Into depth with genre magazine

Rap and Hip Hop. Example of the genre.

History of Rap and Hip Hop with Mood board

This is a mood board of the music magazines based around the genre Rap and Hip Hop. As you can see on the mood board, I've selected 3 types of companies that publish these type of magazines and how different their type of layouts are compared to one another.

Hip Hop first originated in the early 1970s in New York City. One of the creators known to be the pioneers of Hip Hop is named Grandmaster Flash. He's known to be a producer and DJ now in the industry. Throughout these years, Rap and Hip Hop has advanced as there have become split sections such as mainstream and underground. The mainstream artists usually use repetitive beats that chain in together with different type of tempos to bring in audiences, as for the underground artists their music is produced with more original style of instrumentals rather than loudness and bass. Also there have become more major labels becoming associated with these genres due to it being one of the most popular ones. From the major labels artists within the industries become to create sub labels to form their own label with their own group or up coming artists to continue the chain.

Reader Profile

Summary and Ideas from the survey & focus group.

         Using the answers from the survey, It has given me an idea of what age group I'd be targeting for my music magazine since 100% of those aged from around 16 to 20 who took my survey. Another helpful suggestion by the people who took my survey was what appealed to them the most in music magazines and what appeals to them the least. From the results I've realised that the artist is the main feature of the music magazine from issues and the least are the stickers. So what I've realised is that this age group is more grown up as older teenagers or young adults. For example a younger audience would enjoy having stickers on the front cover as it'd be creative for them, however for an older group age it'll be more clear with extra writing. When it came to the last question asking which genre they prefer the most, it was close as all of them were mainly equal however, just by a few more percent, rap and hip-hop was selected as the most voted. This genre was an Idea I was planning to use in general, but since It's also more common I'll need to find a way to make it stand out more compared to the competition there would be In this genre due to It being well known. 

 

          When I recorded the focus group, I interviewed 3 people who were 16-18 years old. In this interview I asked them what appeals to them the most from 3 well known magazines which were; Kerrang!, VIBE & XXL. I asked them which would appeal to them the most if they were to see those 3 on a shelf next to each other. There responses were mixed as it was between XXL and Kerrang! However when I asked them which feature they liked the most from the magazines, they mainly preferred the XXL medium close up image of the artist including the angle of gaze and lighting used. I then proceeded to ask them what they thought of the lay out of the magazine and they told me that XXL was the most clear and spread out magazine and then explaining how they've separated the sub heading from not clashing with the main image and title. Also keeping originality with the masthead to represent the magazines company.

         From using all the research I have gathered here Is a sketch of what Ideas I have for the front cover using the research from the survey and focus group. 
 

The survey and results analysed.

After collecting the results from the survey, It's made It easier and clear for me to know what I have to include for my future front cover for the magazine. Here is the preview of the survey.

The results were collected from an audience, numbers ranging from 20 to around 25. Here are the results.

The reasons to why I chose these questions for the survey were due to what I would need for when I need to create my music magazine. The first question on the survey was "What is your age?". The reason why I opened the survey with this question was due to knowing the audiences age range as It would help see why the rest of the questions are chosen In specific terms. The second question, "Have you ever owned a music magazine" was another important question to see if the audience who is taking the survey actually has owned a music magazine to know what I'll be asking them in the next set of questions so they can give helpful replies on how their views are towards the magazine. In my opinion the most important question I chose was what Is the main feature that sticks out for them and least in any type of music magazine. This question is important because it indicates what would be the main eye catcher to bring in an audience of a specific type of age range and genre basing it on the first question I used asking for their age. Finally the price of a music magazine is also a vital question because some people will not be willing to spend more than a certain amount of money on a magazine they do not enjoy that much or feel like they haven't achieved as much information out of it. So asking people for a specific price range would help benefit the cost of mine to be appropriate to know it's worth every penny that it's been made for.

Creating the survey and how I advertised It to get results.

