How the Urban genre is presented

Key Artists

Most of the top Urban artists are all black, males. Therefore, the fact that my main article will be based around a white, female artist will be refreshing and encourage readers to buy my magazine in order to gain information about how this new, unique act is breaking into the music industry. An established artist that is most like the artist featured in my magazine would be Katy B and Jessie J, as they are both white, British female artists. Urban music is usually associated with hiphop music which is centred around black, American artists. I believe Urban music is the British equivalent of this as it features more white, British artists with the same style of music. Some of the most famous Urban artists are: Nicki Minaj, Jessie J, Katy B, Drake, Rizzle Kicks, Professor Green, Emilie Sand, Tinie Tempah.

Awards
The most popular awards for the Urban genre would be:
Urban Music Awards MTV Music Awards MOBO Awards Grammys
Album) (Best Urban Contemporary

BRIT Awards (Best British Urban Act)

There are many prestigious music

awards out there, however not all of these awards would appeal to Urban artists, therefore most award ceremonies (if not targeted towards the urban genre) would have a category for Urban Music. This is usually the case for awards such as the BRITs and the Grammys as there are so many artists of different genres to appreciate.

Performances/Venues
The Performance venues in

the UK that you would expect Urban artists to perform at would be places like the O2 arena rather than concerts such as Redding Festival (which is associated with music of the Rock genre rather than Urban music). As well as their own concerts, Urban artists would perform at events such as Capital FMs Summertime & Jingle Bell Ball

Attitudes

The attitudes towards early Urban music was quite negative as it was perceived as being misogynistic. Urban music is often confused with Hip-Hop music, which can sometimes be quite rude and can convey anti-social behaviour. Therefore, there were worries of The Effects Debate, which suggests that the listeners of this music would copy the actions of these Urban artists and believe that anti-social behaviour is acceptable as their favourite singers are acting in this manner and are still respected and famous, therefore it must be okay to act in this way too.

Political Messages
Some Urban music has subliminal messages

which can be very political. These messages might be about going against the rules of society and not restraining yourself to what everyone expects of you. In some ways, audiences may feel like the Urban artists are sticking up for the unique people who want to be themselves, however others may take these messages as being rebellious and rude. An example of this is when many bands wrote songs with messages against the monarchy right before the Queens jubilee.

Visual Representation
Clothing the Urban genre has a very distinctive style of clothing. The main clothing items that make an urban artist identifiable would be the long gold chains, snapback hats and baggy, branded clothing. Urban artists like to have a sleek look with swag which makes them look effortlessly cool and stylish Body language/Facial expression The body language of most Urban artists on any print media would be laid back, effortless stances, which again represents the natural swag of the artists. They usually have neutral facial expressions that show no anger or joy. This is used to represent how the artist is so passionate about their music, that a facial expression could not represent it well enough, therefore they seem to be too cool to express their emotions through their faces and stick to neutral expressions.