Come Together//Echo Smith Case Study

Come Together

// Ecosmith

     I’d say that the genre of “Come Together” (CT) displayed in the music video is indie pop. This is because the band suits the stereotype of this genre. For example the band all stands in a room with guitarist, drummer, keyboard and singer. This stance is seen in many indie pop videos for example blink 182’s “All the Small Things” video and Green Day’s “American Idiot”. As seen below.

 Blink 182

Echo Smith

 Green Day

     Genre characteristics can be seen in all music videos. The idea is that it allows a visual representation of the type of genre the song and/or band belongs too. For example it is common, as seen in the last slide, for rock bands to have a stage set up style of the group performing; similarly it is common in rap videos to have visuals of North and Latin American ghetto’s as well as the rapper themselves as the centre of attention surrounded by money, materialistic goods and attractive, barely clothed, young women. The reason directors of music videos so this is to hone on to the target audience and visualise their fantasies of what they want to be and offer them a guideline to their self identity. This therefore makes the music video effective as the viewer sees what they believe to be “cool”, what they wish to be and how to shape their image to achieve this image. Thereby making the viewer wish to see more videos and see more songs.

Music is used by people as a method of escaping their lives and therefore living in a fantasy, their fantasy which can be unique and personal; or can be generic and relatable. The music video can give a visual representation of these fantasy’s and can often be used to create a narrative, fantasy or a behind the scenes look at a band “off camera”. By using the music video as a method of creating fantasy the viewer can help to build their own story within their own head and steal ideas from what is often cons cued as the artists fantasy, however is usually the fantasy the director sees when listening to the song. This is why music videos are often far fetched however share common conventions and inter-textual references, drawn from personal experience, pop culture and (often in rap) rivalry with fellow artists.



This is a poorly shot home video, from YouTube, of Seth MacFarlane's adult comedy, American Dad. Pictured is the main character Stan fantasizing a narrative in his head while listening to a song by his favourite band. This nicely represents the point of people making their own ideas and connotations of songs and the meanings of them.
This is Eminem's music video to "Like Toy Soldiers". The track is about rap rivalries and the use of music videos to express these rivlaries. The track and music video also acknowledges at the end the lives lost due to these rivalries including such names as Notorius B.I.G and Tupac Shakur.

Screen Shot of the dead rappers who lost their lives to gangs and rap rivalries rife within the industry in the 1990's.

The idea of fantasy is seen also within Echosmtihs' video. However it seems to become more of a sexual fantasy coming from the older teacher towards the young female in the group. The notion that sex sells is becoming increasingly popular and began in the 1980's with artists like Madonna and Kylie Minogue. The young girl is used as a sexual object throughout the video for male fantasy; the video, like many pop music videos, is targeting young males with the age range of 13-25 but will satisfy men of all ages with the links to "sex sells" tactics.

This can be seen in modern day also as the best selling artists these days are mainly young women barely over 20. For example Miley Cyrus, Nicki Minaj, Katy Perry and Rihanna amongst others, all of whom have one common theme: music videos with them center stage dancing around barely clothed with focus on their large breasts and bottoms.
Nicki Minaj's latest release "Anaconda". The music video is all about boobs and bums and is used as one giant inuendo for sex, the track peaked at number 2 on the US billboard chart.

The LP cover for Nicki Minaj "Anaconda"

"Sexercize" The 12th track on Kylie Minogue's latest studio album "Kiss Me Once". The album and track names and content are clearly using sex and sexual innuendo's to sell the album.



Miley Cyrus' notorious 2013 VMA awards performance with Robin Thicke. The video gained 3 million views on YouTube and through the star from Disney star to celebrated sex object/recording artist.

The vastly superior age of Robin Thicke (37) from Miley Cyrus (22) is very similar to the sexual references in the music video for Come Together by Echo Smith where the much older teacher has a strange and inappropriate attraction to the young female student.

This symbolises the direction the music industry is heading where something such as Miley's "Twerk" is deemed perfectly accpetable on a man who would have been 31 when Miley reached the age of consent is perfectly capable of having someone that much younger than him perform highly publicized, soft core sexual acts on him; whereas the teacher in Echo Smiths music video would have been handed a prison sentence for something equally as inappropriate. Regardless of the consent from the female.

