Purposes of Music Videos

What Is a Music Video?

A music video is a means of promoting a song which a band has made. Most music videos have the artist in the video as it is their song and this would help promote the artist as well as the song. A prime example of this promotional achievement would be Michael Jackson. Michael Jackson has the world record for the most copies of an album sold. This album of course was called “Thriller”. “Thriller” the album had cost $750,000 just to make. Jackson himself had written some of the songs in the album including “Beat It” and “Billie Jean”, but his most successful song was Thriller. The song thriller was recorded during April up to November in 1982. For the first year the song had not sold much as the last album “Off the Wall”. In recent years music videos had been quite successful due to the new release of the music channel “MTV” which was released in 1982.

Promotion

The promotion of the song is all in the music video, as this is how people will remember the song by the video. This is called music representation. Music representation is a visual format of what the song is about, this could be lots of different formats as this depends on how the director sees and feels about the song.

Extension of Outlets

The extension of outlets means where the song will be played, for example the most obvious place for a music video MTV. The extension of outlets is basically where about the song will be advertised. Some of the most obvious choices are MTV, VH1, and TMF but a lot of artists will also put their song on internet video sites such as YouTube. These again are ways of advertising to the target audience. In turn this makes the audience want to buy the song and it will be waiting for them on places like I-tunes or possible be able to download it off of your phone.

Extension of Income

One of the tags which comes with a music video is an extension of income because the advertisement will get advertise the artist and the song which in turn will make more people buy the album or single which then causes the album to get re-noticed and so therefore begins to sell more copies. As I said earlier Michael Jacksons “Thriller done this well as the song was out for a year but then when the music video was made it became the world’s biggest selling album to date. The money is also used to recuperate money lost from making the video.

Links to Film or TV

Some artists will work together with films and TV programs to make more of an advertisement. When Transformers was released the rock band Linkin Park joined forces with the film and allowed their song to be played this in turn giving them more advertisement. Other artists may wish to advertise through programs such as the X factor.

MTV

As I said earlier music videos were created as an advertising purpose, the biggest of these advertising would be MTV or Music Video Television. MTV’s history began in 1977 when Warner Cable (A division of Warner Communications) decided to make the first 2 way cable TV system; one of these channels was a music channel which featured footage from artist’s concerts. The original idea for MTV came from a man called Robert Pittman, Pittman had tested his idea by going on air on a show called “Pop clips” which he had produced and hosted. People had really enjoyed it and thought that this was a good show. Pittman then later became chief executive officer of MTV Networks.

First Music Video

The first music video was not shown on TV it was shown in a concert while the band were performing. The idea of Music videos have been around since 1894 this was when the first music video was created. It was created by Edward Masen and Joe Stern who came up with the idea of promoting their song by using still images, they done this on one of their songs “The Little Lost Child”. The idea was that when they were playing their song they would have a series of still images being shown. Which is exactly what they did, they had the images of a blurred kitten this was considered to be the first music video. An example of a music video before the release of MTV was “A Hard Day’s Night” by the Beatles. This was not just a music video they also released a feature film with the same title as the song.

History of Music Video Channels

MTV was what made music videos big but it wasn’t the very first music video program, The first music video program was in Sydney, Australia. The show was called “sounds” and was released in 1974 and was hosted by the former radio DJ Graham Webb. The show was aimed at mainly teenagers at was aired every week on Sydney's ATN-7 on Saturday mornings, the show was initially called “sounds unlimited” but then got shortened to just “sounds”. The host of the show Webb was running out of music videos and so turned to Russell Mulcahy a newsroom staffer, Webb asked him to make some new material by recording some video to go with some of the music. Mulcahy had had so much success from these videos that he quit his job, and from his success he began to direct music videos for Stylus, Marcia Hines, Hush and AC/DC. Mulcahy had some early success and so moved to Britain after already directing songs for XTC’s “Making Plans for Nigel” and The Buggles “Video Killed the Radio Star” which became the first music video to be played on MTV.

Top of the Pops

Top of the Pops is one of the longest running shows on the BBC and was also one of the most successful. Top of The Pops started to air in the late 1970’s and then got moved to Thursday’s on BBC 1 and then got moved to Fridays in 1996 before being finally moved to Sundays in 2005.

Some of the first most succesful music video's

Some of the first most succesful music videos were in the 70's. one of which was made by Queen this was "Bohemian Rhapsody" this amazed audiences because of the song amazing use of different beats plus it was also noted for its music video as it was shot entirely on one tape and after they had added in a few efiting techniques and they were finished, on youtube alno it has had over 318 million views.. Another famous music video was done by the Beatles, this was called "Strawberry Fields Forever" this was recorded in 1967 and again was a huge success getting well over 1 million views on youtube.

List of Music Video Stations

• 40 TV

• Alt TV

• BET

• bpm:tv

• Bubble Hits

• C4

• Channel O

• Channel [V]

• Channel [U]

• CMC-TV

• CMC

• CMT • Fly Music

• Fuse TV

• Gospel Music Channel

• GAC

• IMF

• Juice TV

• Kerrang! TV (heavy metal)

• MAD (Music All Day)

• MCM

• MTV

• Much Music

• Music 24 • NME TV

• PMC

• Q TV

• Spirit

• TMF

• Tempo TV

• The Box

• The Tube

• TVU

• VH1

• VIVA

• Worship