The existence of digital media gave people who watch music videos on television a bridge to connect with music in their own way. MTV for example does not provide a accessible space for viewers to engage with the music video or create their own understanding to the music. It is more passive since the way it is shown is through television which blocks the viewers’ connection to engage with the visualisation of music, due to how most viewer are being fed passively visuals to music. Fan made video Digital media in contrast creates a space of listeners creating their own visual representation of the music they listen to. Just to clarify, there is a program my MTV called TRL that gives the audience a chance to showcase their own music videos, but the existence of digital media, especially YouTube, made it a lot more assessable and hands-on.

This way recreation gives listeners and fans a different way of interacting with the music. Which, in my opinion, brings in a larger audience.

Record label produced music videos are mostly mainstream and high cost. There are groups of people who are interested in different genre of music, and the digital platform creates this space where not just mainstream music is present, but also indie music. This creates a more well-rounded environment for music and music videos to be available. This benefits the diversity of music and visual representations.

The different visual representation for the song “Thunder” by Imagine Dragons between the record label production and fan made represents the different visualization of music.

The storytelling and meaning and of the song can be “changed” due to the visual representation given. This reflects how the listener can recreate a bond with the music through presenting their own visual representation of music. Posting them and showing others, their creative music video can bring together fans with similar taste or even bring up “conflicts” with the difference of understanding. This creates a very different engagement with music from MTV.

Reference:

Daniel Cookney ‘Vimeo Killed the Video Star: Burial and the User Generated Music Video’, Music/Video: Histories Aesthetics, Media, 255-267

Questions I had in mind while engaging with this topic. Why music videos are so important. For something that I will listen to over and over again, it was never about the video, but the music itself (this is very subjective). I understand that music videos can give the music another level of stimulation, but it is bound to be a package? Does music come first or the video? If the music is bad but the video is good which is more important to the industry?  

Xin Cindy Sun