However girls are not the only ones using the tactics of sex sells and using women as objects within the music industry as we can see from Robin Thicke's "Unrated" music video of Blurred Lines featuring Pharrell Williams. (The following video contains strong nudity)
 

Here we see Thicke (37) and Williams (41) dancing around with girls half their age completely naked, the video has no narrative, no effort into the production; it can only be described as soft core porn, yet this is the way music videos are made in the 21st century. It would seem that females in the music industry have suffered a nose dive from grace within the music industry from the 40's where females were still desireable within the industry without being literally naked.

Similarly one hit wonder Eric Prydz achieved great commercial success with his track "Call On Me" which also features a highly sexualised music video.
This message is put across within the Echo Smith music video where the lead singer is slightly sexualised and the older male teacher is literally going crazy over her. However the pink lip stick and little use of herself as an actual sex object (ie the lack of nudity) seems to be a throw back to the days when women didnt have to be naked to be famous in the music industry.

However this isnt always the case and some female artists have achieved great success from their natural talent without the necessity to rely upon looks; for example Adele and the late Amy Whinehouse. Both now considered cult legends of the British music industry who's image and grace is similar to that of stars of the 1940's such as Ella Fitzgerald.

 Amy Whinehouse

 Ella Fitzgerald

Adele

Sydney Sierota (EchoSmith)

The location of the music video is set in a high school where the band members are in “Saturday detention” which is an American phenomenon. This links heavily with the 1985 film ‘The Breakfast Club’. The synopsis of The Breakfast Club (TBC) states ‘Five high school students, all different stereotypes, meet in detention, where they pour their hearts out to each other, and discover how they have a lot more in common than they thought.’ The key word to highlight here is stereotypes. This shows that the music video created by Ecosmith is supposed to represent a stereotype of youth music and behaviour.

However the music video also stereotypes the lead singer into what females of the music industry are represented as in modern times. According to Goodwin’s theory the visuals are representative of more than just a narrative to accompany the song and in this instance, the singularity of the female lead singer, front and centre stage in nearly every frame, is the main focus of the music video simply because sex sells. Many of the angles and shots have a sense of voyeurism to them with the microphone not being sung into but being used as a method of seduction and male fantasy, mainly being made to make the viewer imagine the microphone as a penis.

 This has strong links to the 20th century novel ‘Lolita’. Lolita was based on an adult male “Humbert” who has a strange infatuation towards a 12 year old girl he nicknames “Lolita”. The two subsequently tour North America and Humbert bribes her for sexual favours. This is relevant to the music video as the teacher appears to have similar feelings of lust towards the lead singer and she is made out to be a sexual figure desirable to mean young and old.

Still from Lolita (1997)

The Breakfast Club (1984)

Plan B// Ill Manors

“How Are Young People Represented In The Ill Manors Music Video?”

Plan B’s Ill Manors was written during the aftermath of the London riots of 2011. In the song Plan B talks about the way that the working class are repressed by the bourgeoisie and how class struggle is a result of this repression to see change in society; for example the London riots. However within the music video and the lyrics of the song Plan B subsequently portrays a widely stereotyped image of young people as dangerous, violent and delinquent.

Firstly; in the music video Plan B casts a lot of young children in black hoodies wearing clothes that make it very difficult to see their face; i.e. Balaclava’s. This fits a very widely believed stereotype that young offenders walk around in hoodies and commit petty crimes such as vandalism; however can also be believed to commit more serious crimes, mainly knife crimes, and Plan B shows this in the lyric:  “Oi look there's a chav, that means council housed and violent. He's got a hoodie on give him a hug, on second thoughts don't you don't wanna get mugged.” What Plan B is doing here is being ironic and using stereotypes, but talking about them as though they are fundamental and correct; in which he does throughout the song. This is effective as it shows the audience the common belief about these people; the effect it has upon the audience is that it makes them empathise with the kids and feel that the views society have upon them are unjust. For example every one of the viewers will know that every child they see in a hoody isn’t going to attack and mug them.

