Textual Analysis of a Music Video - REVISED

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Meeting Schedule

Meeting Schedule

At the beginning of the course, we decided on set times on which we would meet as a group and discuss any ideas or concerns relating to our music video. Below is a scanned image of my timetable for lessons, marked with an ‘M’ are the slots we agreed upon to meet:

Initially, these meetings were used to acquire the basis of our narrative, to discuss potential locations, actors, themes and motifs et cetera. After most of these were agreed upon, however, the frequency of these meetings naturally decreased according to mutual consent due to other commitments, and now many of them have been transformed into shooting times. We would then expect most of the slots to be used for editing.

Helen and myself at Cafe Nero's during the early stages of our planning

Clearly, though, much of our shooting has taken place outside of school times, whilst some was also done during double periods of Media Studies. We have also used the half-term holiday as a chance to progress with both shooting and editing, designating two full days (Monday and Tuesday) of shooting and editing. We met at a group member’s house and did the editing there, whilst the shooting was done at previously agreed locations. These meetings outside of school times were all agreed on mutually according to when all three of us happened to be available.

Materialism in Music: Follow-up Research

Materialism in Music: Follow-up Research

I have decided to conduct a piece of follow-up research using similar procedures to that of my earlier investigation. This time, however, I will analyse only current music and that which is the most popular. Consequently, I will be investigating the actual level of materialism present in current popular music rather than an increase of materialism over time.

On the 11th of October 2009, the Official UK Top Ten Singles Chart according to http://www.mtv.co.uk/music/charts/official-uk-singles-chart reads as the following:

1. Taio Cruz − Break Your Heart
2. Jay-Z Ft Alicia Keys − Empire State Of Mind
3. David Guetta Ft Akon − Sexy Chick
4. Shakira − She Wolf
5. Black Eyed Peas − I Gotta Feeling
6. Jay-Z Ft Rihanna & Kanye West − Run This Town
7. Temper Trap − Sweet Disposition
8. Pixie Lott − Boys & Girls
9. Pitbull − Hotel Room Service
10. Dizzee Rascal − Dirtee Cash

Using the same list of materialism signifiers as in my previous investigation, I will rate the music videos of this top ten according to their materialism levels. By doing this, I will hopefully gain a broader spectrum of materialism in different genres, rather than just pop music as in the earlier research. This will also provide a detailed look at current popular music, as these ten songs are technically the most popular songs as I am writing this. A further interesting point to consider will be the materialism score for Shakira’s ‘She Wolf’, as Shakira was a major outlier in the previous research with very low materialism scores compared to other artists, will her latest song have increased in materialism?

Results

Artist	Song	Materialism Score According to the Checklist
Taio Cruz	Break Your Heart	10/ 14
Jay-Z Ft Alicia Keys	Empire State of Mind	9/ 14
David Guetta Ft Akon	Sexy Chick	10/14
Shakira	She Wolf	2/ 14
Black Eyed Peas	I Gotta Feeling	8/ 14
Jay-Z Ft Rihanna & Kanye West	Run This Town	7/14
Temper Trap	Sweet Disposition	0/ 14
Pixie Lott	Boys & Girls	7/ 14
Pitbull	Hotel Room Service	10/ 14
Mini Viva*	Left My Heart In Tokyo	3/ 14

*The video for Dizzee Rascal’s ‘Dirtee Money’ was unavailable on http://www.youtube.com/, therefore this song was analysed instead as it is no. 11 in the chart.


