Research into CD Covers and Adverts

The Foals are a similar band to our band, The Factory in the way they look and their style of music with a similar indie genre. The foals use a distinct way of producing an album cover so that they are recognised just by their font. They use two particular fonts. The first font that they used on their album and singles released before this represents them being young and is slightly ‘out-there’ which is shown in the picture below. This font is also used in advertisements about them until they produced their second album.






The second font that they used is plain square capital letters but it gives us the feel that they are mature and sophisticated now. This is used in their second album and also advertisements since their second album release. At this point in their careers they are no longer independent, they have built their fan base and are now more commercialised.



Their CD cover font corresponds with the font that is used in advertisement to produce a sense of identity to the band. This font when looked at acts as a symbolism of the band. This is also the case for other bands such as The Libertines and The Maccabees.






The Libertines for example, also uses a particular font/style of design on the CD covers and adverts. This is that the writing is slightly broken up and put at a slant to each other. This would be to represent their crazy, shambolic ‘do it yourself’ attitude. It is designed to show their individuality rather than be a part of the institutional machine. It also shows that they are highly influenced by the Sex Pistols and ‘punk’.





The Kooks are another band which is similar to ours. They have the same style of music and the same dress sense. And we are highly influenced by them into making our digipak. Taking into account the font of writing which must be continuous and a similar colour scheme on all of ‘The Factory’s’ CD’s we want to use a similar type of style as The Kooks and Arctic Monkeys.

Here are some of there CD covers which they have used.

The Kooks:









It is also show through adverts that the same theme pursue for example, in the Glastonbury Advert below, the same font is used as well as the black, grey and white colour scheme.




Arctic Monkeys:








As you can see, they have a running theme of black, grey and white. We however, also want to represent our bands image within this album artwork and show that although they are more sophisticated and mature, they still have a ‘messy’ streak about them.

This CD cover below is the biggest influence to us and after discussing, we have decided to do a black and white photo of our band (to show sophistication) with a font to show their influences (perhaps slightly 60’s) as they are clearly influenced by guitar bands of the 60s such as ‘Love’ and ‘The Stooges’. Although they are not widely know, they have a sizeable cult following and base their music on bands which they like as they know that their target audience/fan base will also appreciate these artists. We also want to make a coffee ring/spill effect on the corner of the CD’s front cover.

Treatment For Music Video

The treatment for our music video is to show how our band has grown and matured from practicing in messy typical student accommodation as a band to ending up in a studio with fame and fortune that are highly successful.

The song begins in a messy teenage student flat living room which is used as the bands’ rehearsal room. The mess consists of clothes thrown around the room, dirty plates and mugs, cider bottles, ashtrays, newspapers, magazines etc. The band members will wear clothes such as t-shirts, polo-shirts, checked shirts, skinny jeans, and hi top trainers/plimsols.

The mess builds up through the song and is shown particularly through close up shots. The mess reduces towards the end of the song and some things transform in to more sophisticated objects e.g. cider bottles change to wine/champagne bottles and coats will be hung up instead of thrown on the floor, shoes will be lines up tidily etc. although the room is still slightly messy, it shows that they are becoming richer and more successful.

Towards the end of the song, the room is transformed from student rehearsal room to studio where they are obviously obsessed with music. Amps and guitars are added in slowly along with a platinum album to show the audience that they have made it as a band and have grown up and matured.

The structure of the music video rests on seven wide shots which show that the room has changed and shows the bands steady progression from a teenage band to stars. This is shown through close ups and mid shots and sometimes through stop motion. The wide shot we cut back to shows all the changes that’s have been made.

Our idea promotes our bands star image because it shows their audience that they began as normal teenagers with a dream just like anyone else however, they are now extraordinary because they have made it and are passionate about it.

Timeline

Pitch of Idea

Name of Band - The Factory
Genre - indie/alternative rock band.
Star image - Performer - more about the music. Like everyone else (ordinary).
Target audience - teenagers/young adults both male and female.
Track Choice - Arctic Monkeys – Fluorescent Adolescent

Concept for video
Their career experience from playing in their bedroom gradually through stop motion moving to studio with lights etc.

Represents ‘making it big’ and how far they have come.

Focused on ‘lad’ culture and the unity of the band. We would like to use stop motion similar to : Passion Pit - Sleepy Head (Stop Motion)


Star Image
Costume – buttoned up polo shirts/shirts, skinny jeans, adidas trainers, chelsea boots etc.














