New Era of music

Theo Wargo/Getty ImagesTaylor Swift.

First it was the record. Then came  it was the record. Then came the cassette tape, followed by the compact disc, and, finally, the MP3.

Now some of the biggest tech companies are betting that people around the world are eager to pony up and pay a monthly fee to have access to nearly every song ever made at anytime.

But the truth is that we’re barely on the cusp of this new subscription era, which Apple, Spotify, Google, and others are betting it will be the future of how we listen to music.

In case you missed it, Apple on Monday unveiled its long-awaited on-demand music servicecalled Apple Music. Apple's bet is that it can once again change the way we listen to music,like it already did with the iTunes store for digital downloads in 2003.

Not to be outdone, the Swedish streaming-music leader Spotify the next day closed a round of funding that valued the company at a whopping $8.53 billion, The Wall Street Journal reported.

While both Apple and Spotify have options that allow you to listen for free, the core of each of their services is a $9.99-per-month premium membership that allows for on-demand access to millions of songs (and a number of gimmicks). Subscribers can also save those songs to their devices so they can listen to them when they don’t have connections to the internet, like when they’re on an airplane or riding on a subway.

Justin Sullivan/Getty ImagesRapper Drake and Apple SVP Eddy Cue at the Apple Music launch event.

Depending on how you look at it, these companies, and the other ones vying for your music dollars — like Tidal, Rdio, Google Music, and Rhapsody — either have a lot of opportunity, or must convince a lot of people to change how they listen to music.

Only about 5% of people 13 and older who live in the US and have access to the internet actually pay for monthly subscriptions to on-demand streaming services, like Spotify, Tidal, and Google Play Music, according to MusicWatch, a music-industry market research firm.

“We're not even at early days yet,” Russ Crupnick, the managing partner of MusicWatch, told Business Insider, referring to paid subscriptions to streaming services. “We haven't even hit the early adopters.”

Crupnick said that the people who pay for streaming are akin to those who decades ago were the first to buy LaserDisc and CD players.

Although the majority of people over 13 listen to music online — they stream using free services like Pandora, YouTube, iHeartRadio, or the free version of Spotify — only about one in 13 of those actually pay to do it, according to MusicWatch.

“Is streaming mainstream? I would say absolutely,” Crupnick said. “Is paying for streaming mainstream? [There’s a] long way to go.”

There are more ways to listen to music today than ever before. Long gone are the days where you relied on the radio to hear new music, and you could only build up your own music collection by visiting the record store to buy records, tapes, or CDs.

Even the age of paying to download a song or album from online stores like iTunes andAmazon has come and, for all intents and purposes, is on its way out.

Recording Industry Association of AmericaRevenue from digital downloads peaked in 2012, but revenue from streaming services continues to rise.

Now, in addition to traditional radio, CDs, vinyl, and their own purchased MP3s, people can listen to music through internet-radio services like Pandora, free and paid versions of streaming services like Spotify, through their TV providers, via satellite radio, through countless apps on their phones like iHeartRadio, and even by typing a song or artist into YouTube.

The market now is more fragmented than ever.

MusicWatch Inc.

When CD sales were at their peak, 80% of Americans regularly bought CDs, MusicWatch’s Crupnick said. When digital downloads like iTunes and Amazon MP3 ruled, 25% of people were regularly paying to download music, he said.

But the tide is certainly beginning to turn. Revenue from streaming companies, which includes free ad-supported services like Pandora, as well as subscription services like Spotify, is growing by the double digits. Last year, for the first time ever, revenue from these types of services accounted for more of the music industry’s revenue than sales of CDs. 

These two charts from the Recording Industry Association of America (RIAA), an industry trade group, illustrate that trend. The chart on the left shows steadily growing music streaming revenue, while the chart on the right shows the various sources of US music-industry revenue. 

Recording Industry Association of AmericaRevenues from streaming continue to rise.

Here's a chart that shows Spotify's free and paid user growth, via BI Intelligence:

BI IntelligenceSpotify, which is now worth more than $8 billion, has more than 20 million paying subscribers worldwide.

There won’t be one dominant way we listen to music in the near future, Crupnick said.

