An introductionTechnically speaking this website covers everything the audience expects of an artist’s website, good content, interactivity, creativity and originality, information on the artist and his latest songs with live videos to boot. Starting with the title, it's clear has a unique but distinct font of Patch Bawn's name and encompasses the webpage. The colour of it is a white with very slight cream, making it stand out quite strong against its slightly transparent black website; the cream blend prevents the title looking unfinished or empty and the small graphical sprayed points on the lettering gives it a more authentic and street aesthetic, appealing to the target audience who are familiar with such a style.Next to the title we have a small picture of whited-out acoustic instruments, this aids the readers in distinguishing the genre of Patch's music, it also livens up the top of the page and breaks the page down for the reader into manageable chunks. It is also light hearted and keeps the readers state of mind in the musical theme, in my research I’ve found that some sites such as Dashboard Confessional can have very business-like homepage, a feature such as in Patch’s, retains the acoustic mood and keeps the page light.

LayoutIn the general layout lots of chunking and boxing has been used, this clarifies each feature on the site and makes it very simple to navigate, preventing the need to read through a paragraph to find one bit of information. This layout format carries on through all the sub-pages too. This format is extremely user friendly, however it can sometimes also make the page appear very plain, basic and just generally absent of information; in a homepage for an artist this is not too bad, however the lack of information in this case does reflect how small the artist is, Patch Bawn is unfortunately a very small time artist currently.The drop menus along the top of the page are extremely helpful; they are simple links that take you to pages with exactly what they describe. One that caught my attention was the “scientific articles” one, this is an oddity in music websites, making the site appear as more of a personal page than a music site; Patch may have done this because as a performer he isn’t well known and is still at a stage where he can interact closely with his audience, this link to some articles acts as a chance for the audience to interact with him, not eve on a music level, but as a person. I think that really captures the kind of audience in the acoustic genre, while the music is admirable the artist is the one who makes it and is just like everyone else and this link respects that and shows the site has been tailored to the genre specific audience. The layout of the site utilizes consumption theories such as the rule of thirds, placing the contact me link in the upper left, where it will be most visible, showing it’s the main focus of the site, and videos and songs in the centre of the page, telling the audience exactly what the site is. At the bottom of the page he has placed all of his links to social media on both the footer and in a “follow me” box, this points out how many different ways he’s accessible however, having these links repeated can also come off as a bit desperate, especially the YouTube subscribe box, if he were a bigger artist with more subscribed it may be more tempting for the audience to subscribe and visit his channel. However Patch has actually made a point of showing how few subscribers he has with this, which may deter some viewers of the site as they think along the lines of 2 step flow audience theory, “He has barely any subscribers, he’s probably not any good”, defeating the objective of the site, to draw in the audience.

CreativityOn a whole this is a very creative site that draws in my eyes as a consumer and honestly made me click links to find out more. One of the reasons this site is creative is because it is unique and resourceful, Patch doesn’t have much he can put on the site at this stage of his music, however he’s put up whatever he can, attempting to show his performances in 2 styles and advertising his one bit of merchandise he has to offer, and even that is not quite released yet.The videos and music come from both YouTube and sound cloud, cleverly advertising his presence both of those form of media sharing, whilst also displaying diversity in his format and site. The striped background is very obscure for an artist’s website, it is very bright and colourful, drawing the eyes of the reader to the bright colours; the stripes have also used a cleaver consumption mechanic though. The stripes are slanted , the consumers eyes will naturally follow the slant of these stripes which cut right through his announced album and because the background moves with the page scroll, it also cuts down through his YouTube video, highlighting his 2 key components that would have the best chance of drawing in his audience.Another obscurity I find in this page is the 3 badges with the signatures on them, presumably Patch’s’ signature? But why? Patch is not well known enough for the signature to really be worth anything, and it’s not clear what the image is meant to be, it looks similar to a vinyl however has the music writing bars on them. The purpose of this graphic may be similar to the acoustic instruments above it, to spice up the page and create a common ground for the audience; the audience of the acoustic genre however may not even recognise this though as many would play guitar via TAB which has dotted lines and the lines are too close together which the viewers would be unfamiliar with.

