Throughout the past few decades there has been huge leaps in technology, these leaps have helped artists to spread their work via television, the internet and with all forms of advertising around our environment today. Music videos that were hugely popular in the 1960's when the first hit videos started to emerge are now over shadowed by todays massive budget short film style music videos.
Music videos were originally made to spread the work of an artist without the exhaustion of having them tour around the world frequently to keep themselves in the public eye. Through the creation of a hit music video, the artist can stay in the public eye as well as gain new fans without having to move. Music videos do extremely well in promoting the artist with all the available platforms we have today, such as television, the internet, mobile phones and programs like iTunes allowing people to put music videos on to their iPods.
Throughout the 50's before music videos came to be, artists like The Beatles and Bob Dylan were constantly touring the globe and playing the same track lists at each location in order to keep themselves heard and wanted. Once this exhaustive lifestyle was thought about, and considered to not be the most practical way of promoting their work, people started to tinker with the idea of "promo videos". This idea had brought about a massive change to the music industry, and allowed the artists to have more time to relax and to work on new material. These promo videos consisted of a simple live performance from the band which was filmed and then distributed around the globe, giving the fans the music they want to hear as well as a visual side letting them see their favorite artists in action. It may not have been live, but it was a productive way in giving the fans the music they love, and the artists the rest they deserve.
The first videos were extremely simple, but they offered entirely new ways for fans to see their artists. Fans were able to see their artists in a directed visual way, which had never been done before, and also allowed fans to listen to as well as watch their favorite artists from the comfort of their homes through the use of a television set and not just from vinyls. Despite the primitive look and feel of music videos then, they had revolutionized the media industry, with more and more artists hopping onto the band wagon creating promo vid after promo vid. While more and more artists made music videos, more and more fans brought television sets. Artists that made full use of promo videos were The Beatles who continued to bring out more and more promos, with each new feature being made with different techniques, a popular example of a Beatles promo video is the hit song; Strawberry Fields. Strawberry Fields was a song about a place one of the band members spent a lot of childhood time their, and the song is simply about the nostalgia of the location. The promo video for this song featured very new and creative techniques for the time. It featured strange lighting, abstract camera angles and rewinding of footage, simulating the feel of an actual film feature. Strawberry Fields was also in full colour, sparking yet another new wave length for other artists to catch up with.
Despite the success of this form of video directing, many artists chose to remain creating promos featuring a simple camera view of them singing a live performance. Even well into the 70's artists were still creating simplistic promos of them singing, a popular example is David Bowie - Life on Mars which featured Bowie singing with just a white background behind him, giving his audience the song they like, as well as their artist with no other artistic attempts to gain their favor, just the music they love. Some artists however did take promos further then The Beatles did,and chose to feature separate clips of footage creating somewhat of a collage of the artists travels and incorporated into a music video.
Even though promos were predominantly made in the U.K and the U.S.A, Australia became one of the main players in the ever growing market of music video production, it did this by creating television programs that did not feature scripted television episodes, but featured music video after music video, giving fans the chance to watch their artists as if they would day time television. Although the U.K was airing Top of The Pops since the 70's, it had put a limit on the what videos it would show as well as the amount it would show, preventing it from being a global hit. More and more households begun owning television sets, thus creating more reason for countries and companies to compete with the way they will air their music videos to their public. The U.S.A squashed all competition with the airing of "The Music Television Program" which is today known as the popular MTV. The first song played on MTV was the Bugles hit; Video Killed The Radio Star, placing a somewhat humorous sense of irony in the viewers and sparked a new age for fans to see and hear their artists. MTV easily beat all competition due to it being 24 hours, allowing fans to watch and hear their artists literally whenever they wanted to. There were also leaps in recording and editing technology in this time, giving the music video concept all the more space to grow around the globe.
Promotion
When artists were considering a music video, they also had to consider how this would promote them, and how it would place them in the public eye as well as give fans an outlook on what their favorite artists are all about. This put a huge strain on artists to ensure they are able to attract and gain as many fans as possible without losing any due to a wrongful opinion they may have evoked in the way they carry themselves. They have to also consider how they would promote the music video. If said artist is signed to a successful record company, the record company will do the labor for them and place their video in all the right places such as a time of day in which their genre of music fans would be watching MTV, Kerrang etc. As well as the channel best suited to their genre, being more accurate in reaching the right kind of fans. However, if there are any doubts that an instant music video would be successful, maybe because the artists are not backed by a record label, it was a good idea to send out the song for radio play, to save funding in case the promo publicity failed to gain attention. Depending on the amount of radio play the song receives, there will or will not be a music video created. If the song generated a lot of radio play, then it suggests to the artists that there are fans of the song and with more and more people owning television sets, so much so that television has become a household necessity, it was definitely a good idea to create a music video for television use, all the more contributing to the success of the artist and the song. Nowadays, due to the 6 billion people on Earth, there is not often a music video hated by everyone, and as such there is a much wider market and more and more music videos are posted onto websites such as YouTube, Myspace and forms of social networking, where fans spread the video around themselves. Due to the success of the internet, successful artists have their own journalists, reviewers and promoters working for them for free with people spreading around their work trying to get others interested as well as commenting on the videos others have posted. All the market research any artist will ever need now exists on the internet.
Extension of Income
All artists need to make money in order for their record company to continue paying for them to create more and more material. Due to the extremely fast growing amount of formats available, there are more ways then ever now to recoup any money spent on the artists. It used to be just radio play which made money for the artists, but now there are music video charts any artist can scale, radio charts to scale, CD charts to scale, Music video DVD charts to scale and more. Popular songs are now featured on games, CD's, MP3 format as well as others, iTunes, television, radio, films and vinyls are still sold to collectors and DJ's. There are ways in which to fund music videos also, if the artist is not particularly successful enough to be backed up by a record label, they could fund a music video project by featuring in interviews for magazines, the internet as well as clothing lines and through live performances. But due to booming technology advancement rates, any one can go out and create a music video now with the right equipment. Merely a decade ago, a low budget music video cost would be in the tens of thousands, most likely lower down the line. If the artist is acquainted with someone who possesses the necessary equipment, they could effectively go out and shoot one. If the video is successful, it would mean very good things for the crew who helped create it as well as the featured artist. People are getting more and more interested in other roles of music video production, if a director is successful enough and has enough productions floating about on all formats, the directors themselves will gain fans.
No comments:
Post a Comment