The star theory applied to some artists

Richard Dyers- Star theory

Hi everyone, today I'm going to be talking about Richard Dyers star theory. Richard Dyers is someone who has written about the roles of stars in film, TV, and music whilst also saying that 'stars' all have common key features. The theory that Richard came up with can be split into 3 area's, these are:

1. The star as a construction
2. The star as a commodity
3. The star as an ideology

Construction: Richard states that 'stars' are constructed and that they are not really real people. He says that they are constructed through things such as music videos, magazines, and advertising etc. He believes that the actual person and the star are 2 completely different things. For example, some people think that what Miley Cyrus does now is just an act and that it is just to make her more famous (e.g. wearing not much clothing and dancing more controversially than she would have before).

Commodity: He believes that stars are produced to basically create money (for example by selling perfume, t-shirts and other pieces of merchandise). He also states that record labels make their 'stars' have some similar characteristics so there will be trends that come about, therefore making the record label more money. (an example of this are boy bands such as One Direction and The Wanted who are quite similar with the way they act and perform.

Ideology: He states that stars will represent certain social groups/views so will therefore create certain ideologies. For example, he says that fans of the star will usually want to copy their style and be more like them.

He says that stars have a certain 'star quality'

Lady gaga for example is someone who a lot of people would refer to as a star, or a pop star. She basically is thought to have the 'full package which makes up a star. For example she wears different outfits, she sings, she can act and she is generally just a great performer.
Some common values of music stars include being youthful, rebellious, sexual magnetism, originality, being creative and talented, sometimes aggression, drugs, sex, and bad behaviour, and finally success against all of the odds...

However, someone like Alex Turner from the Arctic Monkeys would be someone to e less likely looked at as a 'star'. This is because he seems to be more of a reserved person and doesn't perform and act in a way in which some other artists considered 'stars' do.

The term 'star' refers to a semi-mythological set of meaning constructed around music performers in order to sell the performer to a large and loyal audience.

There are 2 Paradox's of a star, these are:

Paradox 1- The star must be simultaneously ordinary and extraordinary for the consumer (for example, ordinary in a way in which they can relate to the star, but extraordinary so that the audience sees something different in them which makes them a 'star'.

Paradox 2- The star must be simultaneously present and absent for the consumer (meaning that the star is present in the fans lives such as on social media platforms, but absent as they are still out of reach and people still want to know more about them).

The star image:

The 'star image' makes the audience constantly strive to 'complete' or 'make sense' of the image this is achieved by the continued consumption of the star. This means that fans of the star will go away and be determined to continue consuming the star, this is in order to carry on attempting to complete their image.

The star image can be used to position the consumer in relation to the dominant social values, which is called 'hegemony'.

My view on democracy:

Democracy is a system of government by the whole population or all the eligible members of a state, typically through elected representatives. Everyone has different views on democracy and how it is effected by the media, the theorist Andrew Keen believes that ‘We Media’ is bad and has previously described people who pay attention to it to be like “monkeys, dancing to the world of the internet”. Personally, I disagree to the most extent with this as I believe that ‘We Media’ opens new windows for people to be able to share what the main news companies can usually miss. By this I mean that with the technology people have now (mobile phones cameras), they can usually capture events in real time, before big news companies get to the scene. An example of this is the 9/11 attacks as witnesses could capture the event on phones/cameras which allowed people to know what was happening, and also gave different perspectives of the event.  The theorist John Stewart Mill believes that people should have the right to express themselves (being self-regarding) but  limits to freedom of speech should be there when it comes ‘other-regarding’ (being hateful/abusive). I agree with this so therefore lean more towards the left wing with my thoughts on democracy as I think that there has to be some power there to keep order.

Rihanna- 'Bitch betta have my money'

Today in lesson we got given a sheet which had an article on it about Rihanna's music video to 'Bitch betta have my money'. The article discussed what the music video included such as Rihanna kidnapping someone's an accountant's wife who stole her money, then proceeds to "stuff her into a trunk, strips her half naked, hangs her upside down, gets her drunk, half drowns her and then stabs the accountant. The article then carries on talking about the controversy of the music video by saying that Rihanna "finally has a relaxing smoke in a bath while naked and covered in blood. It states how the internet "unpacked the sexual and racial politics of the video" and the fact that they ignored that the video was what like pop stars will do at some point in their careers. In my opinion, a lot of pop stars do sometimes come out with some quite 'controversial' videos in their career however, I think that Rihanna's video for 'BBHMM' would easily shock any viewer watching due to the extent of the 'explicit' content within the narrative of the music video. An example of another artist's music video that was considered to be 'controversial' at the time of it's release is Miley Cyrus' 'Wrecking ball' which was released in 2013 as part of her album 'Bangers and mash'. This music video contains scenes of Miley swinging about on a wrecking ball whilst only wearing boots, however, it doesn't 'reveal' anything or I believe show anything as 'controversial' as Rihanna's music video for BBHMM.