Band BioThe bio of Patch Bawn is not written by him. Immediately this cuts him off from the audience slightly, almost as if he couldn’t take the time to talk about himself for 5minutes to his audience, but onto the content.The paragraphs briefly detail where patch began who he is, what his music is about and the most recent development at the bottom. This bio is short and sweet, good for a cover page such as this, however the “Biography” link is very limited too, it Is a slightly longer length than on the cover page and addresses the readers from patch himself instead of his producer which is a nice change of approach. If anything comparing the 2 bios of Patch gives you a deeper understanding of his personality as we can differentiate the two and pick out his characteristics more clearly when we have a comparative paragraph. I wish the Bio had more information on his workings and his current developments however, maybe some on the social network sites he’s on or even current song and life development, the acoustic genre is well aware that songs have an immense influence on from life experiences and knowing a bit more about Patch will allow the reader to gain a deeper insight on his songs and Patch himself.

Things to do on the pageThe site is quite interactive; it has several links to Patch’s performances and his social media if you want to talk amongst fans and Patch. To improve this I believe Patch should plant a comments section or discussion section into his website, this would stir up views on the site as well, making it more publically known, increasing the chances of a company or record label potentially scouting him. In addition it would make the easily accessible features on the site such as YouTube subscription more likely to flourish as people would see the videos and links each time they went to discuss.

Images on the siteAs a whole this site’s bright colours, modern layout and lack of still pictures of the artist depict him as a modern small-time lad who sees his music more as a hobby with no pursuit of a career in it, only to share his music.The focal image on this site is the album ‘Epoch’ depicted as Patch’s upcoming debut. The picture on the cover features Patch himself on a very dark toned colour scheme, looking in a direct mode of address at the audience. It’s a possibility that the lack of pictures of Patch is planned to have been made up with this photo that features his face. The Alum art will be taken as a representation of Patch himself, the washed over lettering and colour scheme however contrast the rest of the image his website has built up thus far and this is a problem. The image and scheme of the website do not complement each other, making the album seem abnormal and attention is drawn to it, but not necessarily the good sort. The opinion taken from it is largely based on the uses and gratification audience theory, where the audience is to interpret and take their own opinions and values from the image. Some may view it as an essential colour scheme to compliment the theme of the album, the word ‘Epoch’; however others may apply the album more to the website and focus more on the clash of colour schemes making the album look out of place. In terms of the imagery itself, Patch is mostly covered up in the picture by his own name and a couple of loosely transparent graphics. Uses and gratification can also be applied to the image itself, the transparent images are not too clear and different viewers could take them as images of different things, for instance I see a unicorn in the bottom right, however someone else may just think it’s meant to be a parchment-like crease, we will both however apply both our images to Patch Bawn taking it as a representation of him. I mentioned the lack of images on the cover page earlier, however Patch has actually gone about a different unique way of showing himself to the audience, on his videos they’re his live performances, which I think is the best possible way to present yourself to an acoustic genre audience as it shows what you’re really like which is immensely appreciated by the audience who like to be as close as they can to the artists.

Contact infoThis site is covered with contact information; every possible way of contacting the artist can be found on this site, which is great, exactly what you’d hope for on a music site. If a simple contact number were not enough there’s a full contact page linked at the top of the homepage that even gives out Patch’ Bawn’s producer’s email. We have multiple formats of which we can contact him online and ways of talking to him personally; the contact links are also present at the bottom of every page and sub-page of the site. This is a consistent layout feature in place even on the contact sub-page which could be considered overkill, but would ruin the consistency of the site if it were not there.

Broken LinksWorth a mention, are the number of broken links and streams on this website, sound cloud streams may be broken and the links next to the plug below the bio, these have no hyperlinks and their lack of practicality make the site seem more amateurish and incomplete.