Genre Theory

Genre can be described as the particular form or style of a text, which includes a certain typical structure or conventions. In A2 we created a music video ours of a country/pop genre. The purpose of genres within the music industry is a means of ordering and organising where types of music fit in, and by doing so allow audiences to interact with software such as iTunes or YouTube in a functional way. A particular genre of music a person prefers can be accessed easily, with genre forming the basis of categorisation. In a modern world we relish order.

Theorist Glenhill said 'One advantage of genres is that they can rely on readers already having knowledge and expectations about works within genre.' It was important for our video to satisfy the audience’s expectations of the pop/country genre, as people choose to watch music videos as a means of entertainment, and escapism. This can be related to the uses and gratifications model, as pop/country music videos can be seen to benefit an audience by providing them with the diversion and pleasure they desire. An audience will select to watch videos of a particular genre, as they already hold preconceptions on how they will be and so are confident they will enjoy them. Therefore by formulating our music video to fit a genre, we could be confident of the expectations of this target audience of and so how to make it appeal to them. The creation of texts outside of genre is risky, as you cannot be certain they will have elements that appeal to any market.

The target audience for our music video was primarily females aged 13-21 years old. We selected this audience as from analysis of the market for the Taylor swift song we were using as our base, this audience appeared to be the primary consumers. In order to adhere to our country/pop genre we attempted to follow the conventions of current real media texts. From our analysis of similar artists videos, we concluded some of conventions to be; A focus on star image of the main artist, we included this by having 90% of shots being of our artist and with frequent close ups of her face. Editing with the beat of the song to match the pace of the music, in our video we adapted the cutting speed of shots, creating a fast paced montage for the lively instrumental. Specific to primarily pop videos is also the presents of a narrative within the video that usually directly illustrates or amplifies the lyrics of the song. To re-create this in our video with had a narrative storyline portraying a relationship break-up between our female artist and her 'boyfriend.' Not only is the present of a narrative common in pop videos, but also a storyline based specifically on a relationship is repeated frequently and fulfils certain expectations. The reason this is so popular within this genre is that it appeals to the target audience, with primarily young girls watching these videos, relationships and break-ups are a concept they can relate to and likely to be a part of their life. The purpose of a female pop artist is also to appear aspirational and attractive to her audience. We therefore tailored our mise en scene to emulate our artist’s beauty by; curling her hair, using light natural make-up, and feminine floral clothes that reflected innocents and youth. Within the genre of pop female artists are often exploited for their beauty and use it to expand their appeal to both sexes. This is the basis of Laura Mulvey's theory of 'the male gaze,' and that women are sexual objects, admired by males and aspirational to women. However the country element of our videos genre made us avoid the sexualisation of our artist, as it isn't main stream pop but a more traditional and classic music style, which is reflected by a more demure image we tried to exhibit.

To conclude, the use of genre provided us with guidelines for the production of our music video and helped us make creative decisions by providing some restriction to the possibilities of our video. Genre also ensured we were focusing on the audience’s reception of our video and providing a product that would fulfil a purpose to provide enjoyment. Genre can be regarded incredibly post-modern as it actively encourages the mimicking of concepts to create predictable products that lack originality and are just versions of old work. However it seems that people enjoy the consumption of predictable products as there is enough variation for them to enjoy guessing, for example the end to a narrative storyline, however the sense of familiarity is comforting. It was sated by theorist Neale that ‘Pleasure is derived through repetition and difference.’ Our music video had a predictable clique narrative of a boy and girl, however the new faces and catchy tune of country pop creates a pleasant image the audience can empathise with and recognise. The hyper reality of pop videos evokes an emotional response that never gets old.