Genre Theory

What is genre?
A tool that helps us study texts and audience responses to texts by parting them into different categories that have common elements. It has been argued by Daniel Chandler (2001) that the word "genre" comes from the French for "class". The term is used in literary text, media theory and to refer to a distinctive type of text

Sub genres
This is a genre within a genre. Genres are divided up into specific categories to allow us to identify them specfically by their recognisable characteristics. Steve Neale (1995) says that genres are not "systems" but they are "processes of systematization" meaning that they are are not set in stone and genres are dynamic and evolve over time.

Our Email to producers of our song

As we are going to be using an established artist's song for our music video, we need to request permission from the musics' producers (Angelo Petraglia and Ethan Johns) to use the song so that it does not appear we are claiming the song as our own work.
This is the email we sent to Angelo Petraglia and Ethan Johns as they are the producers of Kings of Leons' third album "Because of the Times" which features Charmer;

Dear Sirs,

Our names are Molly Wing, Aimie Condon, Sarah Isaacs and Charlotte Boag and we are media studies students at Enfield County School and we are currently in the early stages of producing a music video and promotional digipack alongside that. The reason for our email is to request your permission to use Kings of Leons' song 'Charmer' that you produced for our chosen video song. We have no intention of selling our video and we can assure you there will be no copyright issues at akk as it will solely be used for educational purposes.

If there are any issues please feel free to contact us.

Yours Sincerely
Molly Wing, Aimie Condon, Sarah Isaacs and Charlotte Boag

Our Groups Chosen Song for Our Music Video

As a group we have decided to make a music video for Charmer by Kings of Leon. Each member of our group likes the song and it has a very memorable riff throughout the song which can help us while editing. The song is made up of 4 instruments (2 guitars, a bass guitar and drums) which we all own so we can cover the performance side of the music video too. The lyrics are very easy which will also help us when getting someone to mime.




Despite our initial decision we decided not to continue with our Ska genre with this chosen song as the song edges more towards begin a Reggae song. The narrative of the song would also be difficult for us to show because the song is about going to prison for possesion of marijuana. The age of the song also makes it difficult for us to make a video for as the quality of the music is not as good as a recent song.



We also considered doing an older song (Jumping Jack Flash - The Rolling Stones) but we had difficulty deciding on the narrative as the lyrics to the song are very basic and do not tell a story. The song is also very repetitive which could end up very boring for our video.

Group Discussion On Our Initial Ideas

In our group we had a discussion about what bands and songs we would like to use for our music video. Some of our initial ideas on songs were;

Madness - One Step Beyond
The Specials - Ghost Town
The Kinks - All Day And All Of The Night
Pressure Drop - Toots & The Maytals
The Specials - Gangsters

We have settled on the genre of Ska as it is a very fun genre due to being a mixture of reggae and rock. We have decided to make our music video for "54-46 Was My Number" - Toots & The Maytals as it is a Reggae-Ska video so our video can reflect where Ska music comes from. The song features in the "This is England" soundtrack which is mainly made up of ska and reggae songs. This song does not have music video either meaning that there are no expectations of the music video.

My Chosen Video

This is one of two music videos for Kid Cudi's Pursuit of Happiness. This version is directed by Megaforce. The song features vocals from MGMT and is produced by Ratatat. The video features footage of members of Ratatat.

Narrative Music Video

Narrative music videos are like short films with musical backgrounds. They sometimes tell the story of the song's lyrics in a visual form. The story's are often easy for the viewer to follow so that they remember the video as well as the song.

Here are two examples of narrative music videos;

http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=SEukS2YN9B8
This video (Leave Before The Lights Come On by Arctic Monkeys) shows a narrative video that does not follow the lyrics of the song but still tells a short story.



This video (Step into My Office Baby by Belle & Sebastian) shows a narrative video that does follow the lyrics of the song to tell a story.

Performance Music Video

A performance music video is where the the vocalist and/or the band are shown in the video singing, miming or playing their instruments in one or more setting.

This is an example of a performance music video (I Am Not a Robot by Marina + The Diamonds). This video shows singer, Marina singing or miming along with the words of the song in 3 different settings, each with different extravagant make up to add interest to the music video. We can not tell if she is singing or miming due to good editing techniques and timing.