edited:CASE STUDY: HOW DOES THE MUSIC VIDEO FOR LOVE ME BY THE 1975 APPEAL TO ITS TARGET AUDIENCE?

The 1975 are an indie rock band with electronic elements from the UK. They became popular in 2014 but have been making music in their small band since 2002. Love Me is the lead single from their second album 'I Like It When You Sleep For You Are So Beautiful Yet So Unaware Of It' which was released in 2016.

Love Me is typical video from The 1975 after the release of their second album. It is a pop synth record that has an equally weird but cool video attached. Their style has been established by the way they dress, especial by front man Matty Healy. His appearance has been described as ‘unkempt’ and dishevelled. This is something that is hugely attractive to their audience.

Their fan base consists of mainly female students aged 18-24. This somewhat iconic look created by Healy and the rest of the band is attractive to this audience and makes any video they produce with the boys in something that is hugely appealing to the fan base.

It could be said that the main appeal of The 1975, after their music, is their band members. This being said makes their videos very important in their success.

In recent videos, there is more of a focus on Matty Healy, whereas in older videos there are entire videos that contain the entire band in performance and some that are purely narrative. These are proven to be less popular than videos of when Healy is being sexualised for the pleasure of the viewers.

The focus on the lead singer has created a motif in the bands videos. A motif is essentially a reoccurring artistic image that is repeated to form a pattern, in my opinion, this is the ascetic of the lead singer. He is the focus for a lot of the videos and demands the most screen time. 

For example, in the video for ‘Love Me’ there are 76 separate shots of Matty,  53 of the rest of the band and 26 of other people in the video eg. Girls in the background etc. This creates a motif in the sense that he is an repeated artistic element that occurs in many of their music videos.

The video for Love Me is extremely glamorous with a dark edge. The lead singer is made up and the band is wearing smart suits. The video includes girls dress up in party dresses and card board cut outs of various famous people from different eras. The slightly darker side to this video is the drunken nature of Matty. This gives of an image that you can’t have fun unless alcohol is involved as we see him consume various glasses that appear to include alcoholic beverages. This could also be considered a motif with the band’s lead singer. At may gigs and festivals he can be seen to be drinking which can appeal to the target audience who are a group of people who tent to spend time in clubs and bars and may aspire to have the kind of fun that the band seem to be having.

A similar video of the band is UGH! Which is another song about drugs and alcohol use, which again shows the lead singer wearing makeup and be equally eccentric. This video again focuses on the lead singer Matty who is essentially the face of the band. This has become something that has created a motif for the band since the release of the second album.  This release has lead to a much more vivid set of videos that have shown what seems to be the true personality of the band members in the sense that they enjoy what they’re doing and allowing themselves to express their feelings in whatever way they feel appropriate. The video for The Sound also contains similar elements of the band performing but in a much more confined way with a serious message behind it, teaching their audience to carry on regardless of what the people surrounding them say or do.  This video features criticisms people have made of the band and their music that have been taken in their stride and thrown back in the commenter’s faces after the release of their second, more personal album.

THE AUDIENCE

The 1975 attract an audience that consists mainly of girls aged 18-24. They are interested in the band not only for the music but the ascetics of the band members. Matty Healy, the lead singer, is a huge selling point for the band and has been a huge helping hand in the bands success.

Many of their fans are said to have a fairly ‘normal’ lifestyle and tend to live in the areas around central Scotland. Their lives consist of education, music, going to pubs & clubs and consuming alcohol and show common interests in sex, beauty and celebrities which is where the band is vital.

Many of the songs written by the band are considered to be dark and sometimes too realistic. The band tends to create songs about things such as sex, love, death and drugs, which again can also bring in a niche of listeners.

The constructed audience may differ vastly from the actual audience of the band. For example, the explicit language and some of the topics in the songs may be seen as something that is not entirely appropriate for younger listeners and therefore setting the constructed audience to people aged 18+ when in actual fact you may find younger people who’re aspiring to feel older listening to their songs in an effort to make them feel more mature and on a relatable level with other listeners and the band members themselves.

Style is something that the band has set for their viewers and listeners. The bands messy and un kept look is something many people aspire to. For example, the idea of wearing all black as an outfit has always been a thing but paring that with a leather jacket, skin tight jeans, a shirt and a pair of biker boots is something that could be said to come from the influence of the band. Similar, the lead singer has been seen to wear black nail varnish and heavy eye makeup which is something that has become more commonly imitated by young male fans of the band. charity shopping is something that has also become more appealing in an effort to get the messy style the band supports in a way that people see as positive by giving to charity and giving old clothes a new lease of life.

 

 AUDIENCE REACTION

Featured here are a few comments posted on the band’s video on YouTube. 

These comments, some sexualised and could be perceived as inappropriate are a generic reaction to videos posted by the band. Mainly posted by girls, the comments are overly sexualised and display an attraction towards the lead singer and on the odd occasion other members of the band, eg. George the drummer.

This is a similar reaction whenever any of the band post on any other social media platforms. This includes on sites like Instagram when any of the boys post a picture of themselves, a live set or each other, there are comments of a similar nature praising the and their appearances.
The 1975 have an incredibly dedicated fan base. They sell out areana tours and their second album won countless awards. This approval, from the audience, can be see plastered on every social media platform with girls falling in love with the band members and guys wanting to be them, dress like them and  act like them. In a way the band has become something of an aspiration for their teenage fans and encourages them to do whatever they want to express themselves. They have reversed some types of gender specific beauty like nail varnish and makeup and allowed some people to feel more comfortable doing things out of the ordinary.  The band, Matty especially interact with their fans not only on social media platforms but at concerts and festivals too

  

Audience positioning refers to the way in which the audience is supposed to see a media text. Stuart Hall talks about how media producers encode messages and the audience’s job is to decode them. He talks about 3 types of reading and audience member can get from a text and in the case of the Love Me video, one of these readings is not entirely applicable. Some may watch the video and see it as entirely inappropriate and others may find it exhilarating or aspirational so could lead to oppositional readings between audience members.

Adorno & Horkheimer talk about the idea that the audience is powerless and they cannot either accept or reject messages that the media text puts upon them. This is similar to the hypodermic needle theory that says we get messages from the media, cannot reject them and will all respond in the same way. In this sense, the audience of the video for Love Me may be so fixated on the band members that they may not be aware that they’re even accepting these messages and could be described as docile or obedient.

Gerbner’s cultivation theory could also be applied to this video in the sense that the people who watch these videos are more likely to copy the actions of the band, e.g. binge drinking, than those who do not have those extra influences surrounding them. At the same time the desensitisation theory can also be applied and it does a similar thing to cultivation in a opposite sense. The desensitisation theory talks about the way the more a person see’s something, eg. Alcohol abuse, the less likely they are to be bothered about it.

In my opinion, I don't believe that the band promote particularly positive messages and values. After watching this video, it is clear to see that a culture of alcohol abuse and self love is promoted, the later of which may be seen as positive but the mistreatment of alcohol is something that could negatively affect the viewers on the video. Today, this is an element that could be considered 'fashionable' which would appeal to their audience, as the band tends to glamourise it. This can create a relatability of which their audience could connect to which would allow the band to reach their fans effectively.