The document discusses conventions of indie rock music videos. It notes that typically they are either narrative or performance-based, or both, and always feature the band. The band is usually shown performing or as part of a narrative in everyday clothes rather than being "glammed up." Examples are provided of videos by The Kooks, Oasis, Kasabian, and The Killers that follow these conventions through narrative/performance elements and depictions of the band in normal clothing.

1. Genre Conventions
Indie Rock

3. • As part of my planning and preparation
for my coursework I am researching the
conventions of my selected genre of
music (indie rock).
• This will help me to fully understand
the genre I am using and therefore be
able to appeal to my audience at a
better level.

4. Origins of Indie Rock
• Originally used to describe independent
record labels, the term ‘indie rock’, when
referring to a genre of music, originated in the
1980s in both the UK and US.
• It is a wide ranging term which can be used to
address a vast number of sub-genres including
post punk revival, indie pop and dance punk.

5. Indie Rock Bands

6. Indie Rock Bands
Bands/Artists associated with this genre include:
Oasis
Arctic Monkeys
Kasabian
Jake Bugg
The Strokes
The Kooks
Alt-J
The Killers

7. Mise-en-scene

8. Mise-en-scene
The clothing style of this particular genre is very
popular and recognisable. It includes skinny
jeans accompanied by either a band t-shirt, a
baggy jumper, a checked shirt or a vest top.
Plain hoodies with white cords are also very
common. Boys who follow this fashion tend to
wear green parka coats and Vans trainers.

9. Indie Rock Music Videos
Stereotypically, music videos of this genre are either narrative
or performance based or both. They always feature the band
whether they are simply performing or actually part of the ongoing narrative. Occasionally the band can be seen performing
in the background of the video as part of the narrative,
something which is fairly common in music videos by The
Killers (see ‘When You Were Young’ and ‘Mr Brightside’). The
band can regularly be seen in normal, everyday clothes as
opposed to being “glammed up”. This is a classic convention of
this genre as Indie music stems from independent record
labels who go against the type of music/image that major
record labels represent and tend to be more about the music
and talent of their signed artists as opposed to just caring
about how much money they are going to make.

10. Indie Rock Music Videos

11. Indie Rock Music Videos
The Kooks – ‘Naïve’
This video is in a
narrative structure
featuring the band
as the main cast
which allows
performance to also
be incorporated into
the video.

12. Indie Rock Music Videos
Oasis – ‘Wonderwall’
This video is
performance based and,
following the
conventions of its genre,
shows the band doing
what they do best
wearing average,
normal clothing.

13. Indie Rock Music Videos
Kasabian – ‘Fire’
Similar to The Kooks’ video, this video is
also both performance and narrative
featuring the band members as the main
cast. In this video they are playing bank
robbers but instead of using guns they
have guitars. This could be seen as a
reference to the genre of Indie and the
belief that music is the weapon.

14. Indie Rock Music Videos
The Killers – ‘When You Were
Young’
This video is both performance
and narrative. The narrative
aspect of the video is performed
by actors and The Killers can be
seen playing the song in a bar in
the background of some of the
shots in the video.