Keith Negus' Theory

Keith Negus

We have been looking at Keith Negus, he believe that there are two ways of thinking about artists from within the music industry.

Organic Ideology

Or

Synthetic Ideology 
 

 Dependent on which ideology they follow shapes the type of career they will have.

An organic artist is someone who is natural (hence organic). They tend to have a longer life span in the industry. The emphasis made my the label is album sales rather than singles. They are often aimed at the older audiences, because they are more mature.

A synthetic artist is someone who is essentially created and molded into what the label wants them to become. They are only given a very short time to prove what they are made of, sometimes they succeed and go on to be massive, and sometimes they fall at the first hurdle. The emphasis this time is on the single sales, aimed at the younger generation.

In order for a big label to work, they must have a good balance of synthetic and organic artists. The profits from the organic artists, ensure that they can take risks on smaller synthetic artists

 

 An example of Organic Ideology- Jake Bugg

• Jake is 19 years old from Nottingham. He was discovered by Mercury Records at the age of 17
•  He was nominated for the 'British Breakthrough Act' award at the 2013 BRIT Awards, he lost to Ben Howard. Before the awards he stated "its great to be nominated but I don't really need an award to inspire me to keep writing my music"- this is a prime example of how he is an organic artist 

•  Jake Bugg is known for a singer-songwriter, not just a solo singer. This proves how organic he is because he is talented enough to write all his own music 

 An example of Synthetic Ideology- One Direction

• One Directions image of five boys has been created by their label (Syco) to attract various teenage audience 
• The band was formed on X Factor when all five boys auditioned as individuals, only to be put into a group together- this makes them synthetic as they didn't come together naturally they were created by the judging panel
• The band do not write all their songs, and if they do they are in collaboration with other writers- a lot of their success is due to their look rather than their own ability to write songs