who listen to indie music, they probably even look like the cover girl Kennis. The cover would appeal to them due to its simplicity and its indie vibe, the choice to have a sleeve on a standard one disc CD extends the indie approach even further.

Evaluating the planning

In relation to Goodwin’s theory of the five key aspects of music videos, our video almost entirely conforms to his theory.
The relationship between the lyrics and visuals will be an illustrative one, as the video is performance based, the narrative will illustrate the lyrics. At some parts the links will be explicit as we intend to show the ‘love’ parts during the chorus of ‘Crazy in Love’. The music and visuals will be closely linked as the mise en scene will be of a 1950’s style. Like Buddy Holly, we will have a modern take on the era so editing will go to the beat of the music unlike common 1950’s videos.
The audience will be aware of the genre through what they see on screen as we intend to create a typical 50’s prom setting. Again, the costume and location conform to a common style of the era. We will also have various close up shots of the lead singer, however this is due to our narrative rather than for creating a star image. We also intend to use as many establishing shots of the band (which will also capture the setting) as possible as their uniformity is the unique selling point of the band.
The video will also contain a reference to voyeurism as we intend to make it seem that our audience is watching people watch the video on TV. Our lead singer will also be watching the main girl throughout the video as he falls in love with her. The intertextual reference is to Grease, we drew a lot of inspiration from the prom scene in Grease when creating the narrative, location and style of the video.

Storyboard

The link to the storyboard on youtube is :

http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=Qt4O50X5qNY

Weezer 'Buddy Holly' - Genre

Weezer’s ‘Buddy Holly’ video has a modern take on 1950’s America. It follows the conventions of ‘50’s TV and video to amplify the lyrics of the song. The video was directed by Spike Jonze whose name is on the screen at (0:04) seconds, a common feature of a 1950’s TV show. Spike Jonze also famously directed Bjork’s ‘Oh So Quiet’ and Fatboy Slim’s ‘Praise You’, at the start of Weezer’s career they were already working with big names. We also plan to shoot a 1950’s style video but have taken a modern approach just like Weezer for ‘Buddy Holly’.

The lyrics in the video are amplified by the fact that the whole video is based on the 1970’s show ‘Happy Days’ which was based on the ‘50’s. As the song is entitled ‘Buddy Holly’ and the chorus features the line ‘I look just like Buddy Holly’, it seems that the choice to shoot this style of video was natural. However, this is where the link between the lyrics and visuals ends, the rest of the video is irrelevant to the lyrics. The editing for the video does not conform to the 1950’s genre; it conforms to the bands genre of Pop Rock. The slow paced editing follows the slow beat at the start of the song, 1950’s videos such as Buddy Holly and the Crickets ‘Peggy Sue’ and Elvis Presley’s ‘Blue Suede Shoes’ features almost no editing and are entirely performance based. The videos editing speeds up at (2:34) with the last verse as the tempo speeds up too.

Weezer’s ‘Buddy Holly’ creates the idea that the band is united and are all the selling point. The establishing shot of the band from (0:36-0:47) is extensive, we know that the band are equals. This is highlighted by the fact that each band member gets a close up at some point in the video such as at (0:34) there is a close up of the drummer or at (0:57) there is a close up of one of the guitarists to name a few. However, Rivers Cuomo, the lead, has various close up shots throughout, at (1:06-1:10), the shot is extended for the audience to take in his image. The reason behind the numerous close ups is because the song was released in 1994 and was their second video, Weezer had to start creating a star image and become recognisable in order to sell music.Their previous video, ‘Undone the Sweater Song’ was also directed by Spike Jonze and was shot in one take. The video is performance based and does not have a concept like ‘Buddy Holly’ does apart from the fact it is one continuous feed of video. Weezer are also wearing typical ‘90’s clothes in this video unlike ‘Buddy Holly’ where they are wearing 1950’s attire.

A notion of looking is created in ‘Buddy Holly’ through the intertextual reference. We feel as if we are watching them on TV due to the establishing shot of ‘Arnold’s Diner’ at the beginning. Also the gen

re convention of having a man present a band before they perform is followed. The notion of looking is deepened when the Fonz enters the video to dance, the audience feels as if they are watching ‘Happy Days’. The intertextual reference creates a familiar feeling within the audience, we feel as if we have known this new band for a long time.
The video is both performance and narrative based. The performance follows the conventions of both the pop rock genre and the 1950’s genre. Most ‘50’s videos are entirely performance based; this is mostly to do with the lack of technology at the time. Weezer creates the 1950’s feel through their concept of being a band featuring in a ‘Happy Days’ episode whilst performing throughout.
The Mis en Scene is what creates the 1950’s feel for this video. Both the band and the video audience are wearing ‘50’s costume with the band all in the same outfit, a typical convention of the genre. The establishing shot of the 1950’s scene at (0:26) sees the band on stage with the audience watching from booths in the diner. The walls are decorated with balloons, paper decorations and team banners creating the feel of a 1950’s American prom. The band are also using old microphones and instruments, the close up of the guitarist at (1:02) and of Cuomo at (1:04) heightens the ‘50’s atmosphere as we get to view their instruments properly.

The editing between the band and the ‘Happy Days’ footage makes the audience feel as if Weezer actually featured in an episode. A close up shot of the Fonz at (2:29) cements the intertextual reference and by featuring his iconic thumbs up at (2:32), Weezer ensure that we won’t forget this video.
Whilst the video doesn’t offer any type of political message or social commentary like other Rock videos do, it does offer nostalgic memories for the audience. The video is based on a concept to recreate the ‘50’s by following the convention of performance based videos. By referencing ‘Happy Days’ extensively, Weezer become familiar to the audience and amplify their lyrics by having a modern take on an olden style video.