Luke Newcombe

Alternative Rock

Alternative rock is a style of rock music that emerged in the 1980s, and refers to music that has a
clear distinction from mainstream rock music. The genre of music itself descended from punk rock
movements, and incorporates rock instruments such as vocals, guitars, bass and drums. The term
alternative has also been used in relation to music from underground rock artists and artists of other
genres not directly related to rock, that has received mainstream recognition. The majority of sub
genres that has formed under alternative rock have achieved minor mainstream success, for
example grunge music, with the majority of artists and bands remaining signed to independent
labels. It was only in the 1990s that alternative rock started to gain major recognition with the
development of movements such as Britpop and the breakthrough of the American band, Nirvana,
that alternative bands became successful. Alternative rock is most commonly associated with
guitars and lyrics that highlight topics of social concern, such as a reflection of the economic and
social strains in the United States and the United Kingdom of the 1980s and 1990s. Examples of
alternative rock bands include Nirvana, Radiohead as well as more modern bands such as Red Hot
Chilli Peppers and Foo Fighters.

The codes and conventions used in the alternative rock genre include:

 Camera angles which focus heavily on the band

The types of camera angles that are used in alternative rock videos include a heavy focus on the
band members themselves with shots such as close- ups used on both the band members as well as
the instruments themselves, in order to reflect and portray the emotion as well as energy to the
audience. Following on from this, the use of hand held shots also feature with alternative rock music
videos in order to portray the emotion of the band as well as further reinforce the energetic vibe
that is created. The vast majority of shots featured in alternative rock music videos focus heavily on
the band themselves and the frequent use of long shots in order to show all the band members
playing there instruments are used to continually reflect the energetic vibe/ upbeat that is
associated with this genre of music.

 Mise En Scene

The use of mise en scene within alternative rock consists of costumes that have a distinguishable,
relaxed look in order to allow audiences to directly relate back to the band. Commonly, the colours
used consist of black and white which are colours stereotypically related to alternative rock bands
and rock bands in general. The general hair style that the band members are known to have are
often either quite radical, in terms of mow- hakes, in order to reflect the breakaway from
mainstream music. As well as radical hairstyles, other hairstyles such as long hair that often has a
messy appearance is adopted by band members, to further make the product more relatable to the
audience.

The type of lighting that is contained in alternative rock videos consists of natural/ low- key lighting.
This is done in order to create a dark atmosphere can be associated with the locations that
alternative rock music videos are set. These locations typically being suburban, dark lit locations such
as alley ways and darkly lit warehouses. Through using dark lighting the audiences centre of
attention is constantly focused on the band themselves and as a result there passion can be directly
Luke Newcombe

seen by the audience. Furthermore, bands are often associated with having low budgets and as a
result extravagant locations do not feature prominently.

The use of props within alternative rock music videos usually consist of showing the band
themselves playing their own instruments. Not only does this link into the point regarding bands
wanting to portray themselves in a natural way to the audience in order to increase the relationship
that the band and audience have, but also due to the low budgets and style of music videos that
alternative rock bands tend to create. These videos often being performance based, showing the
band playing live during gigs or in a studio/ warehouse set- up.

The 1975- The City

An example of a music video that includes the following codes and conventions is The City by the
1975. The colour scheme used for the attires consists of dark coloured clothing such as black t- shirts
and jeans. In doing this, the band has not only played on the stereotypes of indie/ alternative rock
bands wearing dark coloured clothing, but further reinforced the dark theme that is commonly
associated with alternative rock bands. This can also be seen through the use of dark lighting and the
featuring of a greyscale affect added over the top of the footage to further reinforce the colour
schemes that are associated with alternative rock bands. The music video is also performance based
and the band can be seen playing there instruments throughout. The song itself was one of the first
to gain a music video, again, due to the low budgets commonly associated with alt rock bands the
reasoning for them choosing this style of music video could be due to the lack of fame at the time
and the lack of funding to produce another style of music video, this could also be the reason as to
why the band opted to choose a darkly lit warehouse location.