Who are you?

Whats your purpose?

What is your unique selling point?

Think of one example of how media both reflects reality and one example of how it constructs reality:

Media can reflect reality slightly by following the same rules and structures that we have in the real world, in the movie "The Truman Show" it reflects reality in the way that it sets realistic boundaries that can coincide with our own reality which allows us to compare ourselves. Media constructs reality by setting up its own 'rules' or 'parameters' of which it follows to allow consumers to escape our own reality.

• Writer down a list of the kinds of media you consult when you want information:

Phone, Social Media, Classic Media (TV and Radio)

• Reflect on the quote at the start, What borders do media transgress:

They can transgress country borders through television or the internet allowing us to access things that we wouldn't normally expose ourselves too. Even Language borders allowing people to enjoy other languages through their vocal styles, speech structures or even texts. Lastly our cultural borders can be infiltrated through media allowing us to feel and somewhat experience other people struggles, how they live, how they dress, what each other eats, drinks, plays or listens too allowing us to break through the echo chamber of our own society.

Influences:

• Miles Davis - Trumpet Jazz Musician
• Tracy Chapman - Folk/Soul Singer Song writer
• Dr Dre - DJ, Producer, Rapper and Business Mogul

https://www.jstor.org/stable/833565?seq=2#metadata_info_tab_contents

3 influences

Aesthetics of Tracy Chapman:

• Sombre
• Reflection
• Pain/Sadness
• Raw Sound/Vocals

Representation of Dr. Dre:

• Broke the narrative of criminalisation and drug abuse
• First Rapper turned Business
• Came from nothing
• Used the 'street' view to advantage in production
• Took influences from classical
• Invented that new age west coast

West Coast 90'-00:

• Ruthless Records - Eazy-E, Dre and Ice Cube
• N.W.A
• Death Row Records
• Aftermath
• Gangsta Rap
• World Class Wreckin' Cru

My influences throughout the years have impacted and influenced my life to the point of musical pursuit. After highschool I didn't really figure out what I wanted to do until I realised I could turn my hobby and passion into a living. And through this discovery I realised my music has taken elements from Dr. Dre, Tracy Chapman and Billy Davis.

For my fourth birthday I received my first ever album from my Aunty, it was Dr. Dre's second studio album '2001' which was released in 1999. My Aunt was very into Gangsta rap so she thought this would be great for he REALLY young nephew; so I had it in the wrapper until I was six when I finally got my own CD player/cassette/radio.

I would play it ALOT not quite understanding it all but it introduced me to artists such as Snoop Dogg, Eminem, NAS, Kurupt, Dr. Dre's step brother Warren G, Nate Dogg, 50 cent and Xzibit. This introduction to these artists lead to my first purchase of an album which was Eminem's Curtain Call which was released the year before.

As I've grown I've related to rap music because it portrayed this anger for things we cannot control such as where we were born, what we are, our physical features, financial situation, family and parental situation. As a chubby ginger kid who would get bullied for both and for not having a dad because he left when I was born and living out of shed with a mum who has two jobs to pay for the shed; I related to the music because I could help myself and I was angry.

The anger was present but also the idea of flashy cars, nice houses, big expensive clothes and the jewellery was so enticing it kept me hooked to continue to listen to rap and gained the ability to aim for the future which I'm thankful for.

Dr. Dre went from small time DJ to small time producer to big time producer and business mogul. He birth amazing artists such as 50 Cent, Eminem and Anderson Paak. Sold his business for $3 billion dollars. Helped create a whole sub genre. Produced for talent such as Tupac Shakur. A literal rags to riches.

He has inspired, created and maintained an undying legacy and one I hope to one day follow or at least try to.

So if it wasn't for Dr. Dre I might've missed this outlet and massive part of my life and exposed me to things that I wouldn't have had access to because I also didn't get internet until I moved to Brisbane 5 years ago.

Tracy Chapman was a folk singer song writer that I discovered in my early teens but she had always been apart of my life due to my mother. Whether it was Sunday morning cleaning or the car ride home Tracy was always singing. Mum owned her first and self titled album 'Tracy Chapman' which was released in 1988 and her second album 'Crossroads' released the following year in 1989.

I remember succinctly her raw and heartfelt vocals on ‘Fast Car’ or her seemingly heartfelt and upbeat song ‘Freedom Now’ which she was still able to convey a strong message.

