Audience 2 Madness

• Learning objective: To study Madness, Music industry with consideration given to Audience Response.

Key terms:  

Narrow cast.

This where a text, for example the music of an obscure genre will target a specific but narrow audience.  Consider niche audiences.

When considering audience you need to be able to discuss a number of aspects.

• Who is the target audience of the texts?
• How have the texts targeted and appealed to an audience?

Techniques used to target audiences include:

Technical and audio codes.

This is to do with camera shots and angles. They can involve the audience and encourage them to empathise with the artists. 

When analysing records or music videos, the specific genre of music helps to target and audience.

There are often debates surrounding bands that develop their sound in order to appeal to a wider target audience. You can often hear original fans of a band saying things like; 'They've sold out, they've gone too poppy', or 'I much prefer their earlier stuff, they haven't stayed true to their roots.

This happens when an artist or band are broadening their fanbase by adopting a more mainstream approach.

Language and mode of address.

The way in which a text speaks to its audience will place them in a particular position. 

Some artists use an informal chatty or colloquial style of lyrics, this lets the audience feel as though they are part of the text's community.Particularly appropriate with music genres that ecourage Collective identity - the shared sense of belonging to a group.

Construction

Media texts, through their construction create an idea of what their target audience should be like.

For example by telling them what is important or what to question and suggesting to audiences how they should live their lives through the use of the imperative.

Ska and Madness sound

Ska  is a music genre that originated in Jamaica in the late 1950s, and was the precursor to rocksteady and reggae. Ska combined elements of Caribbean mento and calypso with American jazz and rhythm and blues. 

It is characterized by a walking bass line accented with rhythms on the upbeat. 

Ska developed in Jamaica in the 1960s when Prince Buster, Clement "Coxsone" Dodd, and Duke Reid formed sound systems to play American rhythm & blues and then began recording their own songs. In the early 1960s, ska was the dominant music genre of Jamaica and was popular with British mods. Later it became popular with many skinheads.

2Tone

The 2 Tone sound was developed by young musicians in Coventry, West Midlands, England who grew up hearing 1960s Jamaican music. They combined influences from ska, reggae and rocksteady with elements of punk rock and new wave. Bands considered part of the genre include: The Specials, The Selecter, The Beat, Madness, Bad Manners and The Bodysnatchers.

The term was coined by The Specials' keyboard player Jerry Dammers, who — with the assistance of Horace Panter and graphic designer John "Teflon" Sims — created the iconic Walt Jabsco logo (a man in a black suit, white shirt, black tie, pork pie hat, white socks and black loafers) to represent the 2 Tone genre. The logo was based on an early album cover photo of Peter Tosh, and included an added black-and-white check pattern.

Most of the bands considered to be part of the 2 Tone genre were signed to 2 Tone Records at some point. Other record labels associated with the 2 Tone sound were Stiff Records and Go Feet Records. The music was especially popular among skinheads, rude boys and some mod revivalists.

Task 1:

Watch the video of Madness, One Step Beyond.
Discuss how technical and audio codes, language and mode of address, construction serve to position the audience.

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Different audiences may respond in different ways to media texts.

An audience is made up of individuals who will respond differently to media texts and the messages within them. This can be according to the following:

Gender. Men and women may respond differently to certain media texts. Some texts may alienate a gender though through images and mode of address.

Age. The age of the audience may evoke different responses. For example, younger audiences are said to be more desensitised to bad language and excessive violence.

Ethnicity. The upbringing and beliefs of different ethnic groups may affect their response to different music styles.

Cultural competence. The ideologies of the audience as well as life experiences will affect how an audience responds to a text. The text may also shape the experience of the audience should they choose to construct their personal identity around the text.

Task 2:

How gender might affect audience response to this video by Madness which includes these lyrics:
Consider Stuart Hall Response theory, audience pleasures, fandom issues, Uses and Gratification theory.

Lots of girls and lots of boys
Lots of smells and lots of noise
Playing football in the park
Kicking pushbikes after dark
Baggy trousers, dirty shirt
Pulling hair and eating dirt
Teacher comes to break it up
Back of the 'ead with a plastic cup.

Oh what fun we had
But, did it really turn out bad
All I learnt at school
Was how to bend not break the rules
Oh what fun we had
But at the time it seemed so bad
Trying different ways
To make a difference to the days.

The Nutty Boys are back BBC article