As we can see, there are three very obvious outliers (the songs by Shakira, Temper Trap and Mini Viva), whilst the other seven music videos all have reasonably high levels of materialism. The average materialism rating for all ten songs is 6.6/ 14. Considering that in my previous research the highest average score (the average score for the 1990s decade) was 4.6, whilst the highest score for more recent artists (2000 onwards) – which excluded the outlier that was Shakira – was 5.5, this is quite a high score. If we take out the three outliers, which isn’t so unjustifiable as, for one thing, Mini Viva were not in the original list and, by the sounds of it, ‘Dirtee Money’ may well have had a higher score, which would leave just two outliers – suggesting that 80% of today’s most popular music has a reasonably high level of materialism. The average materialism score for 7 of these songs (excluding Shakira, Temper Trap and Mini Viva) is 8.7/ 14. This is very high compared to my previous findings. Of course this is not to say that all modern music is materialistic and these findings cannot be generalised to the whole music scene, however what it does suggest is that, out of the music being produced at the moment, the more materialistic ones are the most popular ones. This is a very important point, but does this mean that the more materialistic a song is the more popular it will become? An interesting thing to consider is the role that the music video plays in the song’s popularity. There can be no question that these highly materialistic music videos are created for the sole purpose of selling the artist, but is this why they are popular, or is it for their music? Do music videos really have this amount of selling power?

Another important thing to consider is that there are several other important debates regarding representational issues in music videos. Perhaps the most important of these is the way in which females are represented in music videos. We can see that in terms of materialism Shakira had a very low score, making her one of the ‘good guys’, if you will. However, in terms of female representation, her video ‘She Wolf’ is quite shocking. My attention was brought to this by an interesting comment on the youtube page by ‘dannythekiller100’ who commented:

“i feel like i am getting violated watching this video. it does not feel good at all.”

Despite the unfortunate username, he has a point. I must admit that I too felt rather uncomfortable whilst watching the video, which may sound unusual coming from a 17 year old boy, but it really is that bad. Some may claim that it’s a message of female strength and freedom, and I can see the arguments for that (and in that sense it’s very effective), but it cannot be ignored that it is absolutely full of sexual implications and phallic symbols, from the wolf to the sucking of the fingers and the bursts of heavy, orgasmic breathing. In my opinion it simply does not provide a good message for young girls (and boys) who have no trouble whatsoever accessing it. Even though the message may have been intended as a positive one, and from a more mature perspective it can justifiably be regarded as that, but viewers under the age of 16, maybe even 17/ 18, will not understand this side of the video and only see the attractive woman breathing heavily in very revealing clothing. Therefore, although I had not originally intended to discuss female representation (but this video provided too much of an argument), it is clear that there are many other issues other than materialism regarding the debate of ‘what makes a good role model’, and as this video suggests that performing well in one area doesn’t absolve an artist of performing poorly in another area.

Back to the issue of materialism, however, perhaps the most important issue here is the idea of the music video selling the artist, which I touched upon very briefly earlier. This is important because if a video has the power the sell an artist, then it is simultaneously selling the ideologies and lifestyles portrayed in the video. And this is the essence of the problem; the ideologies in many of these music should (at least in my opinion) be regarded as immoral, yet it is quite possible that these videos are successfully selling immoral ideologies to viewers, judging by the fact that these songs represent the most popular songs at this moment and assuming that the music videos had something to with it. Because on this assumption, if they are buying the artist (which they are) they are also buying the negative ideologies. This is the worrying thing, and it is worrying that my findings support this.

Media Investigation: Materialism in Pop Music

Media Investigation: Materialism in Pop Music

Aim

This investigation aims to explore the presence of materialistic values in pop music. The investigation will look at prominent artists within the pop genre, both past and present, and compare the levels of materialism in their music and music videos. Arguments for the reasons for any possibly differences between materialism will be made, discussed and evaluated, whilst the potential effects of these values on audiences will also be considered. The hypothesis that pop music has become more materialistic over time will be tested, using 'time' as the independent variable and a 'materialism score' as the dependent variable.

“Materialism”

For the purpose of this study, ‘materialism’ will be recognised as something negative, to be considered synonymous with greed, shallowness and covetousness, whilst being the opposite to generosity. Furthermore, the objectifying of a member of the opposite sex will also be considered to be a signifier of materialism.