I was more familiar with her album ‘Crossroads’ which was dedicated to Nelson Mandela and the first album she ever produced. I was more familiar because it was my mums favourite but also her ability to tell a story was intriguing. I’ve never been a strong writer but she seems to do it with such easy while maintaining her poetic lyricism is astonishing.

She touches on political issues, financial and classist struggles and also with her own emotional battles and to me she is a very diverse artist and certainly someone who I can learn from in terms of my own career ahead.

She has taught me to be raw and honest with music, she will teach me to form stories and don’t focus on what I might get out of something but what I can give to others. Her music brings me down to earth and I remember those humbling days of falling to sleep it in the car while most people have it a lot worse than I do and did.

Miles Davis is a Jazz icon which I discovered briefly as a child and later on when I delved into the likes of Dave Brubeck and stumbled across the song from my childhood the Doo Bop Song.

The Doo Bop song was from his album Doo-Bop released a year after his passing. He died on my birthday in 1991.

The reason why he is an influence to me is because of his ability with the trumpet. It was absolutely breathtaking. His ability to manipulate an instrument was so astonishing to me because I was beginning to learn the clarinet and because of that I practiced to become as good as him and ended up being the first junior band member to play for the senior band at my school in Townsville which at the time was cool but when I left the school I slowly lost my ability to play until I stopped. But his music has still always lived on in my ears.

His music opened me up to learning the about the Coltrane Changes or the Coltrane Matrix which revolutionised the jazz industry because John Coltrane who was signed by Miles Davis thought of a new way to play the music he loved.

This lesson of hard work on something you love and also a way to take a look from outside the box and attack from a different angle has stuck with me when creating music.

If I’m stuck on something I’ll leave it and maybe try things another way until I get it right and I will keep doing that and doing that until I’m happy (which I never really am).

I continue to work at my craft everyday to try and perfect myself and hopefully reach the stage of Miles Davis and becoming so influential, iconic and maybe having dinner with a president (maybe the next one).

These three people influence me slightly but together it creates me.

Dre taught me to look to the future, where you start isn’t where you end up and make connections.

Tracy taught me to stand up for what I want, do it me way, be emotional and stay true to yourself. Tell stories, impact lives but remain humble.

Miles taught me to continue to do what you love until you’re the best you can be. Experiment, don’t always stay comfortable.

Padlet: Find out what you need to achieve success in Studio and Live production

What do you need to know?

What do you need to know about that discipline?

Find a credible source about your specific topic. (At least one for both)

Find two examples one good practice and one bad practice

Trout Mask Replica - for studio production

Style Wars

What is genre? Genre is the classification of media based on repeated themes within, either conforming or subverting with the themes or in other words following a linear or non-linear structure.

Draft:

Grand Master Flash was a revolutionary icon in DJ history, he developed that iconic 80's hip hop sound from popular songs by the use of mixing and scratching.

According to Guy Todd Williams, 53, a.k.a. Rahiem, who saw the group in 1978 and joined the next year. “They were entertainers. You didn’t just come to hear them, you came to see them as well. What he was doing musically on the turntables was unprecedented at the time.”

At one party, Mr. Williams said, Cowboy started teasing a friend who had enlisted in the military, mocking the march cadence, “hip, hop, hip, hop.”

“That’s where the term derived from,” Mr. Williams said.

The revolution of scratching

Reflection:

• What happened?

We had to get into groups of two and discuss with the other person what our topic for our assignment is and what we learnt from our research.

My topic was Grand Master Flash and how he influenced different genre's of music.

• What did I learn?

I learn that GMF used popular music and incorporated scratching (and other forms of scratching) to create a 4 beat instrumental and this had a good translation into my own music in which I can take inspiration from various artists to create something new but I need to expand on my knowledge about grand master flash through research.

• What am I going to do?

I'm going to learn about GMF through research and create a draft on how GMF revolutionised hip hop, disco and DJing and how he was able to express this in a live setting.

Grand Master Flash was a revolutionary, he developed that iconic 80's hip hop sound from popular songs by the use of mixing and scratching.

He was influenced by DJ Cool Herc, who noticed during the funk, soul or R&B breakdown part of a record that would come on at his parties the crowds energy levels would be high.

