Market Research

This is a research of the different music magazines you can purchase in

the UK.

Magazines in the UKSome music magazines who are produced in the UK are: NME, Kerrang!, The Blues Magazine, We <3 pop, Q Magazine, Classic Rock, Metal Hammer, Uncut, Prog Magazine

magazine• Bauer Media Group• Published monthly, price £3.70• Front Cover: medium close up, artist• First issue, october 1986• Bauer also publish Mojo and Kerrang!• Circulation: 89 450• Core audience: Male(66%), female(34%)

Classic Rock Magazine• Team Rock, earlier Future• Front cover: medium long shot• Price: £4.99• Monthly • 1998• Team Rock also publish Prog

Magazine, Metal Hammer and The Blues Magazine

• Age: 35+, mostly men

Mixma• Front cover: medium close up• Development Hell• Dance magazine

first launched in 1983• Covers dance events, reviews music and club

nights• Monthly, Price: £5.50

Textual analysis

Q Magazine, Classic Pop and Mixmag

Masthead: the “Q” on the front page always big and white, with a red background. They have it on the left side, so people will see it when it stands in the shelf. The big letter and the red colours makes the readers focus there. Normally, magazines have their masthead in the middle of the page, so this is something unusual, and not magazines have it one side.

The headline, is written in big fond, and in black, so the readers focus here, along with on the logo

The front cover is a cover of the band Take That, which covers the whole page. It Is five men in the band, and they are lying over each other, while they are laughing. This shows that they are close and connected to each other.

Q cover page

Colours: the colours on the front page are red, white, black and gold. The background is white, which is in contrast to the other colours, especially the bright red.

Price and date: the date mark is important for the reader to know the magazine is up to date. People who buy music magazine want’s to buy magazine who writes about the newest music. The price is also important, but stands in small fond, because the publisher doesn’t want it to be so dominating. Normally, the box with price and date are placed a corner on the bottom, but Q placed it a bit further up, at the white background. If they had putted it on the bottom, it would have showed more, because it would partly be a black background. This proofs that the editor wants to “hide” it, so it won’t be dominating.

Text: the text on the front page are in red, black and gold, which is a contrast compared to the white background, and it also makes the text easy to see and notice.

Mise-en-scene: they wear black leather jackets and black jeans. This symbolizes their rough and cool style. Since a lot of the text are in colours, the black clothes doesn’t take the attention away from the text.

Q contents pageImages: It is several images on this page next to the text to tell the reader what you can see inside the magazine and on which page you can find it. Also, the people on the pictures are artist who you can find later in the magazine.

Dateline: The dateline stands over the main heading. This shows the purchaser when the magazine was published, which is good for the purchaser to know, since people often wants updated magazines.

Main heading: Contents is written in white on a black background, which makes it easy to see.

Text: The text is written small and black, but with big headings. This makes it easy for the reader to find what they want to read about and where to find it in the magazine.

Colours: On this page, it is used many different colours on a white background.

Page numbers: The page numbers are in different colours, which highlights them and makes them in easy to see. This helps the readers to easily see which page the articles they want to read are on.

Main image: The biggest picture, the main image, is a medium close up of a man. This gives the idea that he is the main artist and focus point in this magazine. When you open this page, this is the first picture you look at.

Q double page spreadPicture: it is a big picture of prince, which cover a big part of the pages. The picture shows prince sitting on the stage with his guitar.

The main heading is big, which along with he picture covers a big part of the article. The main heading is ending with “…”. It is a uncomplete sentence, which can make the reader curious to read more.

Colours: The colours on the double page spread are white, black and pink/purple. The pink and purple in the text is also on Prince’s shirt, which makes a balance in the colours.

Text: A bit of the text is in bigger font than the rest of the text, and it starts with “…”. This completes and finish the heading. This is a cool way to get the reader a bit more interested in the text. The article starts with a big, pink/purple T.

Mise en scene: In this photo Prince holding up his guitar, which let us know that the guitar is something important to him, and it is something he use on stage etc. In the background you can also see drums. This shows that he is on stage under a concert.

Classic pop front cover

Colours: The colours on the front page are mostly white, black and red. It is also hints of other colours like yellow, pink and blue. The background is white.

Masthead: The masthead is written in white, over black and red. With both the red and black background, the white fond gives more attention.

Text: The text on this front page are written in white, over red or black background.

Headline: The headline is white, and because of the big font, that’s where we first see.

Sub image: the small images shows a little bit of what’s inside the magazine. This catches the audience’s attention, and can help people decide if they want to buy it or not.

