Conventions of the Pop Promo

Technical Conventions:

- Band shots, whole band shots and performance clips – Advertising the band
- Shadows, mise-en-scene reflects atmosphere, focus on the most well known band members

- High lighting
- Bright lighting
- High angle / low angle, Special lighting effects
- Close-ups / Extreme close-ups
- Animation
- Colour effects – often monochrome
- Mainly straight-cuts
- Faced paced edits
- No real sound effects
- Dubbed Sound
- Zooming in / out
- Panning
- Montage


Narrative

- How is narrative used? – Balanced with performance? Cut into performance? Merged with performance?

- Does it amplify the lyrics? Does it focus on a specific part of the lyrics and illustrate it? Does it contradict the lyrics?

- Narrative might not be constructed in a typical narrative- It may be partial or disjointed


Intertextuality

- The process where one media text references another, it can be a carbon copy, a pastiche, a parody or a homage.

- This borrowing of images, narratives and reconstructing them can be seen of ‘post-modern’.

- Examples – Robbie Williams copies Kiss in ‘Let me entertain you’, Eminem references many celebrities ‘We Made You’


Textual Analysis

- Glamour, Rockstar lifestyle
- Mean and moody men
- Seductive poses from female artists
- Anti-establishment activity
- Deserted locations and straight-forward narrative (sometimes!)
- Guitar solos
- All playing to the audience
- Short skirts and cleavage
- Trying to portray a certain character
- Voyeurism
- Urban Locations
- Dancing
- Crowd Shots
- Destroyed Environments