He found a way to isolate that breakdown or otherwise known as the Get Down part of the song, to keep the energy levels higher for a longer time.

Flash heard these breaks and thought that Cool Herc was sloppy in his delivery, saying that 'People would be getting down to the breakdown Herc would bring in the next record but it would be off beat.

Flash really was impressed by what Herc could do but Flash believed he could do it better. He wanted to take breaks and run them behind each other but do it on time so that there was a cohesion on the dance floor.

Flash was friends with a nightclub DJ by the name of Pete 'DJ' Jones, Jones introduced Flash to a queuing device that he had for his mixer, this would allow Jones to hear what he was going to play before playing it for the crowd. This is where Flash thought Herc lacked before he could hear what he was going to play before he played it.

With this new found knowledge and his ability as a kid to fix various electrical equipment, Flash went to the junk yard and found a throw switch to attach to his own mixer so that he could create his own queuing device, he also around this time created his infamous 'Clock Theory' along with his many other theories.

Clock Theory was based around Flash physically marking the record to know where to play it on a certain time, with this he could keep a beat seamlessly looped which would improve greatly from what Cool Herc had done.

One thing Cool Herc and other DJ's at the time would do was to talk over the record kind of 'ad lib' esque with phrases like 'Yeah Y'all' and 'To the Beat Y'all' but Flash absolutely hated his speaking voice.

To combat this Flash made a microphone available at all his shows for anybody to come up and MC, all would fail except for one.

Keith Cowboy... He apparently had a ring announcer type cadence and inflection in his voice and would employ a call and response technique that would draw the crowd in to engage with the performance.

According to Flash once Cowboy join his concerts in the park turned from statues standing and staring at what he could do into a bumping street party.

At these concerts were BBoy Melle Mel who would dance with his group called the D Squad and his brother Creole, at these parties Mel and Creole naturally picked up the mic too forming a group.

They called themselves Grand Master Flash and the 3 M.C's.

Scorpio another BBoy joined after he had shown interest in joining the group and finally began to rhyme, creating the new group Grand Master Flash and the Furious 4.

Rahiem was part of a group known as the Funky 4 and after a rap battle between Funky 4 and the Furious 4 Flash approached Rahiem with an offer to join his group after he saw what Rahiem could do. Rahiem agreed and then formed Grand Master Flash and the Furious Five which we now know today.

According to Guy Todd Williams, 53, a.k.a. Rahiem, who saw the group in 1978 the year prior to the events. “They were entertainers. You didn’t just come to hear them, you came to see them as well. What he was doing musically on the turntables was unprecedented at the time.”

During their concretes they had a device they dubbed the echo chamber, which create an echo through the mic whenever it was on. That was the problem though it was always on.

Flash again with his knowledge for electronics wired a light switch to the box so that he could turn it off and on during a mix so that he could put emphasis on word that the MC was spitting.

Creole was the only one to connect with this distortion and adopted it as his staple.

Flash also adopted a beat box, it was a device that his neighbour owned that had a selection of pre-made instrumental beats. After a time of Flash begging to buy it of his neighbour his neighbour gave in and sold it to him for $120.

The most important single from not only Flashes Career but Rap/Hip Hop as a whole would have to be Grand Master Flash on The Wheels of Steel, it was ground breaking. It was the first time NYC street culture was put on a record and mass produced.

It contained scratched and mixed snippets of Another One Bites The Dust by Queen, Rapture by Blondie, The 8th Wonder by The Sugar Hill Gang, The Birthday Party by GMFAF5, Goodtime by Chic and Monster Jam by Spoonie Gee Meets the Sequence along with other more obscure records released in the 80's. Scratching was well known in New York by the time this record dropped by because it was released to a wider audience including and international audience people were amazed and astounded by this new sound that Flash was bringing with scratching and looping.

Master Flash and the Furious Five are immortalised by there talent but also their innovation within music, this being reflected by their song The Message being inducted to the Grammy Hall of Fame in 2016 and the group was the first rap group to me inducted into the rock and roll Hall of Fame.

The Message would set a tone for rap music, without this song we most likely wouldn't have the lyrical stylings of N.W.A or Tupac.

In conclusion Grand Master Flash and the Furious Five took what they knew, designed a new way to do it and then worked until they created what we know today as hip hop and rap.

Without their innovation and their abilities to push what we knew to another direction we would've never discovered this new art.