Music Magazine Analysis

Rock Music Magazine Cover Analysis

Rock Sound- for this magazine they have a rock band all giving direct mode of address in a black room causing the background behind the people to be completely black for its cover image. It has the masthead at the top of the page in a large, bold and white font allowing it to stand out against the black background. Some of the masthead is covered by the band member at the front. The fact that one of the band members is further forward in this image suggests that he is the main singer. Above the masthead however is a strapline which says what you get free with the magazine which I haven’t noticed on any other magazines I have analysed so far. The magazine has 5 different cover lines and strap lines which allows the reader to have a wide amount of knowledge to what’s in the magazine. They use 4 different text colours in order to make all text visible no matter where it is on the page. The magazine also has the basic assets such as a bar code, price line and date line however it has all 3 in the same place on the magazine which doesn’t occur on all front covers.

Classic Rock- for this magazine there is only one singer on which suggests he is a single artist. He is giving direct mode of address however you can only see half of his face due to the entire image being edited to being black and white. The fact the image is black and white means that the background is completely black. The masthead is once again at the top of the cover page in a large, bold and white font however the word ‘classic’ is accompanied by 2 stars either side of the word and is in a much smaller font than the word ‘rock’ which represents that the word ‘rock’ is the key word and theme to the magazine. This magazine too has small text above the masthead but this time stating a quote from a newspaper about its own success. Again the magazine has 5 or more cover lines and straplines allowing the reader to know some of its contents before purchasing and opening the item and allowing them to know if it is a kind of magazine they want to be reading. It uses only 2 colours for its font which allows the reader to tell the difference between the strap lines and cover lines and keeps the magazine very plain and simple. It too has a bar code, price line and date line all in the same place in the magazine.

Kerrang!- This magazine also only has one person in the main image who is giving direct address however in this covers image it is in colour and behind the man it looks as if there is a light shining in what looks like a dark room. This means that unlike the other two magazines this one has mainly a black background but with some white towards the middle. Similar to the other two magazines the masthead is at the top of the cover page in a large, bold and white font with a person’s head covering the middle of the word. Also similar to the others is that once again there is text above the masthead but this time stating a chance to take part in a competition. This magazine differs from the first two as it also has other images inserted onto the cover which are small and bordered and are related to topics mention in the strap lines and cover lines. The magazine uses 4 different text colours which makes the magazine more colourful and bold and appealing to the eye. Just like the other two the magazine also has a bar code, price line and date line in the same place.