Friday, 27 September 2013

POSTER ANALYSIS: GREEN DAY - 'AMERICAN IDIOT'

The advert I have chosen to analyze is Green Day’s advert for their single and ‘wake me up when the September ends’ and the album ‘American Idiot’. The red and black white and grey colours used on the advert could be seen as a typical colour used for the punk rock genre. The colours are also masculine and aggressive. This is important for them to use on their advert as Green Day are in a very niche genre The red, white grey and black colours stands out as they contrast and appeal to the target audience as they are serious, depressing and could stand for uniqueness.

The image used on the advert shows the main singer but give you a hint that it is part of a performance with the mic in front of him. This is important to have in their advertising, as performance is a main convention in the punk rock genre. The main singers face can be seen clearly with his spikey gelled up hair and you can also see part of his clothing, which looks like a military uniform which help keep up the punk rock look. Make-up can also be seen on the main singers’ face which is a typical convention used in the punk genre to show that they are unique compared to other genres. The low angle shot on him makes him seem important as if people look up to him. Normally punk rock bands would look angry and very intimidating but this is not the case for Green Day’s advert, which may have been done to appeal to a more mainstream audience.

The composition of the advert is laid out neatly with the bands’ name and title of the single seen in the top left corner. In the bottom half they have a list of singles also being released and the album. The text in the top left hand corner is in white block capitals for the band name ‘Green Day’ looks like paint but looks like its been slowly wearing away giving a classic feel to the band as if they were trying to get punk rock big again like in the 70’s/80’s. But the font for the single ‘wake me up when September ends’ is in a unique font, looking like it has been scrawled in, maybe to show their rebellious side. The font on the bottom half is again in block capitals but use red and white to make the advert more exciting to look at. All of the fonts on the page are san serif font. I feel this is used because Green Day don’t want to be seen as sophisticated and want to keep an informal feel that is seen through the genre. The album seen in the bottom right corner shows a hand holding a grenade, which is shaped as a heart. This could be a political reason fighting against war trying to show that they disagree with the war and maybe the government altogether. This is something seen through the audience of the genre and maybe why they decide to listen to this type of music. Also seen in the bottom right corner is ‘Make Poverty History’ showing they care about people less fortunate than them and want to help these people out any way they can, in this case a charity. They also advertise a 7” picture disc vinyl, which was most popular during the 70s/80s. Again this could have been released to bring back the classic feel of the punk rock era when it was at its biggest. 

Post by: 
Josh Shea



No comments:

Post a Comment