A2 Media Coursework – Tolu Awojobi

Music Adverts Analysis 6X

#1 Jay-Z – ‘The Blueprint 3’

Advert The first advert I analysed was the advert for Hip-Hop artist

Jay-Z ‘s 2009 release ‘The Blueprint 3.

This is Jay-Z’s 11th studio album in a career spanning over 2

decades, meaning there is not a lot of promotion needed to

garner an audience that will definitely buy the album, which is

connoted in the layout of the advert, which has the extended

album cover as the background and the artist name in bold

black letters at the top, with the album title, release date, label

and artist website in that order at the bottom of the advert. The

artists name is in a different (bolder and wider) font to the rest

of the font in on the advert, this connotes the reputation of the

artist, because just putting that name in a different font will

attract people in to look at the advert. All the font on the advert

is black, with the exception of the ‘Roc Nation’ emblem logo,

which is in red. The artist name is the biggest, with the date

next biggest, album title next, then the label and finally the

website of the artist. All of this simplicity is a marketing tool

which conveys the artists ability to attract an audience without

an extravagant marketing campaign, which is very common in

todays marketing.

Using the front cover as the background for the advert will also

help the audience to identify (Katz) with this image that they will

see in different areas of their life, in an attempt to build

familiarity with it. By doing this, when the album is released, it

will cause the audience to already recognise it through the

images they have already seen, and they will be more likely to

spend time looking at it and possibly buy it.

#2 Jessie J – ‘Who You Are’

Advert The second advert I reviewed was R&B Artist Jessie J’s 2010

debut release ‘Who You Are’.

As a this advert is for a debut release, you would expect it to be very eye catching, in order to both promote the new artist in a bold way and to introduce her to and attract a new, wider more mainstream audience. From the layout you can see that the purpose of this advert is to build familiarity with this new artist, as the main image used is the artist face. This image takes up over half of this advert, so it is the first thing you will see. Again, this image is also the album cover, so it helps to form both familiarity with the artist and an identity (Katz) for the album.

The artist name has also been stylized differently to the rest of the font on the page, and is bigger and bolder than all of it, which is also used in this attempt to promote the artist. It is also given a different colour, which helps it to stand off the image that is its background, possibly connoting to the audience how this artist is different to other artists in this genre, who may serve as a background.

This advert uses the phrase ‘Includes The Number 1 Smash’, which was used to help the audience get an idea of both the sound of the album and the style of the artist, but it further connotes how successful the artist and this album is, as it has already garnered a number single, which seemingly every would have heard, which is conveyed by the word ‘Smash’/

However, this advert does not have a release date for the album on it, which is a major criticism as anyone who looks at this advert and is intrigued by what they see will have to go somewhere else (artist website, label website, social media etc) to find out when this album will be released. This may cause a decline in the possible numbers of people that could buy the album, as not all the people who read the advert will take the time to go and find out the release date.

#3 Kings Of Leon – ‘Only By The

Night’ Advert The third advert analysis I did was for the 2008 album ‘Only By

The Night’ by Alternative Rock group Kings Of Leon.

Though this advert has a very basic layout of (from top to bottom)

artist name, image, album title, release date and website

information, it is stylized in a very atypical way which makes it an

eye catching advert. The most notable characteristic of this advert

is the font; there are 3 different font colours used on this

advert, which is not common for an album advert. Also, the album

title and artist name are stylized identically, which separates them

from the other fonts of the advert, and the same way they are on

the album cover, which again helps to build a familiarity with this

brand. The release date is in a red, which is bright and bold

against a dark green background, helping it to stand off and be

very eye catching. This helps the audience build an association

with this date and the album release, which will attract in certain

people to buy the album.

A difference between this advert and the other adverts that I have

analysed is that this advert does not use the standard album

cover as the main image for the advert, but rather the alternative

album cover. A reason for this is that this alternative album cover

is a lot more noticeable, and could itself be marketing campaign

as it can be a topic of discussion, creating word of mouth

promotion.