Here are some screen grabs that portray this music video to be 'controversial' (obviously I can't add a lot of things because they're 'too explicit'):

The article then goes on to talk about viewers expectations and how most music videos will 'ponder' to them, the characteristics being "glamour, success, and fun" which is a completely different case with this music video. It also states how an "event video is designed to project power and money but usually ends up revealing an artists fatal flaw before it swallows them". It states that artists such as Guns N roses, Jackson and Oasis subconsciously telling the audience 'have lost the plot. Please send help', suggesting they are basically saying this if they are "deluded, demented, drug-addicted or just a bit dim'. In my opinion, this is a bit exaggerated and artists that usually use drugs in their music videos are talking about money or just having fun. However, I think that some artists do do it to get more attention and to make people think that they are in a way pretty 'bad-ass'. For example, 'feelin myself' by William featuring other artists talks about drugs and money at the same time, suggesting they are just showing the audience how rich they are and basically that they can do what they want to do. Relating with this, the article then states that "Rihanna wants to be seen as a no-f**k-giving badass but comes off as somewhat desperate", which i think can sometimes apply (it sometimes feels like artists who do this just want attention however, not always).

The article goes on to talk about the artist Taylor Swift, saying that she "wants to cement her status as an A-list celebrity and every famous woman's dream BFF" with reference to her music video for her song 'Bad Blood'. In my opinion, I think that this could definitely be the case as I don't see why else she would have had all of her 'famous friends' involved in a video where she wants to try and put out a message.


The article also states that in 2013, the Billboard hot 100 added YouTube and Vevo news to it's calculations meaning that it makes the songs/music videos go up in the charts the more they are viewed on these platforms. From reading the article I therefore learnt that although the music video for Rihanna's BBHMM was not exactly viewed a lot when there was no video to show for it, however 'Bad blood' was because of the music video contents. The article here states that songs only get listened to and do well in the charts due to their music video views instead of how good the song really is. Quoting the article, It says that "Bad blood, probably the worst song on parent LP 1989, only topped the Billboard charts for a week because of the video views". "A day before Rihanna launched her video, Kendrick Lamar released his clip for 'Alright' (which gives ambitious mini-movies a good name)". The article states that this was "more original, beautiful, moving and thought-provoking than Rihanna's, with a better song boot" however, this received approximately only a quarter of the views and a fraction of the fuss surrounding it. In my opinion, I think that songs will mainly do better and become more successful when there is a music video to it that is either controversial or 'stands out from the crowd' as something that people will look at and remember.

Here's a look at the article that we were given:

As a short conclusion, I really think that this article really points out the importance of music videos in today's generation and about how they can easily make the songs more popular, even if the song itself isn't particularly that good. This therefore also shows the importance of how artists and bands decide to portray themselves in their music videos as how they want people to see them I think is a big part of the music industry (meaning it can effect the success of their songs and them as people).

Famous music videos

Looking at some iconic and popular CD covers

Case study on a music video director- David Wilson

Links to where I got my information from: 

https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/We_Exist
http://thisisdavidwilson.com/pages/info
https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/David_Wilson_(director)

Finished CD cover shoot practice

Hi everyone, today me Josie and Sophie finished editing the stereotypical photos of what we thought could be on album covers.

Here are the finished photos after editing them on Photoshop:

The 'we're young and having fun'

 

The 'icon'

 

The 'not looking at the camera'

 

The 'shadow'

 

The 'serious artist'

 

The 'tortured artist'

The 'mouldering artist'

The 'tween'

The 'your mum will like me artist'

The 'I'll smash your face in'

In detail: Exploring different genres/sub-genres: Alternative

In detail: Exploring different genres/sub-genres: Pop

In detail: Exploring different genres/sub-genres: Indie Rock/Pop

Photo practice for album covers

Today me Josie and Sophie had a task of taking some photos of what we thought some stereotypical album covers should look like and here is what we came up with!

After taking the photos we were asked to edit them in Photoshop to make them look more like a photo you would expect to see on a CD cover but these are not yet finished (I will be posting them when they are). We were asked to come up with 9 different stereotypical photos for specific album covers but we decided to add one more category which we called 'Tween'.

The point of this task was to get us more familiar with taking CD cover style photos as well as just to have a little fun! This is also going to help us get more to grips with editing photos in Photoshop, especially when it comes to making the CD for our final music video.

Hope you enjoy these photos that we took:

Genre Theories

 

Genre theories from LauraKN