Conventions of indie rock music videos

In indie rock music videos there are many conventions that tend to stray away from the pop music genre videos, the most important and obvious of these is the difference in the main focus of the video, in pop music the videos generally consist of a performance from the artist, an example of this being Beyonce’s ‘Single Ladies’ video. Whereas indie rock video tend to concentrate on using multiple camera angles such as extreme close ups pinpointed on the instruments played by the musicians examples of this being when the guitarists strum or when a drummer hits the crash cymbal for instance. These are used to show their talent as musicians rather than their talent as showmen or performers. Opposed to my following point long shots and extreme long shots are used, they are used in order to show the whole band as a whole in one single shot to show the bands unity. Showing each of their importance in the band in comparison to solo artists where the dancers are shown sparingly and almost disposable and sometimes if instruments are used they are even shown on occasion. Another common convention in indie rock videos is the fast paced editing shown, example of this being jump cuts. Jump cuts are a prime example of how to effectively portray speed in a music video as the jump cut itself is sudden. Indie Rock music is notorious for its pleasant tone and uplifting manners so fast paced editing suits one of the convention.  However in relation to my previous point of indie rock music videos tending to stray away from performance based music videos, some artists choose to incorporate performance into their videos but still appear to cast them to a side with the artists themselves being the focal point of the video. An example of this being Two Door Cinema Club’s ‘What You Know’. Indie Rock videos also use both high key and low key lighting, depending of what kind of tone they are trying to set or what story they are trying to tell. Once again using Two Door Cinema Club’s video as an example, obviously this is an example of high key lighting, using bright colours to represent the happy tone of the video. In comparison to Oasis’ ‘Wonderwall’ which is my example of low key lighting which in my opinion is used more frequently in indie rock music videos and is an example of the genre convention of using contrasting colours. The colours in the Wonderwall video is a direct contrast to What You Know mainly due to the two songs completely different tones and messages. Oasis are addressing a much more serious matter meanwhile Two Door Cinema Club are practically saying I told you so. Indie rock is also notorious for their direct narratives shown in their music videos rather than abstract narratives. More often than not the videos are portraying a certain moral or insight into the songwriters life or a past event from their life. The two main styles of music video to stem from indie rock are both direct narratives or montages of live footage. Live footage is common as unlike most massive pop acts, bands are usually involved in extensive and somewhat tedious live concert schedules. So in a way showing live footage is an intelligent way of advertising your band by showing your talent with montages involving snippets from different nights showing a bands most exciting stage antics and more importantly these  videos tend to show a lot of crowd activity whether it be ‘mosh pitting’ or just general enjoyment from the crowd. If the viewers at home see how much they crowd are enjoying themselves or how good a showmen the band appear to be they will feel inclined to buy a ticket in order to see it for themselves.