Conventions

Conventions

Since I am again working with Reece and Barry, we decided to do one of the sub-genres from Rock styled music; this could range from punk, classic rock, aggressive rock, contemporary rock, and grunge, however they all follow similar conventions in the terms of music video style and the relationships that are shown between the lyrics, illustration and performance.

The main and immediate conventions for a rock music video is the balance of live performance and cut-away narrative – in the rock genre of music videos, the narrative in the music video is often an illustration of the lyrics that follows some sort of plot or message. Due to the quick pace and tempo that the music genre is built upon, editing between these two is often quick and cut-away, rarely lasting 10 seconds before another jump; this gives the production team the advantage of working in multiple close-up shots of the vocalist or band to brand their image in iconography. As rock songs are often associated with common event or feeling, the music video associates itself visually in a similar way, (such as The All American Rejects ‘Dirty Little Secret’, which sings of secrets and shows individuals with cards with their own secrets as the narrative – widely associating with the audience). Most of all, one of the larger (yet not always common) convention of rock music videos is the bands performance with an audience, this is the iconography of the genre and can be easily identified for this feature (this can also aid the music video to create the atmosphere of association that this genre attempts to express). The target audience for this genre is identified immediately because of its visual conventions of theme and mise en scene.

The music video coordinates tempo by often synchronising one part of the foreground music or the lyrics themselves – this is often however the drums where each significant sound is emphasised on screen with a cut from performance to narrative, or different shots; however, if tempo lacks (such as the beginning or bridge or the song) a new innovation of slow effect is becoming a relative adaption to illustrate the effect of tempo in sound and on screen. The editing is either driven by tempo or narrative.

The conventions of a rock music video in terms of mise en scene and camera work can be relatively distinctive. The set is conventionally somewhere urban, such as streets, roof tops, venues or more commonly seen, rinks – unless the artist’s move throughout their narrative. This can also be considered as the artists theme as they target a youthful audience and thus attempt to associate. There is normally a clear distinction between the atmosphere the song wishes to express, as most artists are colour suited to their genre, however more conventionally seen is black clothing, signifying the genre’s iconography (such as the use of band shirts from the audience or the artists themselves, supporting others). The camerawork works in tangent with the editing, maintain the same tempo as the music, more so being sportingly fast to increase momentum – whilst the main convention of all music videos is also applied in the rock genre (repeated close-ups, particularly of the vocalist) there are also a majority of pan, zoom, reverse or dolly shots to create the sense of momentum throughout narrative and performance, thus reflecting the atmosphere, iconography and conventions of the genre (these features of camerawork are needed to create a dynamic feeling to the performance of the music video and also increase intimacy). In terms of editing style, there appears a divide between the contemporary rock, from 1995 – 2000, a typically convention is set upon simple cut-away shots, which later develops panel editing and special effects by 2005. Although, a new set in the convention for this genre is the development of narrative further, by demonstrating a whole story with extra footage detached from the song or over layered speech (however, this can often be a break mid-song, as exampled by 30 Seconds To Mars ‘This Is War’).