Van Halen - Non-album Website analysis

This is a intro of the website that shows up when you view the website, which appears to be some form of advertisent. The image shown had an appearance of an album cover, showing the member names along with their respective instruments. The lighting used on the photographs appear be in a perfoming stage lights and have a sharp, gritty effect. This brings out the detail of the photos clearly of the instruments.

Van Halen - Textual analysis of magazine advertisement product

Guitar hero has a product featuring specifically Van Halen. The artwork features the same artwork of the guitarists signature guitar. It also features a guitar plectrum bearing an Van Halen logo, as the product implies an emphasise on the instrument. The colours used, red, black and white, are colours that can be used to signifiy masculine style which typically is showing that this product may be intending to aim at a male audience.

Questionnaire/Analysis- Market Research

1. What is your age?


2. Your Gender?


3. What is your favourite genre(s) and why?


4. Do you watch music videos?


5. In response to question 3, what is your purpose to watch music videos?


6. Do you pay attention to detail i.e. background, clothing style, performance playing?


7. What are your interests/hobbies?


8. What are your favourite music videos? Performance, Abstract, Narrative


9. Have you ever downloaded music videos for your own viewing time?


10. How do you view the music videos? Music Channels, Internet, CD/DVD


11. What is your reason for doing so?

This questionnaire is intending to find out more about the audience along with their opinions and views on music videos. I view that people with different genre taste will have different views on the type of music videos they watch.

Analysis Table

This is a table showing all of the candidates and their responses to the questionnaire. During the questionnaire, there may be some candidates who chose not to take this seriously at it seems. This sort of response can also determine the type of audience they fall into. Also, there had been responses that they name their favourite genre, but without an explanation why, so this may had been that they can’t think of a reason why it’s their favourite genre or that they forgot to write the reason. A lot of the candidate favourite genres listed have a large quantity on rock, although they had responded to simply just rock, so what type of rock music they like is not justified. There is a mixed result of candidates who had a sense of detail awareness of the music videos, so that what they see in the music videos may be relevant to their demands of the media. Each of their type of music video preference is also mixed, with no real correlation between the 3, regardless to which genre they prefer. My view is that people who like heavy music would have a preference to performance, as a reference to high energertic performance those bands usually do, although some ended up choose abstract and narrative, so my view is wrong.

Because I am doing the hard rock genre, I specifically wanted to find out what are the candidates interests in rock are. It is known that most of these people are very energetic when listening to these music, so I would try and base my video to be just as energetic.

'She is Beautiful' - Music video analysis

She is Beautiful - Andrew W.K. A fairly mainstream video, this video is a more unique style having only one person in the entire video as opposed to having multiple members, which is rare for the hard rock genre. This is more of the alternative than the classic hard rock people would know as. During the start when the music kicks in at around 0:20, high angle shots on the subject shows the isolated space around him giving the impression he is alone in the house. Also, shots getting progressively closer to the clock 12th hour as the second passes by produces the effect of getting the audience ready for what is about to happen. Alot of the transitions keep to the rhythm of the song, keeping the energy of the video along, using a mixture of close-up shots on the instruments, mid shots and wide shots, along the way. The person in the video style is messy, in which people could view this as the messy genre of hard rock.

I never knew girls existed like you But now that I do I'd really like to get to know you The girl's too young She don't need any better It's all coming back I can feel it The girl's too young She don't know any better It's all coming back I can feel it Chorus: She is beautiful She is beautiful She is beautiful She is beautiful The girl is beautiful You're giving me moves and hits from all sides And when you're hitting like that, you melt my eyes The girl's too young She don't need any better It's all coming back I can feel it The girl's too young She don't know any better It's all coming back I can feel it You know I never know you I look at your face. To tell you that I love you Don't know what to say You're everything I got you beautiful girl The only thing I live for in the whole wide world Chorus: She is beautiful She is beautiful She is beautiful She is beautiful The girl is beautiful I ain't got nothing to lose (Nothing to lose) Gonna throw it away And talk to you She looks good She looks good And it's true And it's true The girl is beautiful She is beautiful I ain't got nothing to lose (Nothing to lose) When I'm living one time And I want you She looks good She looks good And it's true And it's true The girl is beautiful She is beautiful She is beautiful She is beautiful Na na na na na na na na She is beautiful She is beautiful Na na na na na na na na The girl is beautiful She is beautiful She is beautiful Na na na na na na na na She is beautiful She is beautiful Na na na na na na na na I ain't got nothing to lose (Nothing to lose) Gonna throw it away And talk to you She looks good She looks good And it's true And it's true The girl is beautiful She is beautiful I ain't got nothing to lose (Nothing to lose) And I'll never forget When I saw you She looks good She looks good And it's true And it's true The girl is beautiful She is beautiful

The lyrics tells how the person felt when he saw a girl he immediatly falls in love with. The music video overall appears to be a man waking up then gettng ready for what appears to be a date.

'Oh Yeah' - Music video analysis and Style

Due to the music video being unable to embed by request, I had posted the link of the video for evidence.