Methodology

The investigation requires several stages and many precautions must be taken to ensure that it remains as objective as possible. The comparing of different levels of materialism must especially be scrutinised, therefore a checklist of ‘materialism signifiers’ will be prepared and this same checklist is to be used for every music video that will be analysed. The selection of which artists, and indeed which of their songs, that are to be chosen remains another crucial area which must be as objective as possible. In order to select a range of artists who represent a wide time-span (so that a ‘study over time’ can be produced), the three most influential artists from three time intervals will be chosen, and the music videos of their three most popular songs will be analysed. Although this can be seen as hugely subjective, these decisions will be made using massive popular opinion (i.e. that which is generally accepted among the public), as well as backed up by album sales or chart number one’s (where possible).

‘Materialism Signifiers’ Checklist

The following checklist has been created and will be used for the analysis of all music videos in the investigation:

The presence of each of things signifiers is worth one point. The points are added together to create a total score out of fourteen, the higher this is the more materialistic the music video is.

Selecting the Artists and Their Songs

In order for ‘time’ to be the independent variable, three time intervals will be studied, that is to say that artists will be selected from three different eras, so that differences between eras can be analysed. These intervals will be: 1980-89, 1990-99 and 2000-09. The three most influential artists from each era will be selected.

1980-89

1990-99

2000-09

Data collected from http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/List_of_best-selling_albums_worldwide on 29/08/09

These artists have been selected as the most influential within their respective decades. The artists have been selected based on worldwide album sales. Therefore, for the most part, these artists are the three top selling pop artists for each decade. There are, however, three exceptions to this rule. The first of which is Britney Spears, who is in fact the fourth best selling pop artist of the 90’s after Shania Twain. However, partly due to the fact that Britney Spears has a second album with 20 million sales (‘Oops I Did it Again’ – although it was released in 2000) whilst, furthermore, because Shania Twain borders on the ‘country’ genre, it appears that Britney Spears was, overall, a more influential artist. The other two exceptions to the rule are Justin Timberlake and Beyonce, as there wasn’t enough data representing current album sales (i.e. 2000 onwards), in fact Shakira was the only post 2000 pop artist with at least 20 million sales, below which the sales aren’t included. Therefore, Justin Timberlake and Beyonce were selected on the basis that they are currently extremely popular artists worldwide and regularly have number ones in the charts. It should also be explained that these figures represent the best selling artists of each decade rather than the best selling albums, as in some cases (such as with Michael Jackson, Backstreet and Boys Céline Dion) one artist has two albums which sold more copies than another artist’s best seller (for example Céline Dion’s ‘Let’s Talk About Love’ sold 31 million copies – more than Britney Spears’ ‘...Baby One More Time’), however it’s more important to find the three most influential artists than to find the best selling albums.

Now that the artists have been selected, three songs from each must also be selected. Again, this is based on what tends to be accepted as they’re most popular songs and will be backed up by single sales/ number ones where possible. Note that these songs are not necessarily selected from their bestselling album which was mentioned above.

The tables show the three songs for each artist, including the Materialism Score calculated using the checklist:

1980-89

1990-99

2000-09

Results

This graph includes each of the selected songs from each selected artist and shows their respective materialism scores out of fourteen. The songs are in decade order, and, within each decade, in a lowest to highest materialism score order. Although the trendline shows a positive correlation between time and materialism, it is hard to find any conclusive evidence from this graph due to the excess of outliers; in fact it’s hard to spot any real pattern of results. However, if only a few outliers are excluded then a positive correlation becomes more apparent:

This graph excludes five outliers (‘Material Girl’, ‘Because You Loved Me’ and all three of Shakira’s songs), and the difference is quite significant. A positive correlation is much stronger and therefore suggests a fairly strong link between materialism and the decade that the song belongs to. The strength of the correlation is supported when we look at the avergae materialism score for each artist (i.e. an average calculated from the score of each song):

