Essay
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What is the effect of MTV on music promotion and music artist representation?
With the inception of MTV in 1977 as small TV network, it has now grown into a multi-national, multi-billion pound global machine. The effect of the creation of MTV on television, the music industry and the world, is a reflects of active audience of the teenager music fan of the early 80s. At the beginning, many artists used the new music platform to promote their music on an international level and continue to this day. This new platform allowed music artists to promote on a mass scale that made never been seen before. But unlike before the artist would judged on the mainly on the musicality of their song (even though this it is still a factor) or the style of the artist playing live but on the visual shown in their music video. Marketing the video became key because videos were the main focus of MTV because it was easy to show them and quickly becoming a leading source of new music. My hypotheses is that given though MTV has done much good to the music industry as a whole, it’s net effects has been a negative one. In this essay I will descise the negative effect on audiences and artists.
For many artists, the video is, is the only time that most of the audience see the face of person singing the song. Leonard J. Beer is the editor in chief of Hits Magazine, said that, "You can make a star overnight if they make the right video, and if the right magic happens."( source)
With the idea of an uses and gratifications effects model “U & G theorists argue that people's needs influence how they use and respond to a medium (source). The is an audience is in control and choose a media that they feel like compliant their mood. This is a powerful audience and in control that will not just sit down and watch whatever is on. In the case of MTV that if image is something that his audience likes with, agrees or wish they were. This audience in control of their viewing and the new waves of technology and more channels that appeal to every single possible music taste.
The channel MTV switched it’s focus and stopped playing music in the mid 90s (source) to instead air non-music programming like the real world. The role of giving playing music videos to the masses to it’s sister channels such as (in the UK) MTV Hits, MTV2, MTV Base and MTV Dance. Each sister channel heading having it’s own style, iconography, remit and genre of music that appealed to it’s own audience. This divide in programming, denotes the tread of the spit in viewer. MTV decided to narrowcast to audiences and which further dividing music fans.
When researching, I interviewed a 18 year old male (subject A), who didn’t believe that rap music could be shown on the same channel as other types of music. He can be quoted saying, “Rappers are seen as in it for the money, power and the women. Whereas rock bands and stuff is more about the emotions” This shows that representation the two groups of musicians from different genres having been completely different and that is average viewer is aware of this divide. I found out when interviewing subject A that he picking up on the use of the artist’s image and use generic signifiers like the artist wearing lots of gold. He was very aware of the idea of creating an image and it’s important in music promotion. “MTV is powerful, lots of times, the first time I heard of an artist in their video.” He denotes that one of his only sources of new music played on MTV.
Whereas interviewing a music fan who was a teenager before MTV (subject B), there was a different reaction. He said “we would just sit around and listen to music for fun. Sometime we would go out to the gigs but mostly, we would just listen to whatever was on the radio”. This interview highlights important changes in music production. MTV and the modem world as breed music fans that I extremely aware of artist representation. This may explain the raise of the IPod Video sales (source), giving the audience that ability access to their music videos anywhere they are. Also increasingly narrowcasted channels from MTV (and others), which appear directly to specific target audience.
Other primary research, of watching other people watch MTV showed that interest is lost quickly for music channels that do not show exactly what the viewer wants. Viewers are likely to change channels compared to those listening to music to those how I observed listening to the radio. This denotes that those watching MTV are becoming much more picking about what they are watching comparied to those listening to music on the radio. Weather MTV has made this divide in genre or is reflecting a tend in both society and the viewing patterns, my research didn’t give an answer.
Taking an example day in the scheduling of MTV2 and study tends showed interesting resultt. Music videos seem to show in predictable patterns, denoting that the channel uses predefined play lists. Even shows that premoted to be, request shows, seem to show much the same as the playlisted shows. This shows that MTV is very power in what the audience sees, because it chooses what is and is not shown. If MTV so decided not to show a single than it can crush a band’s promotion before it. As main source for promoting where people find new bands and music, this means the audience will never hear about the artist.
