My finished music video:

My front digipak panel:

My front digipak panel:
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My inside digipak panels:

My inside digipak panels:
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My back digipak panel (with album spine:)

My back digipak panel (with album spine:)
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Sunday 15 October 2017

R+P Post 12: Artists/bands that have influenced my ideas

We have looked at a lot of artists that fit our criteria in order to get ideas- we are likely to create an independent pop artist, so we have been looking at bands and solo musicians that perform music in related genres and sub-genres.

One such band is Echosmith. We looked to them for quite a few ideas, partially because we already know a bit about them and their music from a previous project, but mostly because they have a female lead singer and three male instrumentalists, as we are planning to, and because they are all siblings, and we are intending to have familial ties within our band also. They tend to work off of each other a lot while performing, playing off their sibling relationships in their music videos and social media, and generally have an air of lightheartedness both while performing and beyond. These are two things that we could easily incorporate into our video and social media. They are quite typical of the indie "hipster" style, with lots of pastel colours, wearing shirts, ties, dresses, jackets, skirts, and hats. However, they can sometimes be a bit more subdued in terms of colour scheme than we are planning to be, as they like to match their black and white clothing- however, matching colour schemes in itself is something we would like to do. As described in the last paragraph of this article by Phoebe Reilly, they try to avoid politics but their shared Christian faith influences their music, identity, and the overall direction of the band. We have also been looking at constructing identity and including representation through the beliefs and ideas of the band members.
Echosmith in one of their more colourful sets of outfits. Note how all of them are wearing jackets and pastel colours, as well as the presence of a hat, and the prominence of the lead singer in the front. Click to enlarge.
Another picture of Echosmith, with a similar clothing style but in a different colour scheme. The same person is wearing a hat, and the lead singer is still the most prominent, but this time all the shirts are neat and done up and one of them is wearing a tie. Artists in the genres we are looking at have quite varied fashion styles, as you can see. Click to enlarge.
Another artist we looked at was Lucy Spraggan. She is a British solo singer who progressed quite far on the singing competition TV show X-Factor, and then got signed up to a record label afterwards. She thus has had more chance than most to show off her personality and attract a fanbase, but still goes through all the regular channels to maintain this presence, such as social media and interviews. She also has quite a hipster style clothing-wise, and is quite passionate about her music and performance, once crying on X-Factor when the audience cheered for one of her original songs. Our lead singer's character has thus been inspired by her to some degree, in terms of clothing and passion for the music, as well as her aforementioned British nationality. Another way she has inspired our lead singer is through the fact that she is an openly gay woman, who is for LGBT rights and who attracts young LGBT people to her fanbase. We will likely also make our lead singer a member of the LGBT community, to further construct an identity through her sexual orientation and associated ideals, and to represent a wider part of our targeted age group as well as society at large.
Lucy Spraggan in a typical outfit. She has a warm coloured top offset by a denim jacket with the sleeves rolled up (denim jackets being quite conventional of independent pop artists,) as well as a nice watch. She has a strong sense of style despite not being "dressed up" or in formal clothing. Click to enlarge.
Once more she looks quite smart and stylish in a colourful shirt, despite wearing a bobble-hat, a rather eccentric piece of clothing, especially considering the photo is taken indoors. Once more her sleeves are rolled up and overall she looks casual and smart while not being messy or formal. Click to enlarge.
A third band that we looked at in more detail than others would be New Young Pony Club. They are an English band with quite an eccentric style, who "marry the dance ethic with the pop ethic, and make something that you can dance to and sing along to," as the lead singer once said. This style extends to their music and videos, which are quite packed with interesting sounds and graphics, as well as their actual clothing style. While they and Echosmith both use pastel colours, where Echosmith could be said to be more on the subdued end sometimes, NYPC could be said to be on the brighter end when compared to our plans- although they have still influenced our colour scheme. They are an indie pop artist, but lean more towards the indie side due to their style, while still remaining popular. This niche but popular style is something we could use to great effect with our band.
New Young Pony Club showing off their style. This is one of their more standard sets of outfits, but it nevertheless shows off their range of pastel and even non-pastel colours, and wide variety of clothing, a lot of which can be attributed to conventional indie fashion such as denim jackets, open shirts, and interesting dresses. Click to enlarge.
New Young Pony Club once more showing off a large range of colours. Bright pinks, pastel purples, both light and dark blues can all be seen here, amidst many other hues. They taught us that we have quite a wide variety of colours and clothes to choose from. Click to enlarge.

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