Secondly Plan B sites that ‘council estate kids’ or working class children are represented negatively in the press. This is shown in the lyric “Keep on believing what you read in the papers, council estate kids, scum of the earth”. This appears to be an attack on the middle and upper classes who are readers of such papers as the daily mail who give/ reinforce the working class kids’ negative stereotypes of all having ASBO’s and taking drugs among other common beliefs of council estate kids. Plan B is stating that the working class kids, him being one of them, don’t care about what is spread around about them by the media and the music video is almost a defence mechanism to try and employ a fairer playing field in the media, a fight back almost.

Likewise the lyric “we’re all drinkers, drug takers” uses another media generated stereotype in the frenzy of backlash towards the working class youths following the widespread riots originating in Tottenham late 2011. Although this was a wide spread stereotype well before the riots, it was rumoured that Mark Duggan (the victim who’s death sparked the riots) was a drug dealer, this was a false allegation. Therefore, the lyric used by Plan B intertwines with the riots as it uses a common stereotype thought of people who live in council owned houses and flats. It is also commonly believed that people live in accommodation such as this because of drug addiction; and that these people are living so close to the breadline because of their lack of money, which is due to it all being wasted on drugs, thereby creating an uncompassionate view of the working class. The affect Plan B’s use of this lyric and stereotype is that it will make the viewer realise how ridiculous the idea of this stereotype really is and that will, in turn, make the viewer question other stereotypes.

Another representation of youth in the video Ill Manors is that it creates an atmosphere of class warfare between the upper class and the working class. From a Marxist point of view this is a standard fact throughout societal history and Marxists would approve of this video as it shows revolt and class struggle to help bring about social change; like with the NHS and The Suffragette movement. This essence of class warfare is created within the music video by snippets of clips of rioting and revolt and showing the working class fighting with the police and attacking upper class, privately educated, politicians. One piece of cinematography that portrays this is the image of Cameron and Clegg stood arm in arm on a wedding cake, representing the coalition government; then a dog on a council estate eating the image and excreting them on to the pavement. This can be interpreted as the common view of the proletariat’s views of the government as a ruling power as a whole. This is why this imagery is effective; as it makes the viewer realise what the widespread view of the government and the way the country is being ran is.

Similar too this the lyric “politics, ain’t it all, smoke and mirrors, April fools” indicates that Plan B is attacking the politicians in the current government. The way this represents young people is that it gives the impression that young working class people are angry at the current government and that they have therefore given up on trying to cooperate with the government and want them gone, however can’t get rid of them as they  have too much power over them. The lyrics indicate that young people have no faith in their government as they are all liars and therefore can’t be trusted. The impact this has on the viewer is that it can either make the viewer empathise with the young people or resent them. This is because people will either agree or, at least, side with the kids that the government are liars and can’t be trusted or that the government aren’t liars and that the kids are the negative influences on society and that they are the undesirables in this situation.

The lyric “Give us free money and we don't pay any tax, NHS healthcare, yes please many thanks” is a reference towards successful benefits for the proletariat that Marxists would believe have only been earned through class struggle. This means that if it weren’t for the public suffering and fighting for some kind of benefit then it wouldn’t have been introduced in the first place. However Marxists believe that this is only used as a calming method and in England the NHS and the welfare system, the two things Plan B notes in the lyric, are slowly being taken away from the proletariat and have been since the leadership of Margret Thatcher in the 1980’s; which is what Plan B is referencing in his lyric; that the rewards of class struggle, i.e. the welfare system and the NHS, are being taken away. Plan B is also using irony to say that youths, in particular working class youths, enjoy the benefits of these rewards of class struggle without holding up their end of the deal, paying taxes and living off of the welfare state; because of this they are viewed negatively in the public eye and therefore people are more inclined to dislike them. Therefore Plan B’s lyric, like most, is to state that this is not the case and a gross stereotype. The reason Plan B has used this is to make the public realise the oppression and unfair bias against these kids and that they have difficult lives because of these stereotypes, the goal of this lyric in summary is to generate empathy from the viewer.

