Denotations and Connotations Analysis - Kano - Signs in life

Denotations: (What you see)	Connotations: (What it means)
Flats, Council Estate	The artist has maybe done this to show where he is from; this is also done to give it a grime theme as most grime themes are associated with council estates, flats or in any type of urban area.
Home-Studio with live performance	The artist has done this to show what he does or has done to build up his music career.
Pictures of London	The artist has maybe done this to show where he is from; this is also done to give it a grime theme as most grime themes are associated with council estates, flats or in any type of urban area.
Gangs of youths	The artist has done this to show what kind of social life he lives in or is representing, also when looking at the grime genre a convention we may see is a gang of youths behaving in an antisocial behaviour.
Night time – Evening	The artist has gone for a video where it is produced in the evening during dark hours, this could have been done to give the music video a more sinister atmosphere as well as a more grime based theme seeing as grime could be seen as a sub-genre of heavy metal which is conventionally associated with dark themes.
Images of cars, jewellery, money etc.	The artist has done this to show a visual link with the lyrics, also when analysing why a gang of youths act in a certain way, the motive behind there behaviour could be for these reasons.
Road signs	Visual link with the sound/lyrics, road signs are also used by the artist in the music video so that the audience can associate the road signs with the track title ‘Signs in life’ also when looking at this denotation carefully the signs that are shown is something that someone may see everyday in their life or have seen during any part of their lives.
Images of prison	Artist has used this as this is where most people may end up, especially youths that are involved in gangs like the ones that the artists are representing.
News	The artist shows bad news for e.g. in the video there is a police sign which reads out ‘fatal incident’, this is to show that there is not always good news where he is from.
Stolen Car	Visual link with what the artist is talking about, this is to give the video a more realistic theme to be associated with the lyrics
Image of infant putting up his middle finger	This can represent some issues faced in society, how antisocial behaviour is being passed down to younger generations.
Black or dark clothing	This is to go with the atmosphere of the theme as well as being a typical colour or theme a group of youths will wear. It is also conventional clothing that is linked with grime.
Religious Signs	The artist would like to portray a religious side of his music video, where religion also indicates ‘signs in life’, also because religion guides a lot of people and the term ‘signs’ can mean an indication or direction for a person to follow, the artist is trying to convey an image where it shows double meaning.
Images of police vehicles	These are the sort of things that you will see in a typical London urban area as crime rates are high which means there is a lot of trouble with the police.
Bright and occupied room in an unoccupied flat being used as a studio	This could tell us that the artist is secluded from trouble as he is trying to build on his music career, also it can mean that the artist is trying to convey the problems that he faces outside of the studio.