Another difference between this advert and the previous two I

analysed is that this advert has both the artist website and the

label website at the bottom of the advert, whereas the other two

only have the artist. This could be cause it could build a wider fan

base for the group, as people viewing the advert could be fans of

other artists on the label and therefore listen to this artist. This

could also work the other way around, as fans of the artist may

become fans of the label because they support this artist, so this

#4 Michael Jackson – ‘This Is It’

Advert The fourth advert I analysed was the advert for late Pop Icon

Michael Jackson’s posthumous release for the 2009 single ‘This

Is It’, which was supposed to coincide with his tour of the same

name. Considering this is a single advert as oppose to an album

advert, there will be very different ways in which they will be

marketed.

The actually layout of this advert hardly differs from the previous

adverts that I have reviewed, with the artist name in bold at the

top, the background being the extended release cover, and a

standard two different colours used to highlight certain things.

Where you can see differences in this advert and an advert for

an album is the actually typography, which features the single

title as in the biggest font on the advert and in a different colour

to nearly all the font on the advert. This conveys that this is what

the marketing campaign is hoping to get the audience to

recognise and form a relationship with. This may be due to the

popularity of the artist and therefore the name does not need to

be as big as the new single release. This differs to the album

adverts I have analysed, as they all have the artists name as the

biggest and main attraction, so this may be because the name of

the artist will sell the album, but the title of the single is what will

attract a new audience.

Another characteristic that differs this advert from the album

adverts is that not only does this advert say what date the single

will be released but also says what platform it will be released

on and where. This connotes that it is a single release as the

majority of albums that would receive major advertising in

todays culture would receive priority physical distribution, and

the digital side would not be marketed as much, whereas the

single release is more commonly used digitally through the rise

of platforms such as SoundCloud and YouTube, which allow

artist to release singles digitally to a wide audience. This is also

#5 Plan B – ‘The Defamation Of

Strickland Banks’ Advert The fifth advert that I analysed was ‘The Defamation of Strickland

Banks’s album advert; the 2010 release by British Hip-Hop/Soul

artist Plan B.

There are a few differences in this advert to the previous album,

perhaps the most important is the fact that this is advert is a

retrospective one; the album seems to have been released a

while before this advert, which is connoted through the slogan

used, ‘The multi-platinum album of the year’. The album, which

was released in April of 2010, seems to have garnered many

accolades, which it could not do before its release. Also, it states

that is the album of the year, and with an April release this album

must have been out for the majority of the year before being able

to be considered for album of the year.

The layout is also very simple compared to the other adverts,

which could also connote how the album has been out for a

while, because over promotion is not needed. This is due

because of the success of the album, which has become self

promoting and it is likely that the audience has already heard

about it, therefore this advert serves as less of a promotion and

more of a reminder of the albums resume.

Part of this reminder is the nine 4-star reviews that are put on this

advert, which connotes to the audience that this is a universally

successful album as many different reviews have given it such

positive feedback. This helps to further promote the album

because the audience will now think it is a must-buy as so many

people have said how good it is.

The image used in this advert is also a different style to the

previous adverts I analysed, as the image in this is not the album

cover, but instead is a picture of the artist in the same costume as

on the cover of the album, likely to have been taken in the same

photo shoot. The album cover itself is still used on the advert, in

#6 Wretch 32 – ‘Wretchtrospective’

Advert The last advert that I analysed was rapper Wretch 32 2008 debut

album ‘Wretchrospective’s advert.

On this advert, the artist name is in a completely different font to

the other fonts on the advert, also in a different colour and area to

the rest of the font on this advert. However, this font is not

particularly bold, but the colour (black) stands out against the

bright background, which could be a method to connote how this

artist is different to the background he is from or the music scene

he is entering with his debut release. All the other font on the

advert is in the same, with the album title bolder than the rest,

making it clear and easy to read by anyone who may be passing

by and see that advert at the time.

Again the image used is an extended image from the album

cover, however this advert features the actual album cover in the

bottom left hand corner, similar to the Plan B advert. The use of

the cover as well as the image shows how the marketing

campaign is really trying to get the artist out there, which

connotes this being the artists debut, as they are trying to build

familiarity between the audience and the artist, and aim to do this

by using the cover of the album as an emblem for the artist,

something that the audience can immediately reference when

talking to friends about the album, which in itself will create word

of mouth promotion.

A difference between this advert and the others I have analysed

is that this advert says specifically where the audience can find

the album, which could also connote how the marketing

campaign is trying to over promote this artist, as they want to

make sure the audience knows all they can about the artist and

album and from there can build an identity (Katz) around the artist

by where the album is being released and what features there are

on it, which is also on the advert.