To be a success artists must create a song that is MTV compatible. My content analysis showed that, as a tend Songs that are longer than 3 minutes 40 seconds don’t get played. Songs with rude language, all the language is removed and the mouth is blurred out. When research on the internet, I found that many big artists have music videos had banned, such as “the streets” video for the single 'Blinded By The Lights' (source) . Other songs have been gained poor sales from lack of MTV promotion.
My study of play list patterns showed that MTV are really controls what music people see on their music channels, with it being one the main sources new of music for many and choosing what is and what does not appear on music play lists. If MTV decides not to show an artist, it may not get played and sales might not reach the levels that they really should. Radio is still powerful, because it is easy to access to radio and the sales of of IPODs/MP3 players going up. There is little demand for live music, an example of this is the BBC’s live music “top of the pops” being cancelled after 40 years. Matt cox on the BBC website said “only 1/2 an hour a week, no competition for MTV” (source).
My focus groups show that audiences are now effected greatly but the image that the video represents. Comparing two songs by the same band under a different name showed that the focus group was effected by the first song which was played with the video and seemed uninterested in the song played and simply talked over it. My focus group showed that watching music video is entertain and there is now a firm link in between audio and visual input of music. What MTV has done for music is relate sound and vision so closely, I band or group can have little musicality but still become big but image alone. An example of this is the success of the crazy frog brand, that replied completely on image.
The power of MTV is dying, with creating a world that buys singles and watches music video is dying out. With the rise of the internet and on demand devices such as SKY+ and the IPOD, many people are deciding not to sit thought adverts on MTV. Originally MTV boasted single and album sales but with the ability to download only some songs from an album on the internet. Since it’s inspection, MTV as piored the music video and created a image aware music industry. The length of popular singles has been shorten to be more compitable with a easily bored audience. Narrowcasting has given audiences access to different styles of music and most tastes are meet with a channel designed that audience.
What is the effect of MTV on music promotion and music artist representation?
With the inception of MTV in 1977 as small TV network, it has now grown into a multi-national, multi-billion pound global machine. The effect of the creation of MTV on television, the music industry and the world, is a reflects of active audience of the teenager music fan of the early 80s. At the beginning, many artists used the new music platform to promote their music on an international level and continue to this day. This new platform allowed music artists to promote on a mass scale that made never been seen before. But unlike before the artist would judged on the mainly on the musicality of their song (even though this it is still a factor) or the style of the artist playing live but on the visual shown in their music video. Marketing the video became key because videos were the main focus of MTV because it was easy to show them and quickly becoming a leading source of new music. My hypotheses is that given though MTV has done much good to the music industry as a whole, it’s net effects has been a negative one. In this essay I will descise the negative effect on audiences and artists.
For many artists, the video is, is the only time that most of the audience see the face of person singing the song. Leonard J. Beer is the editor in chief of Hits Magazine, said that, "You can make a star overnight if they make the right video, and if the right magic happens."( source)
With the idea of an uses and gratifications effects model “U & G theorists argue that people's needs influence how they use and respond to a medium (source). The is an audience is in control and choose a media that they feel like compliant their mood. This is a powerful audience and in control that will not just sit down and watch whatever is on. In the case of MTV that if image is something that his audience likes with, agrees or wish they were. This audience in control of their viewing and the new waves of technology and more channels that appeal to every single possible music taste.
The channel MTV switched it’s focus and stopped playing music in the mid 90s (source) to instead air non-music programming like the real world. The role of giving playing music videos to the masses to it’s sister channels such as (in the UK) MTV Hits, MTV2, MTV Base and MTV Dance. Each sister channel heading having it’s own style, iconography, remit and genre of music that appealed to it’s own audience. This divide in programming, denotes the tread of the spit in viewer. MTV decided to narrowcast to audiences and which further dividing music fans.
