Video: Rihanna – ‘Man Down’ I have chosen Rihanna’s video “Man down". Rihanna’s video shows off a strong message, the reggae-tinged single from her album ‘Loud’ tells the compelling story of a sexually-abused woman in the Anthony Mandler-directed clip. Rihanna uses her music video to narrates the massage in the song, In the opening sequence, a long-haired RiRi is seen shooting a man before flashing back to the prior morning to explain what triggered the deadly series of event. The camera language within this video is slow and creates the mood as movie like video. Her video keeps up the sense of branding as the filtered video in red along with the colour of her album cover.
Record label- Def Jam Genres- R&B, pop, dancehall, reggae, hip hop, dance Artist- Robyn Rihanna Fenty is a Barbadian recording artist and actress
The video
Rihanna uses her music video man down to promote her song, it adds a extra element such as to narrate the message that comes across in her song. Rihanna is also a mainstream artist who is in the eyes of many people this is an advantage to her release as her fans will be intrigued to see how the artist is presented within her video, just from this there is a sense of an a event of the making of her video, her record label def jam paid over $1 million for the making of man down this is because of its impact to Rihanna as an artist and to her music. The video is available throughout the Internet on websites such as YouTube and Rihanna’s website. The use of the Internet for music videos is an advantage because of its worldwide usage which means it is available to a mainstream audience raising its awareness of the new music release from this it can promote the sales of their music. Music videos also give 24hrs availability to their audience which means the artist's does not have to perform to allow their songs to be heard this again promotes the awareness efficiently, Rihanna music video ‘man down’ has up to 187,446,803 views on YouTube. Music video’s such as Rihanna’s can become an event it self the release of her video is an example of this Rihanna is known to make interesting and outrageous videos, which gives her fan base the opportunity to look forward to her videos, for example artists such as Rihanna even released teaser video to create a buzz on her actual release, this works for Rihanna because of her mainstream audience so just from the buzz this can promote her music before even officially releasing the video. Promotion of the artists new music release is important, for Rihanna her music videos is a big factor of this, as the advantage of her music video it adds to her single.
Presentation Rihanna’s visual presentation, is summed up as ‘trend setter’ the artist is a fashion icon to women, her main audience are female, 13-17 years who have an interests in seeing how/what Rihanna looks like/is wearing. The success of this is her presentation bring attraction to both gender's girls want to look like. Music videos allow their artists to express themselves through their videos as Rihanna does with her image her style is relative to Rihanna's personality which she gives across within her video’s . The video man down showcases Rihanna with bright red hair and her sense of style within clothes in this sense the success of her presentation revealed with the increase of females following Rihanna’s trend red hair style. Without Rihanna's man down video the opportunity to have her own unique style and to stand out from other artists, would not be as strong. Example of how she presented herself successfully would be what we see throughout her whole album a sense of theme such as the colour red which consists of the single man down, this video strongly supports her theme as we a red filtered video and is presented with red hair, she also constituently keeps this red theme through other videos in her album. She does this deliberately which is a way of branding her album this has a big impact on sales, the video has a big impact on Rihanna as an artist it allows her to express her personal image given her the ability to share with her audience and successfully becoming more known from being a fashionable icon to many, as quoted from The guardian “The singer has the most talked-about wardrobe in pop. Festival-going teens love her fearless look”.
Extended Playability After the release of man down music video, this added to the extend the playability of her new music releases and provide additional income, Rihanna’s video "Man Down" debuted on the US Hot R&B/HipHop Songs Chart at number 84 for the week of April 9, 2011 and reached a top ten peak of number nine For the week of June 11, 2011 the song debuted at number 94 on the US Billboard Hot 100and peaked at number fifty-nine. "Man Down" ranked at number 47 on Billboard magazine's best-selling R&B/HipHop Songs of 2011.The song also peaked at number 63 on the Canadian Hot 100. "Man Down" also charted in other countries due to its release as a single in certain European territories in July 2011. Having debuted on the French Singles Chart at number 65 on the issue dated June 4, 2011 has been played frequently on music channels such as Channel MTV, MTV stands for music TV this is a dedicated channel which you would only find music video's on that are in relation to their genre e.g. Hip-Hop, R'n'B ect.. .Music video's such as Rihanna –Man down is in the genre of R'n'B/Raggae although her genre does not suit most music channels genre completely this did not stop her frequently playability, the release of her music video even allowed more playability from the benefit it can be played on music channels other than just being played by audio on radios, new video releases also usually have more playability than older videos adding to her promotion/raising awareness to a wide audience which is a big impact on sales and even to keep Rihanna in the eye of the public. Not only does music channels influence the sales of an music video release they also pay to put artist to put the music video on their playlist this is called royalty payments, most music channels need new music video releases to keep their audience interest within their channel which means that channels are willing to pay for her music video's for example Rihanna's Man Down video would be paid for just to be put on their show.
Synergy To create synergy this is when the music production company and programme join together to promote both elements. Artist are asked to make a sound track for movie’s to help promote their new release this is a case of trying to get more awareness, however it works both ways for the artist and the movie as both of intuitions within the music video’s audiences are joined together making a greater audience. The movie in the business tie benefit from this since the music video can extended the awareness as music videos are play frequently for a longer period of time which will keep the movie in the eyes of the public, even longer than film trailers. Rihanna’s benefit from a music tie would be it may allow her to go across to another part of the industry, Rihanna has acted within a film called ‘Battleship’ as a star actor, although she did not do a business tie with this film, she has the opportunity as an artist to be apart of other movies, just from the making of her music videos has a big impact on her career since it allows people to visually see Rihanna, her man down video even involves acting showing her other abilities as and artists, within her video man down she is seen to be in the character of a woman that gets abused and has the courage to fight back in the relation to this video which would be classed as action which is the genre of battleship Action/Thriller. This is an advocate for Rihanna since her abilities can be shown through her music videos which gives her many other opportunities.
