The Purpose Of Music Videos

A music video is a short film/video that accompanies a song or soundtrack, these are used to tell a story. These have been around for decades but were made massively popular after the launch of MTV in 1981. One of the first popular music videos is "Video Killed The Radio Star" by "The Buggles" which was released in 1979 and aired regularly on MTV in the early 1980's. The video used very early production technology and used physical sets and real time special effects such as smoke or sparks, this is because at this time computer special effects were in the very early days of development.  This essay is to explain the purpose of music videos and why they are so popular.

             

Promotion of Artists

Some music videos focus mainly on the artist's image, this is to help promote the artist and and it also makes them stand out more. This is more common with solo artists as they can be the center of attention. For example in the music video for the song "Roar" by Katy Perry, she is very much the focus of the video, telling a story through interpretive dance and costumes.
This is also common of directors too, often they will have a certain style that makes them stand
out more.
          

Producers Strategies 

Artists are all marketed in different ways, this is not necessarily about thier 'image' but more so down to the producers strategies. There are different labels that artists are signed to, this means that there are many different approaches to how an artist is promoted or how they are perceived by the public. One example of this type of strategy is in the music video for "Blurred Lines" by Robin Thicke and Pharrell Williams. The music video for this was very controversial and received many complaints, some radio stations even refused to give the song any airplay because of the nature of the song. It was directed by Diane Martel and had a very basic layout. However it objectified women and portrayed the 'Bachelor' lifestyle as a good way to live. However, because the music video became a controversy, more people watched it and it has now received over 400 Million views on YouTube alone, creating millions of dollars of Ad revenue and becoming massively successful.

There are a lot of different strategies used by directors and producers, controversy is just one example. Other examples include extensive use of the artists image such as Miley Cyrus or Lady Gaga. Some also use a narrative as a good strategy, to keep the audience engaged for longer.

         

Extending Income

Music videos are a very good way to bring in more income to a record label and in turn will also bring more income to the artist. Now it is very important to have a music video accompany a song because it is much easier to share on social media. YouTube and Vevo are the most common music video sharing sites today, and they amass millions (sometimes even billions) of views to music videos, this in turn creates revenue from adverts that are played before the videos and can bring in hundreds of thousands, if not millions of dollars depending on the amount of videos, the context of the music video and the time of year that it was posted. However music videos have been around for decades and before the internet, these were played primarily on television, most famously MTV which was launched in 1981. 

A famous example of a song from this period that was massively boosted by its music video is Michael Jackson's "Thriller". It became one of the most replayed music videos of all time because of the story that it tells and also because nothing like it had been done before. Originally the song didn't become a hit, but when the music video was released, it reached a lot more people and the more airplay it got, the more sales there were in records. This in turn took over $500 Million in sales alone.

Extension of Media Outlets

A music video can help expand an artists audience, this is because the people who come to watch the video may not be a fan of the artists music, but maybe a fan of the videos that are produced. This is why a lot of artists tend to stick to the same producer as it gives them their own style or 'niche', so for example Sia is very well known for well choreographed videos such as 'Chandelier', this would interest people who are interested in interpretive dance and would keep them engaged. A video can connect to a bigger audience than just the song alone, this is why there are now so many music videos, it's very uncommon to see big artists without music videos. 

Although Youtube and Vevo are the two top music video sharing sites, Facebook is very useful for an artist to advertise their video, sometimes there will be short clips extracted from the music video and posted onto Facebook, this is so that the clips can be liked and shared so it creates a bigger interest and inevitably a bigger audience. Although in order to gain any success from this, the music video must stand out as there are millions of videos shared on Facebook every day. 

Synergistic Marketing

This strategy is used if a song is used in a movie for example, this is a very easy way for a song to become successful, obviously depending on the success of the movie. One example of this is the song 'See you again' by Wiz Khalifa, featuring Charlie Puth. This song was used at the very end of 'Fast and furious 7' and was made as a tribute and homage to the late Paul Walker. The song became a massive success because of this and when the music video was released, it gained over 2 billion views. This mean't that the movie was more recognizable and the artists gained a lot more attention and revenue because of this. 

Conclusion

I think that music videos are so popular because they add a unique perspective on the original song. They are also a lot easier to share on social media sites and they stand out  a lot more than just the audio track itself. Music videos have grown in popularity since the early 1980's because technology has advanced, it has become easier and easier for more and more people to view music videos, and because of the internet, a music video now makes up a lot of revenue where as in the early days, they were used as a promotional tool to advertise and sell records.