When researching, I interviewed a 18 year old male (subject A), who didn’t believe that rap music could be shown on the same channel as other types of music. He can be quoted saying, “Rappers are seen as in it for the money, power and the women. Whereas rock bands and stuff is more about the emotions” This shows that representation the two groups of musicians from different genres having been completely different and that is average viewer is aware of this divide. I found out when interviewing subject A that he picking up on the use of the artist’s image and use generic signifiers like the artist wearing lots of gold. He was very aware of the idea of creating an image and it’s important in music promotion. “MTV is powerful, lots of times, the first time I heard of an artist in their video.” He denotes that one of his only sources of new music played on MTV.
Whereas interviewing a music fan who was a teenager before MTV (subject B), there was a different reaction. He said “we would just sit around and listen to music for fun. Sometime we would go out to the gigs but mostly, we would just listen to whatever was on the radio”. This interview highlights important changes in music production. MTV and the modem world as breed music fans that I extremely aware of artist representation. This may explain the raise of the IPod Video sales (source), giving the audience that ability access to their music videos anywhere they are. Also increasingly narrowcasted channels from MTV (and others), which appear directly to specific target audience.
Other primary research, of watching other people watch MTV showed that interest is lost quickly for music channels that do not show exactly what the viewer wants. Viewers are likely to change channels compared to those listening to music to those how I observed listening to the radio. This denotes that those watching MTV are becoming much more picking about what they are watching comparied to those listening to music on the radio. Weather MTV has made this divide in genre or is reflecting a tend in both society and the viewing patterns, my research didn’t give an answer.
Taking an example day in the scheduling of MTV2 and study tends showed interesting resultt. Music videos seem to show in predictable patterns, denoting that the channel uses predefined play lists. Even shows that premoted to be, request shows, seem to show much the same as the playlisted shows. This shows that MTV is very power in what the audience sees, because it chooses what is and is not shown. If MTV so decided not to show a single than it can crush a band’s promotion before it. As main source for promoting where people find new bands and music, this means the audience will never hear about the artist.
To be a success artists must create a song that is MTV compatible. My content analysis showed that, as a tend Songs that are longer than 3 minutes 40 seconds don’t get played. Songs with rude language, all the language is removed and the mouth is blurred out. When research on the internet, I found that many big artists have music videos had banned, such as “the streets” video for the single 'Blinded By The Lights' (source) . Other songs have been gained poor sales from lack of MTV promotion.
My study of play list patterns showed that MTV are really controls what music people see on their music channels, with it being one the main sources new of music for many and choosing what is and what does not appear on music play lists. If MTV decides not to show an artist, it may not get played and sales might not reach the levels that they really should. Radio is still powerful, because it is easy to access to radio and the sales of of IPODs/MP3 players going up. There is little demand for live music, an example of this is the BBC’s live music “top of the pops” being cancelled after 40 years. Matt cox on the BBC website said “only 1/2 an hour a week, no competition for MTV” (source).
My focus groups show that audiences are now effected greatly but the image that the video represents. Comparing two songs by the same band under a different name showed that the focus group was effected by the first song which was played with the video and seemed uninterested in the song played and simply talked over it. My focus group showed that watching music video is entertain and there is now a firm link in between audio and visual input of music. What MTV has done for music is relate sound and vision so closely, I band or group can have little musicality but still become big but image alone. An example of this is the success of the crazy frog brand, that replied completely on image.
The power of MTV is dying, with creating a world that buys singles and watches music video is dying out. With the rise of the internet and on demand devices such as SKY+ and the IPOD, many people are deciding not to sit thought adverts on MTV. Originally MTV boasted single and album sales but with the ability to download only some songs from an album on the internet. Since it’s inspection, MTV as piored the music video and created a image aware music industry. The length of popular singles has been shorten to be more compitable with a easily bored audience. Narrowcasting has given audiences access to different styles of music and most tastes are meet with a channel designed that audience.
posted by Spacedmonkey at
2:44 AM