The Art
Rihanna uses a drastic scene within her music video which interprets her lyric “I just shot a man down”. The scene was the murder of a man who had abused her, Rihanna uses this scene to not just only help tell the story but give her fans something to talk about and to remember, she does this by using content that was unexpected from her as an artist, Rihanna is a role model to girls in the age range of teens, artist usually suits their actions to their audience for Rihanna to not take into consideration that she is a role model to teens while giving off violent content within her video, gave off a big debate and talks about her video ‘Man Down’. The shot is at 0:31 we see that a after the event of the abuse Rihanna murders the man in the surrounding of many other people, the sense of arts comes from the colour red that connotes the death and horror of her music video, which sets the mood as depressant that all strongly link together with the lyrics of her song, not many music videos have a constant theme of red which that connects with their lyrics, so from this Rihanna has made her remunerable stamp on this sense of theme within her music video.
CD/DVD The album ‘Loud’ was released on November 12, 2010, winning the artist an award such as American Music Award for Favourite Soul/R&B Female Artist. The artist the released a Deluxe Edition shortly after which was on November 16, 2010 , this is a CD+DVD which not only consist of audio but music videos to her singles as well. Rihanna’s album Loud - Deluxe Edition allows Rihanna’s fan base to buy and listen to her music in the terms of direct support, the amount of sales from just her CD album within the first week was of 207,000 copies, following from this her Deluxe Edition release made additional income as her sales of this was to her of this album added to that income with the amount of which is consisting of their latest music. Once released the CD/DVD's would be on sell within stores such as HMV this is a British global entertainment retail chain, in this store you will find not just CD/DVD's also game consoles and books ect... The advantage of this is that the record label ‘Def jam’ will get a percentage of what Rihanna’s album earns, however downloads over come DVD releases within stores as it is a more used way to get a hold music video, since fans may not want to buy her Deluxe edition which will the lead to her audience to turn to illegal downloads(mostly free).Directs releasing of DVD's has a big disadvantage this would be that videos are not shown in stores so therefore the consumer would of not had the chance to preview what they are buying.
Streaming Websites & Artist Website Rihanna’s music video can be viewed on Streaming websites for example YouTube, YouTube is an online public communications site. This site allows users to upload and have available videos for the public top view. Artists like Rihanna personally do not upload their latest music video's but they record label would see to this for the artists since It is a very successful way of marketing. The audience for YouTube is mainstream/worldwide from this viewing of videos go up to a large amount depending on it's interests, the advantage of streaming websites for an artist would be that it is an efficient way of getting audiences to see the artists video's (worldwide). Streaming websites also allow people that are not particularly your fans but gives them a chance to stumble across the artists video, in the case of YouTube this site showcases other links to various of videos in relation to the video being watched, in the case of Rihanna’s her music video man down can link of to other music video’s from her album this is a big encouragement for viewers to have a browse through other video's and allowing them to view the whole album, this is an advantage for her as an artist just from one popularity of a video can promote many of their other video's through the use of Youtube. A disadvantage would be that streaming websites is very competitive, in the terms of YouTube there is more than a million of videos that have been uploaded making it harder for people to view the artist's video. The amount of views on YouTube her video has gained up to a large amount 187,446,803 views worldwide. Rihanna websites is just dedicated to her that consists of her music, photo's, concert dates, events, and her music video's. The advantage of her website is that it allows her fans to keep track of her movements and exclusive content, artist website only uses content about that specific artist which makes it easier for Rihanna’s audience to keep aware and up to date with them and her music releases, Artist websites also may have exclusive videos that have been released on before any other website, so the artists makes sure their fans get a view of their releases before any other audience. Example of this would be Rihanna's website on her view has a download link to her newest released video.
Downloads Music video downloads can be found on many website throughout the Internet, it is a fast and efficient way to get a hold of latest music. However the disadvantage of downloads can have a big impact on the sales of new music releases, before illegal download had came about the sales of music had been at a higher rate than today. The advantage of this is that there is legal website available meaning the music is not free has to be paid for. Altogether music video downloads is an fast and easy way for the artists fans. Example of where downloads are assessable would be iTunes, iTunes is an legal website, where artists fans can pay for new music releases they can also preview the video before purchasing it. Rihanna ‘man down’ her music video on itune is on sale for ÂŁ0.99, she gained over 80 thousand downloads just from her one music video man down, with 861 customer having her music video available to download is a advantage for since this gives her fans the chance to preview her video before purchasing and even give her fans the opportunity to buy the videos they like instead of buying the whole album collectively, along with that downloads are quick and easy, so this not only raises his awareness as an artist but allows his fans to preview the music videos before purchasing it.
Record label Rihanna is signed to the Record label Def jam, Def Jam Recordings is an American record label, focused primarily on hip hop and urban music, owned by Universal Music Group, and operates as a part of The Island Def Jam Music Group. The provides a very large budget as it is an major label, the cover all the expenses of Rihanna's music video’s and help market her as an artist, because of this the record label gets a higher percentage of Rihanna's income, larger record labels means less control from the artist they get to control what she does how she it presented and where she showcases her self almost as if she is a puppet to her label, the owner of Def Jam recordings is a artist and business man who is well-known from the name Jay-Z. Jay-Z has also done a collaboration with Rihanna earlier within her career with the aim to get her well known and raise her awareness to a main stream audience, Rihanna's advantage to being signed to a major record label such as def jam means her music is marketed very well since they have the money to get her in the eyes of the public worldwide, this also works quickly and efficiently for her to become an successful artist, this then leads to the more sell's from what she produces for example her music video man down will not have been as successful with a less budget for marketing.