When I was creating my survey, I was thinking about ways of how I could reach out to people locally who would be willing to give In some time to answer questions In my survey. I used a website named survey monkey to construct my survey then used social media such as Facebook and Twitter to notify friends and followers to answer the survey.

Media AS Focus Group for Magazine Front Covers

Research Rationale

The target group that I have access to are teenagers ranging from the age of 16 to 19 which they can also fit under the category of being called older teenagers and young adults. The types of research I’ll be conducting from the target group are questions such as; “what type of music magazine do you purchase”, “how often do you purchase magazines”, “what price range you’d buy a magazine for” etc. This would involve a question and answers scheme for the target group to take part in and also surveys to see where the results are on the poll. However, I will be coming up with much more creative ideas to make my research stand out rather than having a dull set up for what I’d be asking the audience. The resource I’ll need to create the surveys is using an online website called survey monkey. Using this would help me put up questions that I’ll need to ask the audience on what their views are of the music industry and how they prefer their magazines. Doing this would help me come out with greater ideas which I can therefore use for the future front cover that I’ll be constructing including the contents page on double spread. For the focus group, I’ll be using magazines are showing the audience the front covers of those magazine and see which ones stick out more compared to the rest and why there reason is to that. This would then help me pick out what I can possibly use to help attract the audience that I’ll be basing the genre around to make it more outstanding rather than original.

Ideas for my magazine front cover

This XXL magazine follows all the convetions such as stamps, masterhead, coverlines, main features including a medium close up shot of the artists which will prove to be successful when producing my magazine front cover. This can help give me guidelines to maintain a good structure in both my front cover and contents page. Out of all the magazines i've descontructed and analysed, XXL has been the most inspiring one to follow on from by using ideas similar to this magazine and creating my own.

Similarities and differences of music magazines

Similarities:

Comparing the XXL magazine to the other magazines I chose which were "Kerrang!" and "NME" there are a few similarities to point out. To begin with the masthead for each magazine are layers behind the artists, also they are bold and manage to stand out in capitals so you can still which magazine it is clearly. Another similarity is the angle of gaze used by all of the artists which help appeal to the audience who want to buy magazines. The lay outs are all clear with subheadings and headings of what's going on in the magazine and it isn't scrambled about so it's well structured in general. They all consist of bar codes on the bottom of the page so it's clear for readers to know the price of the magazine and also the main use of colours include black and white as the main two then colours of their choice. They didn't over do the colours by using more than 3.

Differences:

The differences between the three magazines are the shots of the artists, with the Kerrang! magazine it mainly consists of bands with medium shots, however mainly with the NME or XXL it's medium close up shots of an artist. Also the Kerrang! has a masthead which goes from the left side of the front cover to the right so it stretches out, as for NME and XXL it's simply put into the top left corner of the front cover. The XXL mainly adds in page number on the sub headings on the front cover, as for NME and Kerrang! they just lay out the sub headings for the audience to know who's in the current issue which will eventually lead the audience into going to the contents page.

comparing magazines

The brief for AS Media

Our brief for AS Media in 2014 is to create a music magazine cover using the resources we have which includes analysing front covers of magazines from the music industry and creating a contents page for the audience linking to the front cover that we have created. The contents page would be on a double page spread. We have also been given ideas from previous student magazines and using those ideas to create our own. We’re also looking upon the mistakes they have made so we can overcome then and improve to make it into our own.

Recently, I have been looking at what type of genre I would like to base my magazine on. These type of genres were; rap, hip hop, R&B, rock and indie. With the ideas I have been through, I have come to a conclusion that I’ll be basing it on a rap and hip hop magazine similar to the XXL. The reason why I have chose to do a magazine similar to XXL is because of how the colour and layouts make the magazine stand out. The main colours they always use are red, white and black. Also the mast head of the magazine is put on the top left corner and in front of that is an image of artists with mainly a medium close up shot. They also make the subheadings on the front cover clear for their audience by including the page numbers also by spacing the text out with the artist in the middle of the magazine.