This graph of averages strengthens the argument that materialism is more prone to occur in more recent (and current) music videos than in older ones, as a fairly strong positive correlation is present even with the inclusion of of the outliers which were excluded from the previous graph. Shakira’s average score, however, remains a major outlier, whilst Céline Dion and Madonna’s average scores only appear to be minor outliers, suggesting that their songs previously excluded as outliers perhaps aren’t representative of their typical work. If we remove Shakira from the graph of averages then the correlation becomes very strong:

Providing the strongest correlation yet, here the trendline is able to match the results very closely with only minor outliers in each direction. These results could suggest several things about both the trendline and about the significance of Shakira’s exclusion:

a) That pop music is becoming increasingly materialistic

b) That Shakira is an unconventional artist and ignores current trends in order to pursue her own vision of her art

c) Shakira grew up in Colombia and may therefore have a different musical culture/ opinion than rival US artists, and that this is a reflection of differences between Western cultures and non-Western cultures

d) Three of Shakira’s closest contemporaries (Britney Spears, Backstreet Boys and Justin Timberlake) we’re, at some point or another, working alongside songwriter/ producer Max Martin, whilst Backstreet Boys and Justin Timberlake both worked with song writer/ producer Lou Pearlman. Both of these men had massive commercial success working with several big-name pop stars/ groups simultaneously and therefore heavily influenced the style of their artists. It could be that materialism signifiers are present in these artists’ work as a result of their producers direct audience targeting and perhaps Shakira was able to steer clear of a producer which such ambitions

Either of these arguments, or a combination of them, could have led to the results that we see, however we have no way of investigating this or the extent to which each factor may have influenced the results as it would just be speculation.

Another interesting perspective is if we create an average materialism score for each decade using each of the songs by each artist:

Interestingly, the graph suggests that materialism has peaked in the 1990s and is now slowly dropping. However, this graph includes Shakira’s results who, as we know, can be considered a major outlier compared to Justin Timberlake and Beyonce’s results.

Here the 2000-09 average was calculated using Justim Timberlake and Beyonce’s results (excluding Shakira’s) and it suggests something quite different. If we look at these two graphs, or indeed any of the other previous pairs of graphs, it becomes clear that it’s more likely for Shakira to be an outlier than for both Justin Timberlake and Beyonce to be an outlier, therefore it also appears more likely that this second graph is more accurate and therefore materialism in pop music videos appears to be increasing and may continue to do so.

Conclusion

These sets of graphs now provide enough evidence for us to say that, judging by the artists selected for the study (which were selected on the basis of being the most influential of each decade), pop music is becoming increasingly materialistic. However, the true measure of this may be with a separate case study analysing Madonna’s music videos, as some of her videos were analysed here and, although ‘Material Girl’ was an outlier with a high score of 8/ 14, her average score wasn’t identified as significantly above the average, however she is still making music videos therefore it would be interesting to see if her work has increased, decreased or stayed at the same level of materialism. This case study could provide an interisting follow-up study which may strengthen or possibly contradict these findings.

