Brandon Fry

Exam preparation: Select one production and evaluate it in relation to the genre concept

My coursework consists of Ancillary task 1 which I chose to base around music genre. I have created a CD label with my front cover being called ‘DiscoLights’ By ‘Hungarian Mansion Dealers’. Hungarian Mansion Dealers genre in the music industry is a very stereotypical dance genre with many conventions of dance music being portrayed. Within my CD cover different theories have been explored in the concept of genre.

Firstly one of Lacey’s repertoires of elements is the technical and audio codes. My Ancillary consists of one colour background which is black with grey text used on top of it. Furthermore the font is very big and bold and stands out very centrally and eye catching. The lexis chosen is quite minimum and very simple and specific to the artist name and album name. This all links into Chandler’s theory conveniently as the theme of the dance genre is used quite stereotypically. Also the style and format of the text and the background is an example of Neale’s theory of repetition and difference. This is because it is a repetition of the stereotype of the dance genre with the content of the text being similar to many dance albums. However to make my cover unique and not a copy, from the theory difference is used to present the layout and the format of the text is unique as it overlaps itself within the bold grey text. In regards to the audience, the CD may not appeal to them as eye catching or bright like a stereotypical pop CD. However as it is a dance CD, generally I chose to stick the stereotype which will appeal to a dance genre audience in specific ways. The dance genre audience will understand why that format and style has been chosen. And this is because of how the stereotype has generally shown itself over the years. However this links into Neale’s mental machinery because in the industry it is being sold in the audience will recognise the work as a dance music CD and it will appeal to them specifically. Additionally in ancillary 2 the use of reviews are used to promote what other people think of the album which is a stereotypical feature.

Secondly in Lacey’s repertoire of elements, iconography is explored. Iconography looks into the props used within the piece of work. However in my piece of work no props are used throughout. This is because stereotypically dance genre work does not necessarily have to use them. Judging the stereotype many covers such as mine only present text and no symbolic codes can be explored because of this. This can be seen as repetition as many other cd’s use this technique and also the audience will recognise the reasons for this. In ancillary 2 the use of repetition is used such as the

Brandon Fry

promotion of where it is available to download which is a persuasive and helpful feature.

Lacey’s repertoire of elements also consists of the mise en scene including the setting. However the mise en scene is hard to describe as a stereotypical dance cd cover, there is no setting as it is just a black background with text on it. Also the mise en scene consists of costume but again no costume can be applied as there are no characters. Repetition from Neale can be applied because not all dance genre pieces contain a character or people on their work. Similarly mine does not consists of a location or any characters. Again the dance audience will stereotypically judge the album work in comparism to other dance genre pieces of work and see that not all show a character or a location. So Neale’s mental machinery is applied as in this specific industry the audience will understand that this is normal.

The last part of Lacey’s repertoire of elements is the characters included. However with my dance cd there are no characters involved. Ideas involved around this could be to represent the darkness of a night club, and not many of the DJ’s creating the music are to be seen. However again repetition is involved as it is stereotypical that not all dance album covers involve a character and that they are not always necessary. Neale’s mental machinery comes into the work with the idea that once again the audience who like dance genre will understand the ideas behind there being no characters.