Lady Gaga
Lady Gaga has created her own niche by having an individual and eccentric style that hasn't been seen before, and as she has become more popular her style has developed with that. Because she already had the fans and had made her place in the music industry, she could afford to be even more creative and bold with her fashion statements. Before she became world famous, Lady Gaga signed with Streamline Records which is a part of Interscope Records. Here she worked as a songwriter for other artists signed to that label until Akon recognised her vocal ability and signed her to his own label Kon Live Distribution. By beginning her own singing career with her first single 'Just Dance' which was a new sound but had elements of music that had been heard before, she could let just enough of her creativity to shine through to get noticed by other record companies. Her debut album 'The Fame' went straight to number number one in the UK, and also reached number one in Canada, Austria, Germany and Ireland.In 2009 Lady Gaga released her second album, 'The Fame Monster'. With this album she could express herself a lot more through her image and performances, as well as her music. Her image changed dramatically between the two albums as the album covers show:
Her inspiration comes from glam rock artists such as David Bowie and Queen, as well as artists like Madonna which is displayed in her most recent video for her single 'Alejandro'. Although the song does not particularly represent any of Madonna's, the costume in the video in certain places does. The videos for Lady Gaga's songs have also developed with her image, because she can also afford to be more creative and eccentric now with these too, with the video for 'Telephone', featuring Beyonce, lasting almost ten minutes. In this video Lady Gaga has a very distinctive style that she continued with off screen as seen in the picture below.
By creating a niche, when the consumer is looking to buy a particular album they immediately know what they are looking for and what they should expect to get. Even if they weren't looking for a certain artist or band, they would no doubt already be familiar with someone like Lady Gaga and know whose album it is they are looking at when they see it. If an artist or band wants to be recognised everywhere and become popular in order to promote and eventually sell their own music, creating something individual about them is the way to do this.
Heather McDonald - 'The sad truth is, every writer, radio station, website, or fan for that matter, you are trying to reach is likely being bombarded with info from other music hopefuls. You need a reason to stand out.'
To create my own niche through my three tasks, I will adopt the camper van concept from the music video and feature images of it throught the two ancillary tasks. Most artists and bands sell their music throught their image and style, but that will not be the case with the products I create for Eight Track Stereo. Of course the band will feature somewhere in the products, or the audience might not be completely aware of the genre of their music before buying it.