Locations
We would use a messy bedroom and use stop motion to turn this room in to a studio by taking objects out and replacing others.











Performance, Narrative and Thematic Elements
The performance aspect is the band playing in the bedroom followed by a studio with lights, full band kit perhaps guitars. The thematic element is the bedroom changing from bedroom to studio. This represents the transformation of the band from normal life (ordinary) to becoming performers (extraordinary).


Ordinary Boys - Boys Will Be Boys
The ‘laddish’ culture


The Maccabees - Love You Better
The projected effect


Passion Pit - Sleepy Head (Stop Motion)
The stop motion aspect


The Kooks - Shine on
The bedroom aspect

Reseach into Real Similar Artists

Maccabees


The Maccabees are similar in the ways that The Factory looks. They wear the same style of clothes.







Foals


The foals have a similar genre of music to The Factory.











The Kooks



The Kooks have a similar look to The Factory and they have the same genre of music.











Libertines




The Libertines are similar to The Factory in the way they act. They follow a ‘laddish’ culture.




All of these above artists are similar to The Factory. Some of these artists are similar because of their look, dress and ‘laddish’ culture and some because of the style of music.

Feedback

You have made a start by posting your initial ideas, Amy, but it is disappointing that you have not fully followed the instructions for this first set of postings. There is no sign of your thumbnai of your hypothetical act, nor of the research required into similar real bands and their star image, audience and institutional contexts. To benefit fully from the coursework unit, you need to work hard to meet all of the research and planning requirements.

James

Initial Ideas

To start with we each needed to come up with three initial ideas, my ideas consisted of song called ‘Ambling Alp’ by Yeasayer, ‘Embers’ by Just Jack and ‘Only Man’ by Audiobullys.

Yeasayer – Ambling Alp

The star image of this band is quite alternative and quirky. This band is similar to Grizzly Bea, MGMT, Temper Trap and Placebo. Yeasayer are an experimental rock, psychedelic pop band based in New York, America. Their target audience is teenagers and young adults both male and female.

In this video, I would like to paint the band members in blue and blue screen them so their body and other features disappear. I would like the lead singer to have the eyes and mouth showing. It is important that his mouth shows as he is singing. I would like the drummer to have his hands showing with the drumsticks in his hands as it is important that the audience knows that he is playing. Similarly with the guitarist I would like his hands showing and perhaps his shoulder the instrument doesn’t look like its floating in mid air.

I would like it to do this as I think that the song is a bit mysterious and would therefore like the video to follow this idea. The idea of body parts could gradually be revealed towards the end. As a background story I would perhaps the members walking/running through woods and up a hill with hopefully a grey shy looking playful and tight as a group of friends.

Just Jack – Embers

The star image of this artist is indie/alternative/dance pop. Just Jack is an English musician who comes from Camden Town in London. This artist is similar to Artic Monkeys, Kings of Leon and the XX. Although the similar artists are all bands, I think that Just Jack sounds and looks similar to these band members. I would dress the person we use for this song in skinny jeans, chelsea boots, a buttoned up polo shirt or checked shirt and a leather jacket. The target audience for Just Jack is teenagers and young adults both male and female.

In this video I would like four duplicates of the same person singing the four different parts of the song. This could be on a cube rotating or in a line, or even around a camp fire since the song to me has a festival feel. These images of the four duplicates could be strong when singing and faded when not. I think that the artist could possibly spin or stand in front of a screen with an image of him on. I think that the idea of using a campfire represents the song title embers. The background story could be a man walking through a festival or around a campfire with tents around.



Audio Bullys – Only Man

The star image of this band is of the dance/indie/pop genre that is well known for their electronic pop style. The members are good looking, clean cut young males who look like they live an expensive lifestyle. They are similar to Justice, Groove Armada, Crookers and Calvin Harris. Their target audience is teenagers and young adults which will be mostly females but males would also like this music.

In this video I would have the members on a running machine sideways which are going alternate ways so as they walk across they will be going left to right and right to left. I would preferably like to blue screen the handles out so it is not obvious they are on a running machine. I would cross cut to half naked/good looking female dancers. There could also be a background story of the members in a sports car to highlight their lifestyle.

There could also be one girl dancing in a clear box with multiple men running towards trying to get into the box to represent them wanting her. Basically, there is a long obstacle to get past to reach the hot girl.