People listening in the background at work, or while they’re driving and can’t control the music, will listen to something that’s curated, like Pandora, or maybe Apple’s new global 24-hour streaming radio station, Beats 1. But when they're passengers on a road trip, or at home, they'll go to the on-demand service that they're paying for to create their own custom playlists, or use one of the service's own. 

Consumers have more options than ever, and with Apple Music launching later this month, they'll have one more.

It’s now up to the many companies duking it out with each other to create the best experience and convince us that theirs is the one worth paying for.

The amazing history of the music video

Music videos didn’t start with The Beatles’ A Hard Day’s Night, any more than it started with MTV, VH1 or YouTube. In fact, believe it or not, the story of the music video begins well over a century ago.

A picture perfect beginning 

It was American electrician-slash-photographer George Thomas who was the first to marry images to music. His ‘illustrated song’ – a series of still images printed onto glass slides, coloured in by hand and projected onto a screen alongside a live musical performance – made song-book publishers Edward B. Marks and Joe Stern’s number, The Little Lost Child, a massive hit back in the music halls of 1894.

Melodies are made

Skip forward almost thirty years to the era of the talkies, and musical films were taking off dramatically. Spooney Melodies was a series of five musical shorts produced by Warner Brothers between 1930 and 1931 – films that mixed art-deco animation and live-action footage and aimed to showcase the popular tunes of the day. Clocking in a six minutes (so double the typical length of the later pop video proper), only one of them, Crying’ For The Carolines, is known to have survived.

Video boxes juke it out

In the late 1950s, a company called Cameca in Courbevoie, France, came up with the Scopitone, a jukebox that incorporated a 16mm film component. Magic! Soon the Italians were following suit with the Cinebox, which emigrated to the USA with the Scopitone in the 1960s, where the Cinebox became the Cinejukebox and Francis Ford Coppolla invested in the Scopitone. The craze for video jukeboxes had fizzled out by 1967, but by then the enthusiasm for music videos was unstoppable. 

Video kills the radio star

It was television, of course, that truly embraced the music video. In the mid-1970s, alongside the UK’s famous Top of the Pops (which had quite restrictive rules on how many non-live ‘outsourced clips’ they could use in the programme), Australian TV shows Countdown and Sounds were busy popularising the genre. Sounds presenter and DJ Graham Webb hired new director Russell Mulcahy to shoot videos for songs he wanted to feature on his show but that didn’t already have their own promo clips. Mulchay went on create the video for The Buggles’Video Killed The Radio Star – which became, in 1981, the first music video ever to be played on MTV!

Music TV takes off

Since the 1980s, round-the-clock music video channels have become the norm – starting with MTV, VH1 and Canada’s MuchMusic – and in 1984, MTV launched their Music Awards (latterly the VMAs). Directors grew ambitious – John Landis’ video for Michael Jackson’s Thriller cost a staggering half a million dollars to make and opened the way for African-American artists in the music video scene.

Videos go viral

Although MTV is now more focussed on reality shows than music, the Internet has picked up where TV has waned, and, since 2005, YouTube is now the first port of call for anybody searching for their favourite artist’s latest video. The video for Lady GaGa’s hit, Bad Romance (which owes more than a nod to Thriller) became, in 2010, the most-viewed video not only on YouTube, but on the entire Internet. And now, thanks to smartphones, more people than ever check out videos anywhere, anytime.

So, one hundred and eighteen years old and still going from strength to strength – here’s to the music video!

BEYONCE - Music Video Analysis

Written By: BC Jean and Toby Gad
Director: Jake Nava
Genre: Pop/ Folk Rock
Structure: Narrative

Beyonce plays the part of the girlfriend in the relationship between the two character's on screen. There is an obvious trust issue between the couple as there are suspects of the male cheating on her. Beyonce tries to take the point of view of the male and steps in his shoes for a day. She is expressing her views of the male species and how they miss signals from their girlfriends when they are upset and their general attitudes towards life and relationships.

The whole video is in black and white as opposed to colour which gives the video an archaic feel. The video resembles that of something from the past as though to connote a re-occurrence of events - maybe he has cheated before and it is as plain as 'black and white'. The use of colour could also represent a gender conflict or opposition between two sexes. Black and white is used to show contrast and here we can see it is being used for a contrast of views.