Date and price: The date is important to the purchaser to see that the magazine they buy is up to date, to get a magazine who writes about the newest and relevant music and artists. The price is also important, but stands in small font because the publisher doesn't’t want it to be that dominating.

Main image: The main image, which cover almost the whole front page, is a medium long shot of a duo.

Mise-en-scene: One of the brothers is dressed with a hat, jeans and a denim shirt. The other one is wearing jeans and a green shirt. This gives us a feeling that they are cool, and up to date with their outfits.

Classic Pop contents pagePictures: There are eight pictures on the contents page. The pictures are of some of the artist who are written articles about. The pictures takes most of the space on these two pages.

Colours: The colours on the front page, is the same as on the front page. Mostly red, white and black. It is also a lot of blue and grey tones in the pictures.

Text: the text is written small, with small headlines. Under the “headlines” it is excerpt from the articles. This gives more information to the reader, and it makes it easy for the reader to find which articles they want to read and which they don’t.

Sub heading: to divide the different categories, it is used sub headings like “features” and “news”. This helps the readers to find what they want to read quick and easy.

Page numbers: the page numbers are placed next to the text, but there are also numbers on the pictures. The ones on the pictures tells us easily where to find the articles about the artists on the pictures.

Classic Pop double page spreadQuote: Next to the artist on the picture, there is a quote from the text. Using a quote, gives the reader more than only a heading, and can make the reader want to read more. Also, since the quote is written in a bigger font, it easy to notice and gives attention.

Picture: It is only one, big photograph on the double page spread. The picture is a medium close up. With using only one picture of the artist, the reader focus on him, and we understand that this is a article where the artist is the most important thing.

Main heading: The heading is “Marc on avoiding Bowie”. This is an interesting heading, which makes the reader to want to read more. When you open the page, you see the heading, which makes the reader interested straight away. This heading makes us think that it is a conflict between the artist, and a lot of people are interested in drama between famous people.

Text: The text are written in black, white and gray. This is a bit more interesting than only using one colour on all of the text.

Colours: The colours on this double page spread are red and white, which keeps it simple, but still interesting.

Mise-en-scene: On this picture, there is only one prop, a chair. The artist doesn’t have clothes on, which shows his tattoos, who often can tell a lot more about a person than clothes can. The tattoos we can see on his arms, are rough cool tattoos, which can also be how the artist is.

Mixmag front cover

Colours: The background on this magazine is purple, and other things are mostly black. This makes the magazine simple, without too many details. It is also a hint of orange/pink, which gives a cool detail to the front cover.

Picture: The picture is a long shot of four persons. They stands close to each other, but one of them looks another way than the rest. This can be the lead singer, or the “main person” in the group.

Masthead: The masthead is simple. It is written in black, with the same font as on all the magazines.

Date, price, website: On this picture, the price and date are in two different boxes, but next to each other. The price stands in both pounds and what it would cost on the internet. They also have their website their, to show that people can also buy it online.

Mise-en-scene: The artists are dressed with black clothes. This gives them a cool look, and also fits to the look to the rest of the magazine.

Text: Over the masthead, it is a text in small font. This tells us about what this magazine writes about.

Mixmag contents page

Picture: It is only one picture on the contents page, with three persons in it. This makes this page simple, and doesn’t take the attention away from the contents.

Dateline: the dateline stands next to the masthead, but in smaller font. This makes the date visible, but it’s not the first thing we notice. The dateline is important for the reader because they want to know that is up to date, and the newest issue of the magazine. Also by writing month and year, reminds us that this is a monthly magazine.

Sub-heading: Next to the page numbers, there are different sub headings to divide the contents in to different categories. By doing this, it makes it easier for the reader to find which page the contents they want to read are on.

Colours: The page are black with white text. The picture is the only thing with colours on it. The white text over the black page makes a contrast, and it seems cool and rough.

Mixmag double page spreadPicture: It is only one picture on this double page spread. The artist stands in a room alone, which helps us understand that he is a single artist, and not in a group. The picture is very simple, which relates to the headline.

Headline: The headline is big and pink. Since the pink in the headline is the only colour, it gives an extra focus on the headline.

Colours: The only colours on this page are the pink in the headline. The rest of the page are white, black and gray. This makes the page very simple, but still a bit more exciting than it would have been without the colour on the headline.

Sub-heading: The sub-heading is a text that gives a bit information about the article. By reading this sub-heading, you know what the article is going to be about.

Text: On the side of the page, it is a list of his DJ set up. This is something the extra interested people would love. It is four sub-headings which tells the names of the things he use. Under the headlines, there are a text where Sonny tells about it and what he thinks about it