Codes and Conventions of boy bands

Codes and conventions of boy band music videos

Do BTS conform to the traditional codes and conventions of typical boy band music videos?

Butter - BTS (2021)

BTS are a well-known boy band, who first started in 2013, and their massive hit, ‘DNA’ (2017), expanded their reach into the Western Music industry, and have since been acknowledged for their hit-after-hit success. They were proclaimed as TIME’s ‘Entertainer Of The Year’ for 2020, with the massive success of their hit song, ‘Dynamite’. BTS’ music videos always tend to be sort of different to that of traditional pop music videos, especially given their second English song of their career. This separation from the conventional music videos with boy bands allows them to effectively differentiate from the likes of One Direction or The Vamps.

Representation

In terms of representation, typically, boy bands target audience is teenage girls, and hence they must have a line between the 'edgy/outgoing' aspect but also the 'wholesome' aspect. The outcome is a non-threatening representation of masculinity, with emphasis on the young energy and playfulness of the group.

With regards to BTS, their representation is also atypical, with the teenage girl audience, as well as their edgy/wholesomeness aspects, which is shown throughout the music video with shots of members laughing and enjoying themselves through their dancing and singing.

The target audience is shown select close-up shots of each of the member's face, during the period in which they only sing, as well as other shots between other member's parts, so that each of the members are shown for equal durations.

Technical codes:

For typical boy band music videos, all of the members within the band have own shots, as well as the typical group shots. In this instance, BTS' butter does conform to this, as each of the members have their own shots, as well as group shots (especially during the chorus), wherein the set design is different each time:

Pre-Chorus (1):

Chorus (2):

Chorus (3):

Chorus (4):

Mise-en-scene:

In terms of the mise-en-scene of the music video, there is not much, obvious, if any, of the 'typical' conventions of youth, but rather more codes of enjoyment and ultimately having a good time. This is shown with the dance moves that they have for the chorus.

Each of the members wear colour-corresponding outfits, which allow them to both stand out individually, but complement one another, as a group. This allows for their fans to identify each of the members easily.

Target audience:

For the traditional target audience, there's many individual, close-up shots of each of the member's faces, with various outfits in different scenes. Each of these close-ups are ‘supposed’ to make the viewers feel desire towards the members, hence the various different shots of each members doing different actions - which all promotes their individuality.

Each of the member's are shown for equal amounts of time, which will allow for fans to see each of the member's for equal amounts of duration, and hence keep fans intrigued and captivated to watch the music video for the whole amount of time. Given, typical boy bands target audience is teen girls, the close-ups of each of the member's doing different poses, should in a way yearn for the band.

Intertextuality:

In typical boy band music videos, there’s usually references to: existing or previous boy band’s, or various characters from a similar reference to emphasise on the similarities and differences of the members in the group. For example, One Direction’s big music video, ‘Kiss You’, featured references from the likes of The Beatles, The Monkees, The Beach Boys, and Elvis.

BTS's intertextuality

In terms of the music video itself, there isn't much references to other existing or previous boy bands, or characters from similar references. This just helps accentuate their own-selves from other boy bands, and to really display their uniqueness and originality, and helps effectively separate themselves, in order to represent the group as not like any other preceding boy group.

For BTS, they don’t have references to other boy bands or characters from a similar reference, but more just individuality in their different outfits. The only ‘real’ references are in their original song, but even with these direct references, it still portrays their individual selves.

With the references in the song; at the very beginning, there’s an obvious reference to Micheal Jackson’s ‘Smooth Criminal’ song.