My Genre

My chosen genre, being American Rock has many different conventions that belong to it alongside codes and conventions which today are very stereotypical and big in the eye of the media.

Rock and Roll originates from the 1940s, although primarily being a combination of blues, country and jazz, this genre of music has evolved through the different eras becoming heavier and maybe now, more of a style than a stereotype like it used to be. In the 1940s Rock and Roll would include the trend “teddy boys” and be associated with artists such as “Buddy Holly”, they would also wear leather jackets alongside tight jeans, taken as inspiration from idols at the time such as Elvis. Although this era was over 50 years ago, the fashion of this Rock and Roll era has kept on coming back today and has been extremely popular in the last couple of years. As metal music started to evolve, people would associate the Rocker fashion with that too. As the instruments got heavier so did the increase of black clothes and heavy make-up, for example rock turned into metal rock (which is a lot heavier). Lady Gaga demonstrates a good sense of Rock in her music video “Telephone” where the video is based around a prison cell, in which all of the girls in that cell are wearing black clothing of some sort with heavy make-up, leather jackets and leather gloves, ripped up trousers alongside Lady Gaga who wears a very studded leather jacket. Therefore showing how Rock and Roll has now been given a widespread social impact. Although, “rock” as a whole has been given a negative stereotype by some people, as it is apparently associated with sex, drugs and violence.

Conventions of Rock Music usually include a heavy solo piece, but the song I have chosen has more of a classical Rock/Post-Grunge sound rather than heavy Rock (which includes a lot more heavy solo pieces) such as AC/DC or Led Zeppelin, whereas with the classical, the drums and guitars are more consistent and throughout the entire song. Also, Rock music videos are usually performance or narrative pieces, through my research it is very rare that abstract has been used.

Furthermore, the camera movement is a lot more focused on a lot more in Rock music videos than camera shots, whereas in performance videos seen in the more mainstream artists videos, they use a lot of both and concentrate on shots that will emphasise and exagerrate the artists performance and image. For example,  some shots are used to emphasize the importance of the band and the “musicianship”, usually extreme close-ups and close-ups of the artist singing into a microphone.

Posture and movement is also very important with Rock Videos as the artist needs to look and have the attitude expected. For example, with females it could go two ways, the posture can be very lazy looking and a “can’t be bothered” attitude which is the case with Taylor Momsen in the band The Pretty Reckless (my band choice). Or in contrast, the artist can also have a more upbeat, fierce attitude (Hayley Williams from Paramore). Also, posture and gestures would include factors such as the singer screaming into the microphone and either pulling it close or leaning into it. Also, even in the editing of music videos, there are some aspects which are seen as conventional to Rock music videos in particular, for example, styles such as quick cuts are mainly used in Rock videos, to give it the “edgy” look/feel, instead of long atmospheric long shots which wouldn’t work and tend to be seen more with artists such as Ellie Goulding who have a mainstream pop/indie/electro genre.

Mise-en-scene is extremely important when it comes to Music Videos as it pulls in the whole “look” and creates the artists image and sense of individuality. For example, the make-up used in different rock genres such as death metal, emo, goth rock are associated with lots of dark black eye make-up and pale faces to give a stark contrast. Today, this has been more modernised such as bright red lipstick and either black dyed hair or peroxide blonde (or even white in some cases), now being quite conventional to the rock look. Usually in the rock genre, black will be quite a dominant colour in some way shape or form, for example the setting and lighting might be dark throughout, or the artist will be wearing black clothing. Although, it all depends what sub-genre of Rock, as Pop-Rock has become more mainstream and doesn’t necessarily follow the conventions of the typical Rock Music Video that we’d expect, such as shots of the band performing in the video.