Codes and conventions of a tropical house music video

Tropical house is a mix of catchy, melodic chimes and good vibes. Artists like Thomas Jack and Kygo are the type of artists that express this in their music and their music is based around this genre. The artist, Thomas Jack, used the term 'tropical house' to describe his style of music he creates.

When discussing the codes and conventions of a tropical house music video there are many that come into play like many music videos of this genre tend to have messages about dancing, love and drugs which are all underpinned with a steady bass drum beat. Another code and convention of a tropical house music video is that there are usually women dancing seductively and wearing clothes that reveals most of their body so it can attract a male audience.  

A common code and convention that is used in a tropical house music video is that there will be lots of shots of people dancing in a club and listening to the DJ perform live whether it be at a club or a dance festival. Both of these scenes are very common in tropical house music videos. Also most of the time, the DJ who produced the song won't appear in the music video and whoever sings the vocals of the song will appear in the music video.

The song 'Firestone' by Kygo ft Conrad Sewell displays some codes and conventions of a tropical house music video. This is because the narrative of the music video is that this guy is fixated on this particular girl and will do anything to have her. She is obviously the way to get a male's audience attention as she is skinny and attractive and will be pleasing to the eye for most of the audience that watch this video. Also the music video ends up being shot in a music video displaying images of the DJ, Kygo, playing live at a festival which is a common code and convention that is used in a tropical house music video. 

When we start to shoot our video we hope to include live sets of the song we have chosen as this will add more a tropical house feel to it and clearly represent the type of look and genre we are going for. 

The song 'Rivers' by Thomas Jack has elements of the codes and conventions of a tropical house music video and is classed as this type of genre which was why I decided to look at him when researching into codes and conventions. Through its entirety the music video follows a couple when they are on holiday. The video has a dreamy feel to it which fits the genre perfectly and even though it is only two characters in the video, the video has a strong narrative. 

Yet again, the lady character is wearing kind of revealing clothing and the guy in the music video is attractive suggesting there is a mixed target audience for the music video. When creating our music video we want to have a mixed target audience as it will broaden the popularity of our video. Throughout the video there are close ups of the character's faces which indicates their moods and what is happening in the video. Some shots are slow mo which yet again goes well with the music and the type of genre it is.