Analysis of 'Bang Bang' By Will.i.am

Will.i.am - Bang Bang:

Conventions

The song Bang Bang written by Will.i.am features on The Great Gatsby soundtrack. This has influenced the music video to coincide with the song. The Great Gatsby is set in the 1920's and is associated with parties. The video is in black in white; both Will.i.am  and the featuring artist are dressed in clothes that look from the 20's. From the video I get the impression its set on a stage to look like a performance. The camera is quite static in the video; it only switches between a few different angles throughout. Most of the movement in the video is made by Will.i.am himself and the musicians and dancers around him. This makes the audiences attention be drawn to dancing throughout, which ties in with the era.

Will.i.am can be seen lip-syncing along with the lady featured directly to the camera. This makes it seem like their directing performing to the audience, this is called direct address. The dancing in the video links with the beat in the music, the dancers slap their knees' when a beat drops in the song making it seem like they are creating the sound.

Representation

For the whole of the video, Will.i.am is shown, this is because he is the main artist on the track. When the second singer - the lady -  starts to sing, she becomes visible in shot. Both of them are smartly dressed like those from the 20's to represent to era from the film. The Charleston is heavily featured in the video to represent the party scenes from The Great Gatsby as this is what most people associated the film and the era with.

At the start of the video a image is shown which can be seen below, it features the name of the song and the artists name; Will.i.am. The detail in the background comes from The Great Gatsby's album art, they've done this to show that the song is associated with the film. To link this image to Will.i.am, the middle of the image shown you can see Will.i.am's logo known as #willpower. This logo features on all of Will.i.am's merchandise, therefore is a well known representation of him as an artist. This ties the video with both the film and the artist.

Audience

The target audience for this video would be the same as the film along with others, as even though it features in the 1920's film it is a modern day song. Will.i.ams other songs features rappers and many other artists, therefore the target audience would like this similar style of music.

Institution

This song was written for The Great Gatsby soundtrack and to promote the new film. This is why the video has elements from the film.  By creating a music video for the song it's advertising both the film and soundtrack.