Case Study on a Music Artist

I have chosen to do a case study on Christina Aguilera and look into how she has explored different types of images with each different album that she releases. Christina is a very successful pop singer and has exposed into a international star. Each time she produces a new album it is varied from her previous one and ensuring that she is always current. Her career began at when she was just a teenager and record 'Reflection' for a multimillion Disney movie Mulan. This was very successful and gained her a record contract with RCA Records. Her Debut album titled 'Christina Aguilera' was realised on 24 August 1999 and reached the top of the Billboard 200. This album portrayed her as an innocent girl that young teenagers would relate to. However Christina was dissatisfied with the music and image that her Record company had created for her 'Bubblegum pop' and decided to leave them.

Her second album 'Stripped' showed a very different side to Christina and showcased her raunchiness. It was instantly successful debuting at no2 on the Billboard charts but her amazing vocals were overlooked by her sexually provocative image. She had decided to go completely against her Bubblegum image and started to refer to herself as 'Xtina'. The first song off her new album was 'Dirrty' with it controverisal music video which was had a negative effect on her in the U.S. However this did not discourage Christina she claimed that "the image better reflected her true personality than the image she cultivated back in 1999". Despite all this the media attention the album was still a huge success and the song 'Beautiful' gain her a Grammy for best female pop vocal. This album allowed her to cross over into different genre such as R&B and Rock enabling her to appeal to a variety of different people. Christina was very much in control of her career and image. In attempt to further shift her innocent image she appeared in many sexy photo shoots such as 'Rolling Stones' where she appeared naked with only a guitar covering her and performing with the 'Pussycat Dolls' in the Viper room. This act is know for it's raunchy and sexy dancing. Christina was also caught in a major media story in which she kissed Madonna and Britney Spears at the MTV Music Awards during Madonna's song 'Like a Virgin. She had been successful of changing her image and portraying a different side to her.

Christina's third album 'Back to Basics' showed her embracing a much more mature look which was praised highly by critics. She took on a 'Marilyn Monroe' look with bright blonde hair and red lips portraying the old Hollywood glamour seen in the 1920s. On this album she produced to duets with Miss Elliot and Nelly both of which were not that successful in the U.S but were in other parts of the world. Overall the album did very well debuting at no1 in the U.S, U.K and many other countries. The album had a much more old fashioned and jazz style to it seen in the music and videos. Christina is once again showcasing a different side to her, a much more mature side. Her single 'Ain't No Other Man' reached no2 on the world chart and her follow up singles 'Hurt' and 'Candyman' also did well. Christina co-directed all the videos showing her artistic side and having control over her image. Each album presents different times within Christina's like, the first being her innocents, the second her rebellion and her third showing her maturity. She is a talented singer who knows what image and music she wants to produce. Who knows what her next image will be with her up coming album. Either way she is very successful in the music industry and has achieved what she wanted.

Nickleback's 'Someday' Text Analysis

Aside for my absolute love for this band and this video I feel that the concept and the style in which it is done is excellent. Though not uncommon in its idea the execution of shots, angles and everything in between how each actor moves in relation to each other makes this a truly superbly designed video and one I enjoy watching over and over.
This idea of course is the central character being dead. Though he and the audience are unaware of this. The character repeatedly tries to communicate with other characters, typically a love interest, and through the manipulation of all those elements above the audience remains unaware that they are deceit and no longer seen. The discovery of such fact is made even more poignant in this video as death is only clearly shown when the love interest is killed also, When her ghost can finally see our protagonist it is clear he has been dead all along.
Though this great realisation doesn’t occur until the final scene there are many hints throughout the video which build up to this ending that display the true skill of the director. For instance the first narrative shot shows us a woman crying whilst looking at a newspaper, the paper we later discover contains an article on her partners death. However with the next scene of her throwing the paper combined with her packing a suitcase as described by the lyrics and the presence of her also upset partner we disregard the papers relevance and assume that anguish of the man is a result of an argument. Angles and misc-en-scene help this misinterpretation he is often in the background and so seen by the audience but not by the character. This is manipulation is also used in other scenes such as the car when he is bashing on the window. It is originally thought that his strong action are the cause of her upset and the result of her death though we later discover this is grief.
Another technique used within the video to enhance the narrative and style as well as to foreshadow the conclusion is special effects. One of the best examples is during the begging of the video in a seemingly insignificant shot. The alive woman steps through a puddle and leaves footprints behind her. She is then followed by the man who does not. The quick continuity editing of this hinting scene helps to enhance to brilliance of the video whilst not bluntly giving away the finale. Other hints similar to this include the shot of the paper seen previously and the shot of her rear view mirror which doesn’t show him running behind her. These hints though part of the overall narrative are also very carefully linked into the lyrics which state ’why weren’t we able to see the signs that we missed.’
The narrative and how it is established using media techniques is what I believe makes this video so powerful however as the video still is a promotional device for the band, the establishing and close up shots of the band playing and performing the song are also integrated within the video.

Panic At The Disco!

This is another one of my favourite music videos, this is because of the way that the band has choosen to represent the song. Throughout the whole video there appears to be a circus theme with face paint and freaky people, it appears to be very showy. However the video still has some relevance to the songs with its wedding scences that follow the lyrical narrative. This narrative is of course broken towards the end and replaced with a ciruseque dance scene. The lead singer is defintately portrayed as the main foucus throughtout the video and maintains the domance within each scence.

All American Rejects

This music video by All American Rejects has to be one of my favourites. I like how the video connects to the song and helps the audience connected to the song also. The quick cuts and continuously moving also make this video affective to it's target audience.

Glogster

Induction

This will be my music blog and will show my process of anaylsing and eventually creating a music video. On this blog i will look at a varity of different music videos, directors and artists, by doing this it will help to further my knowledge of how music videos work. once i have gain enoguh knowlegde i will begin to create my own music video that fits the brief of a traditional music video.