Evaluation of my coursework

 

Evaluation of my coursework                                                                            Nosarhieme Ighodaro

For my coursework I created a music promotional campaign for a band The Cabal. This included a music video for their song The Awakening as well as a digipak and Instagram page.

With our research into the different types of heavy metal music videos and bands. We chose to make our band and lead singer a fair mix between how heavy metal artists would typically act in their video, such as the lead singer being a male being very aggressive, violent and dominant which would engage the audience as this is what they would typically expect. But we had also decided to add a uniformed and mysterious aspect to the band members especially the lead singer. In the performance sections of our video our lead singer would usually been conveying lots of emotion (aggression) through his hands, body language and shaking his hair around violently which is typical for male leads to do in heavy metal performances.

In our social media posts, we wanted to recreate but also expand on how we portrayed the members of our band. We had a group shot of the band performing which showed the expression and attitude of each of the members our lead singer at the very front screaming with his hands in a strained grabbing motion evoking his possible anger. But for our social media page we also had other posts with tour dates and stories which gave updates about the production of the music video with other photos showing the band members rehearsing and walking around.

For our digipak I created a cover which did not really give much information on what the band was like and what potential audiences might expect when they pick up the digipak. I do not have any images of the band members on the cover on the digipak which is not very typical for heavy metal digipaks as there would at least be the lead singer on the front cover. I did this because I wanted our band to come off as quite unconventional and different to already established heavy metal bands so that we could stand out more as a singular band. This can attract audiences from many age ranges even though we are still targeting the age demographic of late teens to possibly mid 20’s.

We decided not to depict the woman in our music video how women are usually used in music videos and how they are sexualised and used to gather male viewers through the ‘male gaze’. We had all the women who took part in the music video wear suits not only to signify the connection between the band members and the cult but to show that all members were seen and treated as equals regardless of their gender. Are lead cult member was also a woman which is breaking gender tropes for most music videos as she was the focus of power in the video. In heavy metal however it is more common for women to be represented on an equal basis to men and they are not sexualised nearly as much as women usually are in pop

 

Through the entire genre of heavy metal, it is very typical to make the brand of your artist/band to be intense, violent and chaotic (not organised), this is usually popular with rebellious and more anti political groups. We conveyed this sense of branding in our music video by having our lead singer seem frustrated and full of anger by jumping around and stamping his feet around in an almost child like manner this is usually how the lead singers are presented in heavy metal performance videos. We did not however have flashy costumes or any costume changes which is not conventional for heavy metal music videos as the costumes will usually portray the aggressive and rebellious nature of the singer and band members. We did this to also match the theme and tone of our music video and digipak as loud flashy costumes would not have fit the dark, mysterious and cult aspects to the video.

Inn our social media page most of the pictures of our band members are still of them in their suits which they are seen wearing in the music video but in the rehearsal clips and pictures they are seen in their normal clothes and different costumes. It is important to keep the consistency of the image of the band across our products, but when creating the digipak, I wanted to add more of a mysterious element I chose to do this to make the audience become more invested into what the band will sound like and how they act since there are no photos of them on the cover of the digipak.

Richard Dyers’ theory suggests that star personas are formed through the audience’s image of the band/artist and in not having many visuals of the band outside the music video it shrouds the band in mystery.

Across our products from our music video to the social media page I do not believe that we had much engagement with our audience in the sense that we did not want our band to seem as they had a close “relationship” with the audience members. We did interact with our audience mainly through our social media page by keeping them updated of when our music video would release and when they could expect to see the band on tour. We also shared images of the band behind the scenes and rehearsals which showed a completely different side and attitude of our band members which made them seem more relatable to the audience members since they looked and dressed the same as a ‘normal’ person would.

Our music video might give the audience/viewer a sense of escapism, but there are certain themes that the audience may be able to relate to such as the feeling of entrapment. The band feeling they were being trapped and unable to show expression while being part of the cult, some audience members may feel in their lives that they don’t have a sense of freedom and become engaged with the members in the music video.

The cult theme could engage certain audiences as they have an interest in the idea of the band members running from a controlled organisation, which could make the audience feel as though they were part of a larger experience.

Typical conventions of heavy metal genre include being aggressive, over the top sharp costumes and mostly being comprised of male band members. As we were researching these conventions to see what would fit with our idea. We intended to have our lead singer be aggressive to fit the convention of lead heavy metal singers moving and thrashing around violently. I believe we also had a small mix of rock along with the heavy metal as it is more typical to see matching/similar outfits between the band members in a rock music video whereas in heavy metal every member’s outfit is usually different from one another.

For our social media we kept more of a low profile only posting updates and some behind the scenes photos and videos from rehearsals. We did this to create a image around the band members of keeping to themselves, heavy metal band social media pages typically have much more posts regarding tour dates, live performances and announcements regarding the release of new music. And each member of a heavy metal band might have their own personal social media accounts which we do not have to keep the image of privacy and mystery.

As for our digipak it was quite unconventional for a heavy metal as it did not feature any graphic art or images of the band members/lead singer. Instead, I decided just to have images of the set and a deep red as the primary focus of the digipak. The font matched the creepy cult theme we were going for I had also added rips and tears to the band and inside covers of the digipak to give it more of a worn and rugged look.

Overall, I feel that our music promotion campaign was quite successful and that we had created a strong promotional campaign. Our key strength was being able to adapt and film in a unique location which was quite challenging in the end our music video had come out quite well. I feel I did a great job of the prop making as I had to learn to create something which I had never done before which was creating voodoo dolls out of string and wire. I learned in future productions I need to be able to have better organisation and planning skills. I think we could have improved on our organizational skills and communication with each other as a group.