We see Beyonce, a female, in a mans role. She dresses in a police uniform made up of a cap, ray ban aviators, a shirt, trousers and black boots. This uniform displays a strong role in the relationship and as the police are seen as dominant figures of society. The uniform makes Beyonce appear in control and of fair and honest standards, as though we should see her view as one society agrees with, so the audience understand her views in the video through this aspect. In the 50's and 60's a job as a police officer was seen as a male dominating role and women weren't generally seen 'on the job'. The black and white ties into this idea as though these archaic concepts are related to this current event all make her male role more obvious to the audience.

Beyonce displays male qualities and things that we associate with the male gender. For example, through the use of a medium two-shot we see Beyonce grab, what appears to be a criminal, by the arms and slam him onto a police car. This gives a very violent aspect to her character and shows men as violent species. This gives the audience negative attitudes towards the man in the relationship and takes sides with her. It is also an unusual viewing experience for the audience as they arn't as used to seeing a women as opposed to a man act in a violent way.

Meanwhile, through the use of a low angle medium shot, we can see Beyonce's male co-worker acting voyeuristic by staring at the lead's bottom as she bends over. Her bottom is framed left at an extreme close-up proximity for the audience, so we are forced to look at her bottom two, given use almost the p.o.v of another male onlooker. The man is also dressed in the same police uniform as the lead which makes the act of voyeurism seem more unnatural, almost corrupt of the officer to do so. This makes the audience feel all the more negative towards the man in the relationship.

In the setting of the shooting range we see the artist helping the co-worker to improve his shooting. What we are seeing a fantasy of Beyonce's imagination depicting her taking the role of her lover. Again this is connoting violence among the male species and helps to build up a negative view of her lover through a medium close up two-shot. The black and grey shooting range clothing continues the theme of black and white reinforcing the contrast between the two genders. It also gives Beyonce a male appearance to help establish her role as her male lover. In this violent action we see a moment of tenderness as Beyonce seems to lovingly touch her coworkers Adam, again through the two-shot. This subtly suggest an attempt to cheat on her partner which resembles herself, making the audience all the more empathetic towards the artist. As she is in his shoes the audience feel as though they are in here's.

We also see, through the use of a low angle medium shot, the man sitting vulnerably at the table eating breakfast. Beyonce walks in, takes a bite of food which he had prepared, looks at the man with hopelessness and walks out of the door. We feel sorry for the man in  scene but our feelings are translated onto Beyoncé as we are seeing her in the alternate role of the male. This scene expresses her efforts to make things right between them and the hopelessness that is mutually felt in the relationship.

Another scene of voyeurism is show through the use of a long shot jump cut to a medium close-up where Beyonce is in, what feels like a males changing room, as she undresses, (a tradition act related to the police force's culture). She is in a black bra, again continuing the colour scheme, and she looks over her left shoulder and smiles at someone outside of the camera. We, the audience, believe it to be the police co-worker, further suggesting the idea of cheating on the other partner. We the audience are watching her undress as is the potential male in the changing room.

A master shot shows the lead with her police co-workers, including the male friend, around a restaurant table. The warm lighting suggest an environment she feels comfortable in, the mise-en-scene provides a 'diner' environment with sugar, salt and pepper pots in the middle of the table and the fact they are seated in the window, typical of a restaurant. The man in the relationship texts her and she ignores him which directly corporates with the lyrics of the song. For example, "Tell everyone it's broken, so they think that I was sleeping alone." This seems to be a repeating convention of mainstream music videos, to match the action to the lyrics. Again this builds up a negative view of the man. Use of medium close-ups are used to show the lead and the man to reveal their emotions to the audience.

Finally a clear image is presented to the audience where Beyonce is dancing sexually with her male co-worker, the audience see this through a long P.O.V shot of the male/Beyoncé. A medium close-up is used to reveal her shock when she realises he is watching and she passes her drink to the co-worker and walks to her boyfriend. A long two-shot shows her trying to explain to him but he has none of it. The audience imagine the roles reversed and more empty is felt towards Beyoncé as we see her upset net and frustration with him. The colour black again is prominent in the scene as Beyonce wears a black dress, this connotes the evilness of  her actions against her lover. Black is also associated with funerals so the black dress could represent the death of their relationship, and the end of an era.

