The document analyzes various codes and conventions used in musician websites, highlighting elements like the use of marquess, animated features, typography, images of the artists, and merchandise promotion. It discusses how these design choices cater to different genres and audience engagement, emphasizing the importance of providing updates on tours and new music. Additionally, it notes the significance of maintaining an artist's aesthetic through color schemes, layouts, and collaborative media such as video snippets.

1. Codes and
Conventions
–
Websites

2. Inspiration
Websites

3. Analysed
Websites
Codes and
Conventions:

4. Marquee
- A constantly sliding compilation of
photos can be used to convey a
larger and more varied
impression of the band to the
audience without their purposeful
investigation deeper in the
website
- The Haunt use a marquee as
their main feature on the top/ first
scroll of their website, transitioned
into after a still of the two band
members, requiring no user-effort
but delivering many images and
information on the band

5. Animated/ Interactive Elements
- Another method of adding motion used by
these websites is animated aspects that
bring attention and interesting motion to an
otherwise still image
- The Red Hot Chili Peppers do this in their
homepage by animating parts of their latest
album cover which takes up the first scroll-
width, with the bubbles drifting; lightning
striking; clouds floating; and text wiggling
- Billie Eilish also does this in her homepage,
which features her latest album art, with the
door and water particles swaying in motion
- Furthermore, an artist can do even further
into the use of motion and engage the
audience with interactive elements such as
AURORA's front page featuring a pumping
silver heart that can be rotated and switched
switched between dark and light filters
using the mouse, a promotion for her new
album which features the same heart.

6. Logo and signature typography
- Often, artists will keep their name and
related named products in a similar succinct
font related to the artist, which can be used
to denote aspects of the musical and
aesthetic style of the artist
- For example, the Cure use a distinct stylised
font on their front page, the bottom of their
front page, and even in their bio tab.
Granted, their store page uses a similarly
graphic font, but it is different however most
of their branding is kept in a similar
recognisable font that allows the band to
stand out by font and typography alone
- On the other hand, some bands add a
specific twist on the visual appearance of
their band name beyond fonts, such as Korn
who stylise the ‘r’ in their name as a
backwards capital to make it original and
stand out. This is also seen in their
merchandise, advertisements, as well as
their homepage

7. Photos featuring artist
- Though bands tend to favour using images
without central focus on the artist(s) in leu of
logos, single artists tend to use images
containing their likeness, in order to establish
a presence of the artist’s appearance in their
brand, even if the photo is indirect in showing
the full visage of the artist
- This is shown in a more subtle way in
Kingsbury’s website, where the background
a collage of tv-static images of her face from
close angles
- Bands do also exhibit themselves in front
page images, such as Destroy Boys who use
an overhead shot of the band making direct
address with the audience.
- A more obvious example is Conan Gray who
not only features his likeness but chooses the
album cover of his latest album to promote
appearance and music at the same time.

8. Performance Images
- Images of performance is an
important element of musician
websites as it serves as a form of
advertising for live shows and tours,
whilst showing motion-filled shots of
the band in their element and often
expressing more emotion and
passion than a non-candid
photoshoot image would
- The Cure use this along with Nirvana
who implement a video of a
performance from the band to show
the audience what they could expect
should they buy tickets to a show
from the band.

9. Album/Single Cover Art
- Often, artist advertisements are suffused
into the first visuals of their website,
making sure the audience is aware of
the latest piece of music released before
anything else. This can relate to the
latest music videos through the use of
links, which a lot of these examples
contain
- The Arctic Monkeys, Conan Gray, The
Red Hot Chili Peppers and MOTHICA all
feature their latest albums in the front
page of their website at the top of the
page, with Conan, RHCP and HMHAS
featuring the name of the album and the
art; Arctic Monkeys featuring the album
art; and MOTHICA including text related
to the release of her newest album and
an alternative photo from the cover.

10. Tour Dates
- Following from the featuring of
photos from live performances is the
providing of audiences the means to
act on learning more about the artist
and their tour. Artists usually exhibit
their tour dates in a long list below
their main image and ‘greeting’
screen of the home page
- Shown here are two examples of
tour advertisements, both formatted
in similar ways yet differing
depending on their genre and
aesthetic. Slipknot, a nu metal band,
use a tour photo as a backdrop,
adding to their busy and chaotic style
however Conan Gray, a pop artist,
opts for a clean black background to
sacrifice stylisation for clear
conveyance of information, using the
core colour of the website and his

11. Merchandise slideshow and link
- Artist websites' main goal is to promote the artist
and engage the visitors enough to pursue
consumption of the artist's music. This consumption
comes in many forms, one being merchandise.
- Usually considered after the audience has grown
attached and fond of the artist, notably
after viewing a music video or other piece of
performative media with the artist featuring (like a
live show), merch is integral all music artists as a
method of direct income more valuable
than streams, and as a form of advertising as
people begin wearing the artist's face, logo, and
album covers on their persons in public
- Thusly, links and inviting presentations of the
artist's merch are crucial to the marketability of an
artist on their website, providing the means with
which the audience can support the artist directly.
Merchandise is not limited to apparel and vinyl/CD
forms of the artist's music is also a direct and
more personal way of supporting the artist to many
consumers.
- This is best shown in Billie Eilish's website, where
her products feature photos of her holding, wearing
and interacting with them.
- Furthermore, the band Korn present the audience
with a deal, showing the scope of their
merchandise, from clothing, to accessories, to
mugs, and coffee, also storing it in a bundle to

