Sunday, 25 September 2011

Honey

I just finished watching honey with my mum on channel VIVA.
I recognised some stereotypical techniques and the challenging of stereotypes in the film. Honey is a resident of a troublesome estate who works as a bartender and her only way of getting money is bartending and dance instructing which both require a skill that isn’t educationally earned. This displays the stereotype of people in working class areas are there because they don’t have/use their qualifications wisely and only way for them to get out is to either use a criminal/artistic skill such as her pursuit to become a dancing choreographer.


Thursday, 8 September 2011

Why at the end of every american voilent/crime film is their a rap song in the credits?

Fast Five Poster


I just finished watching fast and furious five also known as 'Fast Five', first things first watch it it’s the stuff! Now that we got that out of the way, after I enjoyed watching one of  the best car films ever made the first song in the credits was a rap song called 'How We Roll' by Don Omar featuring legendary rapper Busta Rhymes. Now after this a thought occurred to me why do many American films that are about negative or violent views all have rap films in them? 
This must mean that people tend to associate rap with violent and negative things which must degrade it as a musical genre in society? Then I asked myself can I really blame society for thinking this way? Obviously not I told myself my reason for this is  2 thirds of rap is gangster rap. As a fan of rap and an aspiring rapper myself I have listened to and researched some information about musicians, especially rappers and most especially my favourite rappers. So I have some understanding of how gangster rap actually started and why it was so strongly received; gangster rap was mainly about civilians in gang polluted areas speaking about their experiences that attracted a large audience because some people who couldn't relate were interested and people who could related liked it too. It is similar to the grandfather/father concept telling his grandchildren/children camp-fire stories of their experiences expect for every line rhymed with another, they were delivers a melodic articulation described as flow and they had backing music called a beat. Even though this form of rap started to help a lot of people mentally and physically and it became therapeutic, as every beautiful thing created it got corrupted by liars, money hungry and business people. I will touch on this topic more deeper in a later time. 

Wednesday, 6 July 2011

Fresh Start; Lets check some music videos!

In class today we were learning about the purpose of music videos and the different types they are... 


A music video
- a series of (often consecutive) moving pictures to promote a song. 
- the images tend to be in line with the song
- they either show the artist or tell a story that fits the song
We learnt today that there are 3 types of music videos:

Performance - This is when a band/artist is shown in the video often miming or playing along to song in the video. Often this is a small concert so it shows fans liking the song with the filming crew easily being able to film it with a camera and a crane.

Non-Narrative - This is when a  band/artist might be featured in the video and the video has no reference or relevance to the song many dance videos are non narrative.

Narrative - This is when a band/artist may not be the main feature of the video and the video focuses more on telling a the story behind the song as opposed to performance when the artist is the main focus of the video.

Existing Performance Music Videos: 
Beyonce - ft Shakira http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=QrOe2h9RtWI








Linkin Park  - What I've Done http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=8sgycukafqQ







Eminem- The Way I Am http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=mQvteoFiMlg















Existing Non-Narrative Music Videos: 
Benny Benassi - Satisfaction  http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=V5bYDhZBFLA






















Fedde Le Grand - Put Your Hands Up For Detroit http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=SYs2HHY
















Existing Narrative Music Videos: 
Eminem - Stan ft Dido http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=aSLZFdqwh7E







Ludacris -  Runaway Love ft Mary J Blige http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=ISvMS6s41vY












Kelis - Millionaire ft Andre 3000 http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=8qImH-0UCHI