Star Analysis of 'James Morrison'
James Morrison was born in the town of Rugby in 1984. He grew up surrounded by music with his mother a keen listener of soul music and his father a fan of folk and country music. His uncle got him into playing the guitar as a child and he pursued his interest in this throughout his childhood. After years of covering songs by other artists he started to write his own music. He attributes his distinctive voice to a severe bout with whooping cough that nearly killed him when he was a baby. Doctors gave him a 30% chance of survival from this illness, and if he did survive there would be a high chance of being servilely brain damage. There was one time where he went blue and stopped breathing, doctors had to resuscitate him four times. He used to get bullied at school for being so into his music rather than being interested in sport, this all changed when he moved to Cornwall in his teens where people accepted his passion for music and he gained confidence. When he got a bit older is where his musical career started to break through where when working in Derby, he found an Irish bar that had an open mic night on Wednesday and Sunday nights, he met Kev Andrews at one of these nights who later helped produce James' demo tape.
James Morrison was born in the town of Rugby in 1984. He grew up surrounded by music with his mother a keen listener of soul music and his father a fan of folk and country music. His uncle got him into playing the guitar as a child and he pursued his interest in this throughout his childhood. After years of covering songs by other artists he started to write his own music. He attributes his distinctive voice to a severe bout with whooping cough that nearly killed him when he was a baby. Doctors gave him a 30% chance of survival from this illness, and if he did survive there would be a high chance of being servilely brain damage. There was one time where he went blue and stopped breathing, doctors had to resuscitate him four times. He used to get bullied at school for being so into his music rather than being interested in sport, this all changed when he moved to Cornwall in his teens where people accepted his passion for music and he gained confidence. When he got a bit older is where his musical career started to break through where when working in Derby, he found an Irish bar that had an open mic night on Wednesday and Sunday nights, he met Kev Andrews at one of these nights who later helped produce James' demo tape.
James Morrison released his debut album 'Undiscovered' in July 2006. The album topped the UK album charts within the first week of its release selling over one million copies around the world making him the UK best selling male solo artist on 2006. In 2007 he was nominated for 3 BRIT Awards: Best British Male Solo Artist, Best British Breakthrough Act and Best British Single. He managed to win the Best British Male Solo Artist award. There was a total of 2 top 10 singles from this album.
Album Cover of James Morrison's debut album 'Undiscovered'.
James' second album was released in September 2008. 'Songs for You, Truths for Me' reached number 3 in the UK album chart and managed to stay in the top 10 for a total of 5 weeks. 20 weeks after its first release, the album found its self back in the top 10 at number 4 and then the next week at number 5 again, this helped boost the album up the Irish album chart all the way to the top spot making it his second number 1 album. He worked with a lot of different people in his second album including a duet with the Canadian superstar Nelly Furtado on the track 'Broken Strings'. This song managed to get to number 2 in the UK singles chart and was the highest charting single on the album.
Album Cover for James Morrison's second album 'Songs For You, Truths For Me'.
On September 26th 2011 he released his third studio album, 'The Awakening' it managed to get number 1 in the UK Album Chart.
Album Cover for James Morrison's third album 'The Awakening'.
Textual Analysis on 'James Morrison- Undiscovered'
The video I am analysing is 'Undiscovered' by the pop rock artist 'James Morrison'. The song I am analysing is from Morrison's debut album 'Undiscovered'. The genera of the track is pop rock, the only way this genera is really shown in the video is with how James Morrison is dressed.
The video shows quite a few links between the lyrics and the visuals. The first this happens is 0:46 in where the lyrics say 'I just want you to find me' and at this time in the video the star man accidentally bumps into a woman and it is like the woman has found him just like it says in the lyrics. However, the video contradicts these lyrics just after when the woman actually walks off away from the man. Another example is at 2:35 where the lyrics say 'Were all the same as each other', at this time, the video shows the man discovering a little window where his heart is just as everybody else in the video has had, this shows that he is the same as everybody else just as the lyrics are saying. One last example of this at the end of the video at 3:12, this time the lyrics contradict the video, 'I'm not lost, no, just undiscovered'. In the video the man actually gets discovered by the same woman as in the start of the video, the two then walk off together, this shows the contradiction where the lyrics say undiscovered but the video shows him being discovered.
There are not many links between the music and the video. The only one that that was obvious is at 2:50 the music changes slightly where a lot of backing vocals are added for the chorus. The rest of the video has just James Morrison's vocals and this links to the video by there being mainly only the one single man, however where the backing singers start to kick in there is suddenly lots of people all in the video and it is all quite hectic and busy just like the music.
There are a lot of close ups of James in this video which suggests that the record company may be trying to sell the music on the looks of the artist. Women that think James Morrison is good looking would like that this video has lots of close ups of his face. The artist is being presented as heartbroken, it is like he is singing about himself in the song with a character playing his role in the story within the video. He is singing about not being discovered yet by women, saying he needs to find a woman. This may also help towards the selling of the track with women feeling sorry for the artist and buying the record. Most videos by James Morrison involve him doing a lot of singing to the camera, this is a star image motif that is shown across most of the videos.