In conclusion young people are represented in a stereotypical way in the Ill Manors music video. Plan B cleverly takes stereotypes generated by media and politicians and creates a music video that almost makes a mockery of them. The reason Plan B does this is to try and show to the public how these stereotypes are not true and that young people are actually a lot different to what they are made out to be in an ironic way by mocking the stereotypes which then makes them seem silly and unrealistic. Also I feel that the music video is designed to generate some sympathy and empathy towards the young people of this country because of these stereotypes; which is then used to show people how damaging these stereotypes can be towards these young people’s lives; with the removal of housing estates, difficulty to find jobs and lack of things to do outside of school with the demolition of things such as community centres; as seen in the lyric “Who closed down the community center? I killed time there used to be a member, what will I do now 'til September?” Plan B’s music video is used as a defensive mechanism, to stand up for the young people represented in the music video who don’t have a voice in the way their country is ran; which is then used as another devise to create empathy from the viewer.

Why We Chose Fold//Fight Back

Why We Chose Fold.

In our group we decided on Fold because Fold are in a small minority in this current generation of musicians; by this I mean, that they have tapped into the zeitgeist. We feel that the band have used the mutual feeling the youth of our generation feel of oppression and irrelevance to the way in which the country is run; as well as feeling pushed aside by the government and the ever growing difficulty to socialise themselves within British society.

The track “Fight Back” isn’t the strongest of tracks for its technicality or strength as a song in its own right; however it is innovative and original, as well as being a very political, anti-establishment tune which will reconcile within the youths of Britain as is the age old story of young people standing up for a cause and not being like their “mum and dad”. The track is all about the education cuts of 2011 and links heavily with the “March for the Alternative” demonstrations of the same year. This allowed a lot of room for creativity and Fred and I were able to brainstorm ideas with great prowess and meaning as the track’s overall message reconciled within us as individuals due to its heavy links with standing up for the youths of this country.

The track puts a beat behind a post-cuts speech by Barnabie Rayne delivered articulately with great passion and makes Barnabie out to be the voice of a generation. With this in mind we felt as though the track would allow good grounds for us to do the same with our protagonist to be perceived as the voice of a generation “without saying a word”. We planned to do this by showing him as a stereotype of the young people of England today similar to the objectives of TV programme Skins which received widely renowned praise from its target audience of 16-21 year olds, amongst criticism from the parents of these kids watching, as well as Americans.

Fold//Fight Back Track

Examples of Negative reviews of Skins from Americans

Russell Brand V Jeremy Paxman

Jeremy Paxman- Russell Brand interview.

In the early months of last year Jeremy Paxman interviewed the highly opinionated, revolutionary Russell Brand. In the video Paxman enquires about the political stance Brand takes, very similar to a Marxist point of view, and begins to delve into Brand's views of revolution from the demeaning, bourgeois exploitation of the "disenfranchised, disillusioned underclass". 

This links to our music video as it highlights the exploitation the government carries out upon the public and apart of that public is the students. Brand points out the governments failure to tackle the problems at hand with the country and the world and points out the government's obsession with money by suing the EU over banker's bonus'. This is a problem highlighted by the Marxist William Chambliss who believed that laws are passed by the ruling class to benefit their economic growth. Likewise Laureen Snider believes that the ruling class are reluctant to create laws which will threaten economic growth, which monitor businesses. 

This greed and lust for money within the ruling powers of the British government is the reason that so many cuts have been made in education and the reason these cuts have been made are because of the huge debts caused by the recession. Therefore Brand is stating that the Capitalist society our society is based upon is no longer worth taking any interest in and the only way we can resolve the problems we have is stop living to gain profit and start living to help each other's prosperity; and that this is only achievable by revolution; starting by creating things like "March for the Alternative".

We took inspiration from this video as we felt it gave us great background knowledge and insight into the politics and political views of the modern day revolutionary. As our protagonist himself is a lonely revolutionary who takes part in rallies and protests, we felt as though Brand's views would give us an insight as to what our protagonist's views and behaviours would be like in order to then display this via our music video.     

Pitch

Pitch

For our music video project Fred and I decided that we'd like to make something politically profound, however that would also identify with our peers at an age range of 17-19 year old's. With this age demographic we felt that we could make a really strong piece as we are both young adults with aspirations of attending universities next year in our education. With this train of thought we felt it would be a good idea to do a piece that links to the student cuts in 2011 and thus had the idea of using a generic student character involved with the "March for the Alternative" movement.