As opposed to other music videos which are generally in 1980s, this video is of a modern hard rock band in the 2009. Even with the year gap the formula is still the same; this is mainly performance based music video. The main difference is that now with modern technology to alter clips in many ways, the use of effects on parts of the video is more frequent than older music videos. For example, alot of the scenes are in sepia tone effect, and using an effect which appears to give the video an old film clip at 2:05. The camera angle is varied, such as when the members perform on stage with the angle low for a low shot, giving the impression of being in a live performance. Plus along with the use of medium shots at eye level is and looks as they used a hand-held camera for most part. It appears that mostly the mise-en-scene of this video is mostly of inside a recording studio, jamming together in places such as the basketball court or outtakes of a photoshoot. Each shot length would go to the rhythm beat of the song. During the instrumental section at 2:10 the video becomes more abstract, various scenes of the band members doing something unrelated to performance becomes more frequent, usually at the same time.

Lyrically, the video has no relation to the lyrics, which appears to refer to a male who is begging for a female for respect.

Chickenfoot is a hard rock 'supergroup', which usually consists of already famous band members from different bands brought together. Supergroups generally do not tend to be permanent as opposed to bands, as supergroups lasts for an album or two, although with only their debut album and plans for more, its not the case for Chickenfoot. Despite the status, Lead vocalist Sammy Hagar does not agree with the term, claiming they like hanging out together and playing great music, they just happen to be in other groups.

Their self-titled debut album and only one is rather unique; a heat sensitive sleeve which reveals images against heat. When exposed to heat, images of band members appear in a 4 cross section formation with their names. The same applies to the back cover, revealing song track names with heat applied. The front cover style fully uncovered has a sepia tone look, which gives the effect of dark, yet standing out look, and also using the modern technological aspect to produce the effect.

The top band picture is Chickenfoot, formed in modern 2009. The bottom is Van Halen, formed in 1972. As you can see, the style and clothing difference is great. Van Halen's image of clothing appears to be more emphasise on glamour of masculinity, while Chickenfoot's image is more of a casual clothing. The top shows the members having a more relaxed feel which shows their attitude towards the modern society, while the bottom would seem to give a more wild look. This shows that Hard rock image through the years have been changed throughout the years to suit the modern style background that they are performing in. Most noticably, the right-most member, Michael Anthony is a former Van Halen member in both bands of the two pictures interestingly enough, as to show the style change during that time until now. The one next to him, lead vocalist Sammy Hager also a former Van Halen member, although not in bottom picture as they were both in their different eras of the band.

'Love Is Only A Feeling' - Music video analysis

The Darkness - Love is only a feeling

The English hard rock band was more mainstream that the other music videos that have been analysed. Like many of the hard rock music videos, this was performance based, which is considered unusual since this is a power ballad song, as it is generally associated to be using narrative based videos. This was filmed on top of a mesa in the Blue Mountains of Australia so on first glance this seemed to give an impression of exposing the beautiful scenery, along with the steady power ballad to give the mood of freedom. At the beginning, special effects are used to produce floating light 'fairies' and transform into the members. The shots utilized extreme long shots with the members playing in the distance for emphasise of the scenery and also how close they are playing on the edge, along with close up and medium shots and rule of thirds of one of the member; the left empty space used to show the environment at the beginning. What is also intriguing is some of the angle cuts of their instruments and focused on the top half of their body and the surrounding environment. Many angles used in this video are varied, such as using low shots to expose the sky as well as emphasise on the member peformance. Then a slow pan out from the lead member out to reveal other members and the environment out to show them peforming at the bottom of the valley. Again during the chorus the two guitarists stand back to front with the low shot camera rotating around them. During a section of a guitar lick low shots and dark lighting to produce silhouettes brings out the members performance playing to the audience attention. The guitar solo has varied shot types, for example extreme long shots showing how the subject is surrounded by nothing but rock and scenery. This would usually show loneliess and vunderability, but this is not necassarily the case. It also utilizes close shots for an extra effect on the performance.

The first flush of youth was upon you when our eyes first met
And I knew that to you and into your life I had to get
I felt light-headed at the touch of this stranger's hand
An assault my defences systematically failed to withstand

'Cos you came at a time
When the pursuit of one true love in which to fall
Was the be all and end all

Love is only a feeling
(Drifting away)
When I'm in your arms I start believing
(It's here to stay)
But love is only a feeling
Anyway

The state of elation that this unison of hearts achieved
I had seen, I had touched, I had tasted and I truly believed
That the light of my life
Would tear a hole right through each cloud that scudded by
Just to beam on you and I

Love is only a feeling
(Drifting away)
When I'm in your arms I start believing
(It's here to stay)
But love is only a feeling
Anyway, anyway

Love is only a feeling
(Drifting away)
And we've got to stop ourselves believing
(It's here to stay)
'Cos love is only a feeling
Anyway.

The lyrics tell the story of a person falling in love with a girl during the youth and the personal sensation relationship between the couple. As you can see, the music video has no relation to the lyrics.

Record Label - Warner Bros. Record

Warner Bros. Records was originally established in 1958 as the recorded music division of the American movie studio Warner Bros. Pictures. For most of its existence it was one of a group of labels owned and operated by larger parent corporations. The sequence of companies that controlled Warner Bros. and its allied labels evolved through a convoluted series of corporate mergers and acquisitions from the early 1960s to the early 2000s. Over this period, Warner Bros. Records grew from a struggling minor player in the industry to become one of the top recording labels in the world.
In 2003 these music assets were divested by their then owner Time Warner and purchased by a private equity group. This independent company currently trades as the Warner Music Group (WMG), of which Warner Bros. Records is still an active label. WMG is currently the third-largest of the four major international music conglomerates and the world's only publicly traded major music company. The group's extensive publishing assets, which include over one million song copyrights by more than 65,000 songwriters, currently make it the world's largest music publisher.