12. Latest project advertisement
- Often, the musician's latest musical
endeavour will be pushed to the top of
their website, bringing with it a complete
redesign of the website including colour
scheme and theme. The same is true
with merchandise and tours, the artist's
current project having the entire website
revolve around it. This is important to
spurn new and interesting/ cutting edge
content interaction rather than the artist's
older work which has had its hype die
down due to its less recent release. New
albums and singles are opportunities for
artists to start a new chapter, appeal to a
new audience, and draw in all sorts of
new visitors to their websites.
- This is seen in almost every artist's
website, notably Conan Gray, whose
career and genre was redefined by his
latest album, his website using the same
colour palette as the cover

13. Dark atmosphere, monochromatic
- Signature colours are crucial in defining
an artist's aesthetic and setting them
aside from other artists.
- Thusly, many artists stick to a specific
colour or palette for their website, used
by MOTHICA and Arctic Monkeys.
- Dark and gloomy atmospheres are also
succinct with many subsects of indie and
alternative rock, notably grunge, goth,
emo and punk. Such artists as Korn, The
Haunt, and the Cure use dark colours
and a generally gloomy atmosphere in
their websites to better identify with their
genres and appeal to such a group.
- However, some artists purposefully stray
away from monochromatic and dark
conventions like the Red Hot Chili
Peppers appeal to an entirely different
and polarised section of people, standing
out more by rejecting common codes.

14. Music Video Snippets
- Converging websites and music
videos, artist can feature snippets of
their music videos on their websites,
giving a teaser of what the video
contains and spreading awareness
of the video on a wider scale
- AURORA advertises music videos
from her current and second latest
album lower down on her website,
using thumbnails that feature her
face or her performing to register
that it is her brand
- Kasabian advertises their latest
music video for their yet-to-be-
released latest album on the front
page of their website at the top, a
small snippet of the video playing
upon entering the site

15. Newsletter
- Persuading the audience to sign up to an
artist's newsletter opens up another pathway
of delivering knowledge and updates about
the artist, with frequent updates being
delivered personally to every person signed
up by email, detailing upcoming tours,
albums, and other information about the
artist.
- The amount of supporters can also help
gauge economic aspects of the artist's career
like venue sizes and amounts for
tours, expected traffic of newly released
songs, etc.
- Korn, and Arctic Monkeys all do this towards
the bottom of their pages, as an afterthought
after the audience digests all other content
- Destroy Boys and Conan Gray keep their
newsletter sign ups relatively high up, with
Destroy Boys featuring it at the very top of
their website as they prepare to release
their new album

16. Alternative Fashion
- Fashion and outwards appearance is a
huge factor in an artist identifying with
their genre, especially in the alternative
community, wherein rejection of
normative fashion trends is revered as a
staple of the genre
- We see this best in Destroy Boys,
MOTHICA, and The Haunt's websites,
where gothic and punk attire signifies
their belonging with the genre, appealing
to the audience they are targetting but
perhaps presenting as off-putting to a
more mainstream audience.
- More extreme cases of this can be found
in metal band Slipknot, wherein costume
and provocative attire often teetering on
the edge of disturbing is succinct with
their brand and identity as a 'hardcore'
band

17. Navigation Bar
- A navigation bar is a staple
feature of any artist website
- However, the font, use of logo,
location and colour all allow for
a small amount of expression
of the artist's style to be
conveyed through a functional
and interactive aspect of the
website
- This is seen in nearly every
artist website, with some
highlights being shown here.

18. Collages
- To convey a large scope of the
artist's expression and identity,
collages of many photos, often from
many different times in the artist's
career, helping immerse the
audience's with the history of the
artist's career
- We see this from MOTHICA,
featuring photos from her previous
two albums under her current fourth
album to release soon
- Furthermore, Slipknot use a collage
of music video stills, each linked to a
music video in an interactive use of
audience participation as each photo
enlarges and colourises when
hovered over

19. Industry-wide
Codes and
Conventions:

20. Layout
- Sites are designed to be easily navigated and delivering information
with ease
- Images are often used to garner interest with the latest images,
especially of new music releases, taking priority and often appearing in
larger and more prominent form
- Backgrounds are often simplistic and monochromatic unless
intentionally colourful to draw interest by breaking this code, often
with high contrast between text and background
- The main content of the website is often centralised, with notices and
less important segments delegated to lower down the page or the
sides, along with other tabs being linked to at the top or bottom bar

21. Convergence
- Allusion to other products and merchandise belonging to the artist
is evident in these websites, with visual displays of new albums
and merch along with links to social media pages and music
videos
- This helps keep all of the artist’s media existing to be consumed by
an audience referencing eachother in order to foster interest and
research of the artist in the target audience
- This is seen in AURORA's website,
wherein all of her previous albums
are displayed along with social links