Gielliane Gaa

•Indie Pop is a genre of alternative rock that originated from the UK in the mid 1980s with roots from the Scottish post-punk bands.

•It differs from Indie Rock to the extent that it is more melodic, less abrasive, and angst-free.

•Its original rise to popularity started in a small photocopied fanzines, and small shop-based record labels.

British musical weekly New Musical Express released an era-defining compilation cassette called C81.

The cassette featured a wide range of groups, reflecting different approaches of the post-pink era.

NME followed up the C81 with C86 5 years later. This was seen as the birth of “Indie” in the UK...

• Indie Pop music videos are known to be low-budget. • Main settings are in: studios, cities, parks, woods etc. These

locations create mysteries which makes the audience focus more on the performance.

• Most Indie Pop music videos includes a live performance from the artist which makes the audience focus on the talent the artist has. It makes their career about their passion for

music rather than success

• Live performances promote the artist/s too. This enables audiences to see the atmosphere the artist creates in their concerts encouraging the public to watch the artist/s live

• Performance is often partnered with a narrative to break up the music video thus, creating the music video memorable

• A narrative is used to tell a story by using a sequence of images and videos related to the song; not literal, but still enables the audience to understand why it was given that

certain narrative which links with song (Goodwin’s Theory of Illustration and Amplification)

• As technology advances, music video directors are able to create a variation of storytelling created by special effects

making the video a lot more interesting for the audience and keeps them engaged in the music video as the scenes are

always changing. This can also help gain success and status of the song, artist/s and directors.

• Indie music videos are generally simple. Props, costumes, make up etc. are linked to the scene.

• A prop can complete a scene as audiences are able to physically see what the character/artist is currently doing. For example, in Ed Sheeran’s A Team, we see the girl using

drugs. We as an audience assume this already, but our assumptions wouldn’t have been fulfilled without the

character actually showing us her struggles to feed the addiction

• Costume and make up create the character. It indicates their age, wealth, status, era of the music video and stability. For example, in Taylor Swift’s Love Story, they are all dressed in

Period clothing from the 1900s

• Dialogue are often used in music videos either in the beginning or the end to tell or conclude the story. For

example, Taylor Swift’s ‘I knew you were trouble’, at the beginning, she tells her audience what she had learnt from the relationship she was in previously. It is also sometimes used to either distort, fade, increase or decrease the tempo

to express one’s emotions• Diegetic sound is used when filming scenes: to match the lyrics with the actions, but the end product the song is non-

diegetic.

• Extreme, close-ups are the most common shots used as this introduces the artist or the antagonist to the audience. Used

to express emotions. • Long shots, establishing shots are used to show the setting

of the video and sets the character, and helps the audience understand the message behind the video

• Tilts and pans to either move along the scene or cut into another scene

• Handheld shots are often used to show a memory

•Filters are often used over the top of clips or the entire video to give a certain idea to the viewer, such as memory, age to the video or showing the clip in a positive or negative light. For example, in Ellie Goulding’s Your Song, she uses a filter

on the ‘memory’ clips to show the past and her thoughts, and the present time have no filter. Black and white or Sepia are

the main filters used to create a rustic look• Fast and slow cuts between shots reflects the pace of the

music, creating the atmosphere of the music video