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12th-19th September- Choosing and Deciding on an Artist

We looked at a variety of unsigned artists that we could potentially use within our coursework and initially were looking at the acoustic indie/folk genre. However, we quickly moved on to looking at acoustic singer song writers. We felt by choosing a song with sentimentality and a slow pace, we would be able to create an effective and professional video with the resources we have; if we were to look in to the pop or rock genre then we felt it would be more difficult to create a professional and effective video as most pop videos involve multiple outfits and exotic or unusual locations and rock videos usually display a live concert and very dark mise-en scene regarding their location, costumes and lighting.

We used both SoundCloud and Youtube in order to research and listen to various unsigned artists and as a team communicated with one another as to which artists we had found and thought would be a good potential candidates.

Initially, we were looking at a young acoustic singer song writer called Kirsty Lowless and a song called 'Miss Me' which I found on Youtube. This can be seen on the left hand side. We all agreed that we loved this song and thought it would be a good song to create a video for; however, after much deliberation and more research we found out she is signed to a label called Popshack which is a small label committed to the future music and artists of this generation. Popshack helps artists by promoting them in the hope they will get signed by a major record label. We then went on to look at other candidates,. Kathryn found a girl called Dodie and a song called 'Adored by Him'; this can be viewed below. However, not all of us were convinced about the song and felt we could find potentially better songs and artists.

After deciding these first two artsits may not necessarily be good or available to us, our teacher suggested a band he knew called Fred's House. Fred's House is a small award winning band in Cambridge consisting of 5 people. However, after listening to their songs and looking at their videos we were quick to notice that a lot of the songs they did were covers and all their original songs had already had videos produced and created for them. We were unsure as to whether they were signed to a label and about their songs so contacted them via email Their response can be seen below.

However, whilst waiting for a reply from Fred's House, we were also informed about another unsigned artist called The Duke of Nukem who we listened to and researched on ReverbNation; he is a singer song writer from the UK and has a variety of original songs. However, it was whilst listening to The Duke of Nukem that we went on the ranking list chart for Singer Song Writers and came upon the artist at No.1 called Christian Smith who is a 21 year old singer songwriter from Cambridgeshire in the UK. According to the listings on Reverbnation he has 5 original songs which as a group we all listed to and felt all of them could be really good songs to use for our music video. We decided that this artist would also appeal to our target demographic more so than The Duke of Nukem and offers some of the 4 elements of the uses and gratification theory such as personal identity via his songs and personal relationships. He also lives relatively close by so we thoguht it would also be good if he was avialble to feature in the video if possible. After evaluating all the artists we found we felt Christian Smith would be the best one to represent as we all liked him and his music and by listening to the songs felt a lot of them could show a clear narrative story line with intervals of Christian himself playing guitar; this would be effective in order to break the video up as well as showcase his talent, voice and follow the conventions of our genre.

Originally when listening to his songs we liked Another Day Another Way, Find A Way Through and Pack of Cards however, whilst communicating with Christian via email we started re-evaluating the songs and eventually, ended up totalling changing our decision to his song- 'Bruises'. We felt 'Bruises' wasn't just a good song that we all liked but it would be easy to create a narrative video to as we could represent and reflect the lyrics being spoken. We also liked the sentimentality it had to Christian which can be heard through the lyrics and his voice and is also a song that could connect with the audience. Alive performance of 'Bruises' can be viewed below.

Print screens of our emails to Christian can be viewed below in which we asked whether he is signed and whether he gives us permission to use one of his songs for our A2 media coursework which he not only agrees to but also willingly offers to star in the music video himself. We also went on to send him emails regarding our research and planning and when we hope to shoot the video and what genre he classes himself as. Please use the arrows to slide through the emails below.

CHRISTIAN SMITH

Conventions of Singer Songwriters

Singer Songwriters as a genre is much more difficult to define in terms of their conventions than pop for example or acoustic folk or indie as the genre of singer songwriters is too broad (O'Sullivan et al) to label specific conventions to it. An example of a well known acoustic band that started out as singer songwriters is Mumford and Sons; a video of there's can be seen below.

However, whilst researching and listening to a variety of acoustic singer songwriter songs I found various aspects that they all shared in common these include:

  • Acoustic Guitars- This showcases the artist's raw talent.

  • Long Instrumentals.

  • Expressive facial expressions- This reflects upon the lyrics of the song and allows the audience to connect to them on a sympathetic and relatable level.

  • Often builds a climax.

  • Have a meaningful or sentimental meaning- As previously mentioned this allows personal identity from the audience to the artist as the audience will be able to relate to the artist's songs if they too have ever felt the same way during a time in their lives.

  • Intimate feel between the artist and their song and the artist and the audience- This is achieved through not only the lyrics and the actions of the artist but through the mise-en scene regarding the location and the intimate feeling created between the artist and their audience.

  • Often slow motion and slow paced.

  • Most of the time they are inspired by a person or a certain event that has occurred within the artist's personal life (Personal Lyrics fulfils the Personal Identity and Personal Relationships elements of the uses and gratification theory)

  • An isolated location or one that had meaning or sentimentality to them in the past; this allows them to truely showcase and display their true feelings and emotions.

  • Editing is often slow and often features slow paced camera movements to represent the overall feeling of the song.

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