A break down section is included in the video where the music is faded revealing diegetic sound of the character's conversation. A long two-shot is used while they converse again the colour black is evident in their costuming, Beyonce wearing the same outfit previously. A clever twist is used in the dialogue when Beyonce says, "it's not like I'm sleeping with the guy." they both say in unison, "what?" there is a long pause, and the male says, "I said, its not like I'm sleeping with the girl." This changes him from being vulnerable in the situation to being the antagonist. Realisation hits the audience and confirms the alternate twist of views through the video. A medium close-up reveals a tear from the artist 's eyes and the audience can't help but understand her sadness. We understand the video is a depiction of her imagination of the frustration of her lover's ways.

In the introduction there was a long shot of Beyonce leaving her home, entering her work vehicle with the male co-worker in the car and dressed her her police outfit. After the break down section the cinematography is completely copied but with the male in his uniform. When he gets into the car there is a female police officer in the drivers seat. We now understand and can see the bigger picture. Beyonce is sad over suspicions her boyfriend is cheating on her with a woman from work. The audience are left feeling touched and emotional.

Summary

From analysing this video I have seen the use of clever breakdown and speech manipulation to create a twist within a video. I have also learned how to appropriately match the on screen action with the lyrics of the chosen song. I have found how to achieve a continuous symbolic colour scheme to link appropriate scenes and meaning together. Finally, I have learned how to achieve a powerful video with a small cast of 4 main characters.

Taylor Swift - Popular music video artist

         'Taylor Swift 'The Story Of Us' 

Taylor Swift - The Story Of Us

Music Video Analysis The music video begins with a series of cutaway shots - from an establishing shot of an old building to the camera panning horizontally to the right showing a row of books, which allows the mise en scene to be established as a library. Focusing again on the mise en scene, it can be seen that the costuming is designed around preppy/school clothing, giving the impression that it's not a normal library, but a school library. This could establish the audience of the video as younger teenage girls who are possibly able to relate to the song more. As the camera continues to pan along the row of books, it suddenly stops on a book named 'The Story Of Us,' which therefore links the visuals to the lyrics as this is the name of the song. Cutaways of various close ups, extreme close ups and medium long shots are shown of Taylor Swift as she begins to narrate the 'story,' which helps establish and identify to the audience who the singer is. 

Cutaways of flashbacks from the past are used of Taylor Swift and her 'ex' as she continues singing, which provides background information and allows the viewer to understand the story. As Taylor sings 'I used to know my own place was a spot next to you,' an establishing long shot pans to the left inside the crowded library, which shows Taylor 'searching the room for an empty seat' - another technique used to link the visuals to the lyrics. 

Cutaways of various random students working in the library are also shown, possibly showing how they are completely oblivious to the tension that is being created between the two characters. An over the shoulder shot is included when Taylor notices her 'ex' sat in almost direct eye line of her inside the library. Shot reverse shot is also used when the male character notices Taylor - a technique used to capture the reactions of each character and how they're reacting to the fact they are seeing one another for possibly the first time since they separated. 

The silent interaction between the two characters continues throughout the use of cutaways and shot reverse shot. Taylor sings the line 'I've never heard silence quite this loud' which is a clever lyric that could be taken in the literal context - the fact they're both in a library where complete silence is expected - or the fact that these two characters are unable to interact with each other the way they used to and silence has become even more painful and awkward when they are confronted by one another.

Camera movement becomes slightly different towards the end. The camera zooms in on Taylor singing and when she falls to the right then to the left as well as sliding down the bookcase, shaky camera movements follow her. This is possibly showing how as she comes to the end of the 'story,' the storyline becomes more tragic and upsetting - obviously shown through her actions and facial expressions. The fact she is also placed between two bookshelves could also give the impression that everything is closing in on her and how she is powerless in stopping the breakdown of this relationship. 

As the video comes to a climax, a medium slow motion shot reverse shot is used to show Taylor and her ex approaching one another. This is possibly used to create even more tension and build suspense to keep the viewer guessing as to what is going to happen. As soon as a medium two shot of the characters facing each other is introduced, the students who had previously been working throw all their papers into the air - possibly representing the explosive outcome of Taylor and her ex coming face to face after all this time. A close up shot reverse shot is used of the two characters as papers carry on falling around them, therefore showing an extreme contrast between the commotion of all the students and the silence between the two characters who still seem to have no idea what to say to one another.