I get the impression that the artist is on sexual display from this video. There are a lot of close ups of his face during the video which could be seen as a selling point for the artist. However, nothing else but the close ups in the video suggest this, it is not also represented by anything like the costumes, dance routines or anything else.
This is a narrative based video. The story to the video mainly involves the well dressed man and the blonde woman that bump into each other near the beginning of the video. When they bump into each other there is a spark between them but they both walk off in opposite directions, the man thinks he should go back for her so he turns round but because she is walking off he thinks better of it. The man starts to walk off again and walks off screen. However, he re enters the other side of the screen, he soon realises that he can not leave. various other people enter the screen and everybody has a small window on their chest. The man just has an old looking, dirty, broken heart in his window. There are lots of other people that are shown such as young couples with bright, gleaming hearts in their windows. He just wants to find love to complete his heart again and at the end of the video this is what happens and he manages to leave the place with the girl that he missed out on at the beginning of the video. I think this is 100% narrative based.
In summary, this is a narrative based video all about a man trying to find love. This is used because a lot of people could relate to the video and it shows the man eventually finding love which gives everybody relating to the video hope that there is someone out there. The video is very effective in the effect it gives to the audience.
James' second album was released in September 2008. 'Songs for You, Truths for Me' reached number 3 in the UK album chart and managed to stay in the top 10 for a total of 5 weeks. 20 weeks after its first release, the album found its self back in the top 10 at number 4 and then the next week at number 5 again, this helped boost the album up the Irish album chart all the way to the top spot making it his second number 1 album. He worked with a lot of different people in his second album including a duet with the Canadian superstar Nelly Furtado on the track 'Broken Strings'. This song managed to get to number 2 in the UK singles chart and was the highest charting single on the album.
Album Cover for James Morrison's second album 'Songs For You, Truths For Me'.
On September 26th 2011 he released his third studio album, 'The Awakening' it managed to get number 1 in the UK Album Chart.
Album Cover for James Morrison's third album 'The Awakening'.
Textual Analysis on 'James Morrison- Undiscovered'
The video I am analysing is 'Undiscovered' by the pop rock artist 'James Morrison'. The song I am analysing is from Morrison's debut album 'Undiscovered'. The genera of the track is pop rock, the only way this genera is really shown in the video is with how James Morrison is dressed.
The video shows quite a few links between the lyrics and the visuals. The first this happens is 0:46 in where the lyrics say 'I just want you to find me' and at this time in the video the star man accidentally bumps into a woman and it is like the woman has found him just like it says in the lyrics. However, the video contradicts these lyrics just after when the woman actually walks off away from the man. Another example is at 2:35 where the lyrics say 'Were all the same as each other', at this time, the video shows the man discovering a little window where his heart is just as everybody else in the video has had, this shows that he is the same as everybody else just as the lyrics are saying. One last example of this at the end of the video at 3:12, this time the lyrics contradict the video, 'I'm not lost, no, just undiscovered'. In the video the man actually gets discovered by the same woman as in the start of the video, the two then walk off together, this shows the contradiction where the lyrics say undiscovered but the video shows him being discovered.
There are not many links between the music and the video. The only one that that was obvious is at 2:50 the music changes slightly where a lot of backing vocals are added for the chorus. The rest of the video has just James Morrison's vocals and this links to the video by there being mainly only the one single man, however where the backing singers start to kick in there is suddenly lots of people all in the video and it is all quite hectic and busy just like the music.
There are a lot of close ups of James in this video which suggests that the record company may be trying to sell the music on the looks of the artist. Women that think James Morrison is good looking would like that this video has lots of close ups of his face. The artist is being presented as heartbroken, it is like he is singing about himself in the song with a character playing his role in the story within the video. He is singing about not being discovered yet by women, saying he needs to find a woman. This may also help towards the selling of the track with women feeling sorry for the artist and buying the record. Most videos by James Morrison involve him doing a lot of singing to the camera, this is a star image motif that is shown across most of the videos.
I get the impression that the artist is on sexual display from this video. There are a lot of close ups of his face during the video which could be seen as a selling point for the artist. However, nothing else but the close ups in the video suggest this, it is not also represented by anything like the costumes, dance routines or anything else.
This is a narrative based video. The story to the video mainly involves the well dressed man and the blonde woman that bump into each other near the beginning of the video. When they bump into each other there is a spark between them but they both walk off in opposite directions, the man thinks he should go back for her so he turns round but because she is walking off he thinks better of it. The man starts to walk off again and walks off screen. However, he re enters the other side of the screen, he soon realises that he can not leave. various other people enter the screen and everybody has a small window on their chest. The man just has an old looking, dirty, broken heart in his window. There are lots of other people that are shown such as young couples with bright, gleaming hearts in their windows. He just wants to find love to complete his heart again and at the end of the video this is what happens and he manages to leave the place with the girl that he missed out on at the beginning of the video. I think this is 100% narrative based.
In summary, this is a narrative based video all about a man trying to find love. This is used because a lot of people could relate to the video and it shows the man eventually finding love which gives everybody relating to the video hope that there is someone out there. The video is very effective in the effect it gives to the audience.
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