The original idea was to film in London and join a protest movement of any kind to get our footage, however this seemed unachievable and highly dangerous as well as expensive and inaccessible. 

So with this in mind Fred and I decided to concentrate more of a "behind the scenes" look at what toll the cuts would have on the students. Therefore we decided to do a "day in the life" principle by showing a stereotypical teenage student who failed to gain entrance to a university due to the cuts and increasing expense to higher education which is commonly becoming a middle to upper class privilege. 

Therefore we decided that we would have one sole protagonist similar to videos such as "Bittersweet Symphony"; "The Day I Died" and "Sunday Morning Call". Our protagonist would be struggling with depression due to the crushing realization that he will forever be doomed to living his life wondering what might have been, had he been able to afford the opportunity to attend a university. His life has been intoxicated with alcohol and drug abuse, amongst violence and anger at the world surrounding him; our narrative follows the broken soul on his journey to trying to find himself, firstly by figuring out what to do with his future.

Image representing the worth of a degree in the modern world, the student is depicted as a homeless man begging for money. His hat is used as a collection tray and his degree is what one would expect the sign to say "money for food".

An Insight Into The History Of The Music Industry (Unfinished)

An Insight Into The History Of The Music Industry.

Blues: 

"The Blues" originated in the US in the late 19th century. It's basic principles were of 3 chord progressions in a 12/8 bar format. The Blues "scene" is predominantly considered an African-American sub-culture and threw a lot of African-American artists into the limelight of mainstream media. Notable artists could include Robert Johnson and Ray Charles.

Robert Johnson had little recognition for his works during his lifetimes, playing on street corner bars and at small social dances. It was only after his death that he came to prominence in the media. Although Johnson's life was poorly documented; his death at 27 was a revelation at the time, however, due to his relatively low profile during his lifetime, his cause of death was widely disputed, as it still is today. The media started to join in the speculation as to what caused this mysterious death to someone so young and early on in their career and one story states that Johnson, in fact, sold his soul at a cross roads to obtain the talent that he is now remembered for. Robert Johnson was the first musician to enter "The 27 club" a club of very high profile musicians that have died aged 27, a brain child of the media.

Ray Charles cam to prominence in 1947 and his style of music was seen as very controversial at the time. The world was still enjoying the "ground-breaking" new styles of music introduced to America, and subsequently the world, by the black community and the likes of Roger Johnson. Jazz, Swing and, of course, Blues were still relatively new forms of music in comparison to the several years of dominance of the genre we now know to be "classical" music. The black community was taking it's place in western society after the abolition of the slave trade and was fighting it's way towards equal civil-rights with the assistance of the black input to music. However Ray Charles' music was the next new thing to hit the world and, in some cases, can be seen as the most influential artist in making the link between Blues and Rock n Roll. However while Ray Charles was coming to prominance in the late forties and enjoying great success in the 1950's; so where others of a different genre...

Swing/ Big Band:

Bittersweet Symphony Case Study

 

Bittersweet Symphony// The Verve Applied To Goodwin’s Theory

Track Title: Bittersweet Symphony
Album: Urban Hymns (1997)
Genre: Brtipop, Alternative Rock
Release Date: 16 June 1997

The Verve were an English Alternative Rock band of the 1990’s, made famous mostly by their iconic singer/songwriter Richard Ashcroft and were an inspiration to many of the great bands to follow in the decade and were sited as such by iconic 90’s songwriters such as Noel Gallagher, Damon Albarn and Thom Yorke. The band were formed in 1990 in Wigan and are yet another great band to be produced by the north of England and were greatly inspired by  the troubles the north faced in previous decades mainly the 70’s and 80’s. They are often associated with such bands as The Stone Roses, The Smiths and The Happy Mondays, all cult legends of the Great British music industry and all, like the Verve, northerners. The band originally began with a psychedelic sound in the early 90’s inspired by such acts as Jimi Hendrix and a great example of their psychedelic sound is the track “She’s a Superstar” and the music video accompanies the original psychedelic sound appropriately; making it look like a video straight out of 1969. However Urban Hymns (1997) is where the group from Wigan achieved great commercial success; with the album becoming one of the best selling albums in UK chart history, and the single “Bittersweet Symphony” becoming a worldwide hit and is still commonly used today; most notably as the soundtrack for the opening title sequence for ITV’s coverage of the England international football games; which, I feel, demonstrates the nations affection to the song and symbolises it’s cult following as an unofficial national anthem similar to “Don’t Look Back In Anger”-Oasis or “We Are The Champions”-Queen. Soon after finding commercial success the group split in the April of ‘99 culminating a 6 year rollercoaster of; law-suits, fall outs and drug abuse. However the 6 years will forever be looked back upon as a magic 6 years of musical genius all created as the brain-child of Richard Ashcroft who will no doubt go down as a British Rock and Roll legend.