But if pop music is becoming more materialistic, what does this really mean? How will this affect the music of the future? How does this influence what audiences think about and want from music? Well all of these are interesting points of discussion, yet without proper audience research we can only speculate. If these trends are to continue, however, it seems worrying to think what a music video might be like twenty years from now, would it score 14/ 14 on the checklist of materialism signifiers? One possibility is that, although already the dominant force in popular music, producers/ songwriters in search of commercial success may become even more widespread, perhaps reducing popular music to watered-down, formulaic works. Although it could be argued that this has been the case for over ten years (starting with the likes of Lou Pearlman and Max Martin), if the trends found in the study continue then it’s possible that producers will become even bigger central figures. Examples of pop music becoming formulaic can be found almost everywhere we look, such as the popular new artist Pixie Lott, amongst others. Take an attractive young woman, write her a catchy song about teenage rebellion (i.e. ‘Mama Do’) and you have an instant number one for a few weeks. This is strongly reminiscent of Britney Spear’s breakthrough into instant fame and popularity through a song of similar themes (i.e. ‘...Baby One More Time’). But is there anything wrong with this? Perhaps not, if audiences are happy listening to a catchy song for a few weeks before being handed another one and so forth then it could be considered not to be a problem at all. However the problem could lie at the feet of artists not content with being flavour of the month, but who have passionate visions for their art. If their work is deemed not to be commercial enough and therefore not marketable or profitable, then it will be hard for them to survive in a world driven by commercial success, and with catchy new songs released every month by attractive new artists then audiences may have no need at all for passionate artists. On the other hand, using the example of Shakira, the results also suggest that there will always be exceptions to the general trend, perhaps even that creavitity and passion is also profitable, therefore maybe these results could be far less significant in terms of predicting how pop music will evolve. Furthermore, there seems to be a current trend whereby independant artists can become popular without the help of a production company. Does this provide a sufficient counter-argument? Perhaps it does, but according to record sales and chartshows it doesn’t, as artists run by powerful producers are, in these terms, significantly more popular. But whatever the argument, the answer will only be revealed as time goes by. In fact, it will ultimately be decided by the future generations of audiences. It brings up the crucial question; ‘is the media controlled by producers or the audience?’, i.e. are the audience happy with whatever the producer gives them or does the producer create what the audience demands? If we assume that materialism is a result of producer influence, and as materialism is increasing, it could be argued that the answer to this question is perhaps that the media is closer to being run by producers than it to being run by the audience. However, if materialism continues to increase, then it could also be argued that in time the media will become even closer to being run by producers, untill eventually it is completely run by producers and the audience becomes completely passive. On the other hand, considering the trend of artists who gain popularity without record companies, the situation could be the complete opposite. It seems, then, that the future of pop music is at a crossroads, where it could become increasingly materialistic and run by producers, or it could become more of a level playingfield where an active audience has control over what the artists create. However, history has taught us that equality on large scales cannot last for long. Ultimately, though, one of the critical deciding factors here could be how record companies and producers manage to remain appealing to artists, as modern technology seems to facilitate artists releasing their own music themselves cheaper than through record companies.

A further interesting point to consider is whether or not this trend applies to other genres of music, or even to other aspects of popular culture. For example, hip- hop and R&B are often talked about as the most materialistic of music genres and there are probably examples of current hip-hop music videos which would score over 10/ 14 using the checklist, so what if they become even more materialistic? Not to mention the fact that an even bigger concern among these videos is the representation of women due to the role they play and the lack of clothes they often wear, some might even argue that hip-hop videos are already bordering on soft porn, what then twenty years from now? Regarding other aspects of popular culture, what is also worth noting is how popular MTV is and how vast its networks have become. In the UK, MTV has a total of ten television channels, at the forefront of which is the original MTV which is primarily made up of shows hosted by singers or other celebrities (e.g. Sharon Osbourne's Charm School, Xzibit’s Pimp My Ride, A Shot At Love With Tila Tequila, Cribs etc), all of which purposefully attract specific audiences with the celebrity host and all of which contain materialistic attitudes, not to mention shows such as My Super Sweet 16 which is incredibly materialistic. Furthermore, it is clear that the type of music a person listens to and the TV/ films they watch are likely to influence what other interests they have, what kind of friends they have, what clothes they tend to wear and perhaps even the way they think. This is indeed a worry if we assume that materialism in popular culture is increasing, as future generations could potentially be adversely affected.

But how does this affect the production of our own video, should we be influenced by these findings? Although we have not chosen a pop band but an indie band instead, and typically indie bands should be promoting ideology opposite to materialism, but if we have reached a stage where materialism is influencing all aspects of popular culture and spreading across different musical genres then perhaps we would not go too far wrong by incorporating some materialism signifiers in our own video. Do we perhaps expect, maybe even want, a certain level of materialism in our music videos? Does it perhaps provide another form of escapism? These videos increase celebrity worship, maybe absorbing ourselves in the rich, glamorous lifestyles of these "role models" helps us forget just how different our world is to theirs. But does this justify creating materialistic music videos? Truth is, this discussion can carry on forever because it's as subjective as anything else.

