#gew101week3

[benbrgew-blog]

O'Shea Jackson, also known as Ice Cube, was ranked #8 on mtv's top ten greatest MC's of all time. In his music video ,"Everything's Corrupt", he portrays through just the title that Everything is corrupt. According to the Websters Dictionary, it describes corrupt as,"having or showing a willingness to act dishonestly in return for money or personal gain." In the lyrics of the music video,Ice Cube says "for my birthday, buy me a politician". Politicians are often bought off by corporate companies. Corporate Companies pay politicians to pass certain laws that will benefit their company. The video illustrates actual footage to use as evidence of what he is singing about in his lyrics. Ice cube does an excellent job showing you that everything is corrupt, an excellent job explaining everything is corrupt through actual text on the video, and an excellent job spreading his message through his lyrics. This is more than just music, It is reality.

[benchgew]

Author: Macklemore is the author and the song is "Wings"

Audience: This video is intended for anybody who is interested in how we as a society have been consumed with how materialistic we have become as a society. It could also be intended for the younger generation who is all about trends.

Text: The text is how Macklemore uses a story from his childhood to explain to kids and society how we are consumed by this obsession to be trendy and updated on the coolest and latest fads. The text is also the concept that we have become a very materialistic society and how we are all about what everybody else has.

Surrounding Context: The overall message of this video is how far we are carrying trends these days. We will do anything to get our hands on the latest and greatest thing. Ultimately we judge people on how they dress and what nice things they have.

[bohbrgew-blog]

I chose the song Pumped Up Kicks. The author of this would be the band that recorded it, Foster the People. This song focuses on the topics of school shootings and also bullying. The intended audience in this video would be young people in schools getting bullied or anyone concerned about the topics of bullying, gun violence, or school shootings. The invoked audience would be anyone else who hears the song even if they are not very concerned about the issues. The text is a story about a boy in school who has been bullied. The boy's mom is gone and his dad is away most of the day, giving him a feeling of loneliness. The boy deals with a lack of love and is also bullied. He is abused and takes a gun to his school and starts shooting the people there. Many people also connect it to the Columbine school shooting in 1999. The surrounding context in the video/song is the issue of bullying and its effect on youth. It also shows how bullying can lead to much more serious things such as killing people.

[grijogew-blog]

Author: The band's name is Enter Shikari and the song is called Arguing With Thermometers. 

Audience: The audience can be anyone who is interested in political issues and what other people's views about them are.

Text: This is a music video that uses a news setting and interviews to ask "what is going to happen next?"

Surrounding Context: The overall point of this song is to question what will happen when there is no longer any oil left on earth. Are we going to go to war in Antarctica to get the last of the oil?

[milaugew-blog]

This text was written by guitarist and vocalist Jim Adkins, and directed by Paul Fedor. It depicts a house party where everyone is in their underwear except one boy who is fully clothed. Feeling left out, he goes from room to room trying to find a place to fit in. He eventually becomes more and more frustrated and decides that he's going to try and fit in by taking his clothes off too. As he starts to change he notices a girl who is fully clothed as well. They leave the party together without changing themselves. 

I think the intended audience would be teenagers who feel as left out, different, or like they need to change themselves to be accepted. 

The lyrics do a good job of relating to how a teenager might feel. Phrases such as, "It's only in your head you feel left out, or looked down on" - and - "Yeah, just be yourself, it doesn't matter if it's good enough for someone else" help tell their listeners that in time they'll be accepted for who they are, and that they shouldn't change themselves just so others will be happy. 

Visually the video does a great job expressing the same message. Everyone in the entire video is doing the same thing except the boy. Everyone's staring him down and giving bad looks; it's easy to see why he'd feel like changing.

I think these messages are what the writer and director were trying to convey both through the lyrics and the visuals. 

[fletagew-blog]

The Soloist, based on true events, is directed by Joe Wright. Actor and musician Jaime Foxx portrays homeless schizophrenic Nathaniel Anthony Ayers. Steve Lopez, (portrayed by Robert Downey, Jr.) a down-on-his-luck Los Angeles reporter who stumbles upon the ex-Julliard cello prodigy. Lopez intends to "decode" Ayers' mind in an attempt to write an article that will save his career. What follows is an unlikely story of friendship.

 "Life has a mind of its own" reads the tagline of The Soloist, as demonstrated in the short clip from the film. In context, this color sequence is a powerful example of symphony and color blended together from the creative mind of a schizophrenic musician. When Lopez and Ayers attend a Beethoven symphony at the Los Angeles concert hall, the onscreen imagery of color in sync with the orchestra allow the audience to see music through the eyes of Nathaniel. It may provoke such questioning as: Does mental illness inspire creativity? Are schizophrenics more apt to being artistically inclined than the rest of society?

Music lovers will be drawn to this sentimental piece that displays the healing effect of music, especially on mental illness. Film-goers may appreciate writer's Susannah Grant's dramatized screenplay based on the novel written by the real Steve Lopez. This piece is also a loose biography.The following is an excerpted interview of  Nathaniel Ayers and Steve Lopez that depicts their real life friendship : http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=cHt6e7jqY5U 

The film conjures up issues of mental illness and the alarming reality of homelessness in the United States- especially the scenes depicting daily life on Los Angeles' Skid Row, one of the largest homeless communities in the country. There is also no definitive cause or known cure for schizophrenia today, meaning that Nathaniel will never see recovery and will most likely be persecuted by delusions his whole life. However, this is also a story of hope and healing: through the power of music and of friendship.

[bruda002gew-blog]

The City

http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=iqUBmeFn7qM

The author of this video is Madeon, he is a electronic DJ from France. The audience is directed towards a younger generation due to the electronic genre of music. It just so happens that the older generation doesn’t appreciate and enjoy the new style of music that our generation has learned to love. This video has a rare amount of text in it and that is the lyrics because it is mainly focused on the electronic background music. The surrounding context of the video is showing an abandoned city and how the youth just wants to live free and have fun with their lives with exploring new things.

[edgangew-blog]

1. The author of this text : Martina McBride was the singer, the song itself was composed by Rob Crosby and Stephanie Bentley.

2. Audience : The audience to the music video include the fans of Martina McBride as well as people involved in Child Help USA (featured in end of video) and those against child abuse.

3. Text : The text of the video is composed of two large parts, the video and the music. The video consists of the images on the screen and music consists of the notes of the music as well as the lyrics sung by McBride.

4. Surrounding Context : The surrounding context of the video is child abuse. Knowing the devastation of child abuse and witnessing the music video would likely allow people to understand the deeper meaning of the video.