 However the journey didn’t end there as the band reformed in the new millennium touring, although they haven’t yet released a new studio album.

 

 

 "She's A Superstar" Official Video

"Bittersweet Symphony" Official Video

 ITV England International Football Title Sequence (2009)


The music video depicts lead singer Richard Ashcroft walking through a busy street in an unspecified English city. Ashcroft is the main focus of the camera throghout the video and he remains along a one way path.
A key point to highlight is the fact that Ashcroft is going at a much slower pace from the other people along the path way. From the songs lyrics one can connote that the track is about the long road of life; this can be seen from the lyric "I'll take you down the only road I've ever been down" the road expressed here is the road of life and is a methaphor used in the song and video respectively. The pavement Ashcroft is walking on is a metaphor for his path in life and is used to express his individuality, the people he crosses paths with are people he encounters in his life, some pass peacefully and others collide with him as seen from the people he brushes shoulders with and the people he barely acknowledges, the main connotation of this idea is that no matter who comes and goes within life, you always end up alone again and noone stays for long, this is the bittersweet nature of life which is where the song and video nicely intertwine with the title.

Inspirational Music Videos; Bittersweet Sympthany// The Verve

We found inspiration from the track "Bittersweet Sympthany" by The Verve as it talks about the struggles people face as apart of the working class and the main themes of the song are that of class struggle and isolation from society.

Firstly the lyric "Tryna make ends meat, you're a slave to money, then you die." Is a brutally honest truth spoken by the mellow tones of Richard Ashcroft. Almost with a drone to his voice, the notes he hits within his key accompany the monogomy of the lyric creating an essence of dispair and hopelessness. This links with how many members of the proletariat feel today within society and expresses the hatred people have towards the class culture we find ourselves in; yet also expresses people's unwillingness to change how the society is run. This links with our music video as the song we have used; "Fightback" by Fold, realises this and is used as a mechanism calling to arms the youth of today to fight back and create a class struggle of which to rid the lower classes of the oppressive society in which we find ourselves trapped in today. Much like famous comedian Russell Brand in his interview with Jeremy Paxman, the song calls for a revolution almost, in which the people stand up, fight back and say we no longer wish to be apart of this repressive, money grabbing society that is designed to put the world's majority of money into the 1%'s pocket.

Secondly the music video for Bittersweet Sympthony dipicts front man Richard Ashcroft alone walking a retail street that symoblises capitalism and being completely oblivious to it. Ashcroft walks into many passers by, sometimes gliding past, sometimes crashing into them, either way he completely ignores the action and carries on walking ignoring the world around him and singing down the camera. This indicates Ashcroft's self inflicted isolation from society and demonstrates how he no longer wishes to be apart of the capitalist reigeim he lives under. The effectiveness of this is that it allows the viewer to see as a visual representation of what the song is about, isolation and rebellion. Within our music video we aimed to replicate this by isolating our protagonist and making him appear to be oblivious to the world around him. By doing this, similar to The Verve's music video, our protagonist demonstrates his will to break away from society's set norms and values and release himself into a new world that is brighter, hense the dream aspect of it, our protagonist is searching for his paradise. I feel that this links to the song we have selected by Fold as it states that we as a generation need to stand up and fight back. This is never necessarily acheived through violent means as shown by legendary protestors and activists such as Gandhi and Dr. King who's peacful protests brought about the abolishment of the British Empire's presence in India and Civil Rights for all respectively.

Still Showing Ashcroft's obliviousness to the world around him, symbolising a retreat from society and a rebellion from it's oppressive ways.