In my personal opinion, materialistic music videos are damaging to society because they have the power to adversely influence popular opinion, promoting greed, vanity and perhaps even ignorance whilst neglecting the value of genuine individuality.

Evaluation

Although my findings suggest a fairly strong correlation and some measures were taken to minimise subjectivity, the methodology can still be criticised for several reasons. For example, although the artists that were selected were selected on a fairly objective and considered basis in order to best represent the majority of other artists active at the same time, a large enough sample of artists for this to be true was still not possible to be collected due to the impossibly vast amount of analysis that this would require. Therefore, although these particular artists may represent a trend in increasing materialistic values, we cannot say for sure that this was true to every artist. In fact, we can say that it was not true to every artist because we found Shakira to be a strong outlier. Another criticism can be made for the 'materialism checklist' which was used as, although it was fairly comprehensive, it is never quite possible to encompass such a subjective matter as 'materialism' into a quantitative measurement. Furthermore, the ratings of materialism may have been subject to a certin level of bias as each rating was relative to what had been analysed before. Also, only one person (me) rated the videos. Needless to say, many other people may have given different ratings, therefore the rating system was subjective, so the reliability of the findings are weakened. In order to improve this aspect of the investigation, more judges must be used to rate the videos so that an averaged may be created and the reliability of the findings increased. In conclusion, many aspects of the investigation were controlled at a good level considering my limitations, however it is clear that there are several weaknesses to the investigation which must be considered when evaluating the strength of the findings.

The History of Indie Music

The History of Indie Music

Today, the 'indie' genre is one of the most popular musical genres, perhaps even the most popular genre among young people. However, the term 'indie' can refer to several things and there are great variances within indie music, and 'indie' is today something quite different to what it was when it first appeared.

Initial Movement, Meaning & Ideology

When the term first appeared, it was used to describe music independant from popular music, i.e. the dominant genre(s) of the time, hence why 'indie' is an abbreviation of 'independant'. Consequently, indie bands weren't signed to major record labels, but rather controlled each aspect of their music (e.g. production, performing, recording etc.) themselves and often refused the help of commercial record labels. Regarding the musical movement, indie bands began to form as far back as the 1960s, where lyrics were mostly inspired by themes of peace and anti-war. Perhaps the earliest, true indie band was Velvet Underground, who did everything themselves regarding the production of their albums and thus created a break from traditional styles of music and the traditional musical culture as a whole. However, as a result, Velvet Underground were not commercially successful and sold very few albums, although they are today widely regarded as hugely influential in breaking ground for future bands.

In the 1970s and 80s, more sub-genres emerged, such as "progressive rock", "new wave" and "alternative". These all represented slight diversions from existing, popular genres, upholding the ideology of indie music being different from what is regarded "mainstream". However, during the 90s this ideology was jeopardised as so-called indie bands began to sign major labels rather than remaining loyal to their respective indie labels. As a result of this, indie music began entering the maintsream and the term indie began to refer to a musical style rather than the ideology it represents.

Modern Indie Music

A crucial change has taken place regarding indie music over the years. This is the concerned with the relationship between music and ideology. What was originally termed indie represented a very specific ideology of differing from current trends, therefore the term indie referred mainly to this ideology rather than the actual style of music. Today, however, the pendulum has swung almost completely to the other side, and indie music refers to a particular musical style rather than a radical ideology. This is perhaps due to the fact that the popularity of indie music has grown vastly, to the point where such bands can be commercially successful, and to the point where it can no longer be a "radical ideology" because it has in fact become a part of popular culture and is the current trend.