Locations (Unfinished)

Shooting Schedule

Shooting Schedule

·         Thursday September 25^th :

This was our first day of filming in which we decided to get our shots from a moving vehicle in early as we had a long drive from our school (CNS) to our first location St James’ Hill, Thorpe. The journey we undertook took us through the heart of Norwich’s city centre a prime example of retail dominance in the UK and a great representation of a repressive Capitalist city. This was relevant to our music video because our music video and track choice is all about the student cuts and the following protests that insued back in 2011 named “March For The Alternative”; and the way the two intertwine is that the cuts show a prime example of the government no longer being a service to the people and becoming a money making mechanism to generate as much profit as possible due to the vast amounts of debts they’re in so try to bleed as much money from students as possible and parallel to this action giving students less bank loans to help them do so and trying to focus on rebooting the dying high street retailers that the economy depends so much upon.



Above: Road side view of St James’ Hill. Below: Mapped route of our journey through the heart of Norwich City Centre, Note Chapelfield, Theatre Royal and Anglia Square Shopping Centre all come past our route.

• Thursday October 2nd:

On this day the weather was pleasent so we as a team decided to film the segment that required the use of my local park, we had to ensure our timing was perfect as the park becomes full to the brim of primary school children between 15:15 and 16:15 . We managed to arrive at 13:00 and the ambient lighting was perfect; the way the clouds sat letting glimmers of crying light down gave a strong impression of a heaven/ paradise commonly discussed in religions such as Christianity, Catholisism, Judaism and Islam. This was vital to our filming as this representation of the heavens is seen in all major religions and is one of the only things that unites a very differing and hostile community. Similarly the government's cuts upon student loans and fees united a very hostile group as young people all have their own cliques and beliefs such as any subculture as described by Jean Baudrillard; who states that in a post modern world such as ours we all have regenerated sub cultures in which we try to belong to so that we can feel individual and correct. Therefore, similar to the ideology of heaven and after life uniting the big religions, the cuts and protests, especially "March For the Alternative", united all these media and capitalist generated subcultures to fight back against the government oppressing them.

Continuing with the imagery the clouds created in our shots; the ideology of heaven links heavily to our music video as it creates a sense of tranquility and paradise where we see our protagonist, in his dream, wondering around this heavenly location, the park.

The park represents the protagonists childhood and longing for a return to a much simpler time of when he was a child, and the weather helps create the essence of tranquility and calmness that goes hand in hand with childhood and that is what, for a moment, our protagonist is longing for.  

Africa Shox Case Study Re-Upload

Idea For Music Video Narrative

The protagonist stumbles home drunk and collapses into his bed. While sleeping the camera pans towards him and a melting transition moves the boy into his dream. The filter will then change from black and white to a slightly processed filter with ambient lighting to give the illusion of a dream. When the boy wakes up he has had an epiphany and realises that he is apart of the proletariat and decides to challenge the bourgeoie members of the public by becoming a radical and trying to fight the oppression he feels his class suffers. This links to current politics with the Scottish referendem and the revolution being called for by figures such as Russell Brand.

The boys awakening from his bed is a reference to his awakening to the oppressive life he actually leads. The boy then begins his search for freedom and takes inspiration from figures such as Harvey Milk, Nelson Mandela and Martin Luther King. When in a rally, however, the boy gets killed and awakens from his dream. The transition will be sharp and the filter change back to black and white, then the narrative will end with the boy opening another can of beer early in the morning, signifying his attempt at making his dream a constant in his dull,black and white life.

Seeking permission from 1after909

Unsigned Artists Ideas

The White Lizards// So Old. There isn't anything about this group on the internet when trying to search them on the internet. The group have a feel similar to Jake Bugg, The Coral and even some aspects of The Beatles.

Unsigned Track Ideas

These music videos show a nice variety of British talent within the music industry. The lyrics and the keys of the chord progressions within the songs allow a wide variety of ideas for our music video. We can use the face paced tempo of the house genre track to create a music video that is fast paced and exciting and will test the skills we possess as editors.
In comparison to this the blues genre track will allow us to create a music video involving a narrative allowing us to be much more creative with our ideas.

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