Front Cover Analysis 1

Instantly when we look as this cover we can tell what genre of music the magazine will contain. Starting with the magazine title ‘KERRANG!’ The black font used for this almost has a ‘smashed’ effect similar to broken glass. This also implies a sense of ‘anarchy’ and corruption, something that is almost ‘breaking the rules’ to own/read, attracting an audience. Kerrang! normally keeps with a colour scheme of black, yellow, white and red as that is their house style, this is stereotypical of a rock magazine. In addition to this Hayley’s head (from the band Paramore) is slightly covering the mast head implying that the magazine is so established there isn’t any need for the reader to see the entire title. Furthermore the use of ‘!’ after the word Kerrang! Indicates the title is almost shouting when saying it, again highlighting the rebellion of the magazine. The main image is the band Paramore and they are all dressed in black again conforming to the house style and colour scheme of the magazine. Hayley is positioned at the front as she is the lead singer, but as well as this she also has orange hair, another implication of anarchy and rebellion. This further implies that the magazine is out of the ordinary and rare even. Again, a technique to attract the target audience as brightness on a rock magazine isn’t the norm. The target audience would be teenagers both male and female, interested in rock music. As this edition of Kerrang! is a souvenir special for Paramore all the cover stories and images are advertising them. However it is a normal convention of Kerrang! To use block cover stories similar to the ones used on this cover. From analysing this front cover I find some of the features could be beneficial for my rock magazine. I will use the convention of having the band’s heads in front of the mast head to show how established my magazine is, similar to this front cover. I will use the same style of font from the mast head and also use the feature of block capitals, as it will be like the magazine is shouting at you and is a useful convention in rock magazines and conforms to the rock genre. Another feature I will take is the minimal text on the front over, I’ll use the images and bold texts to draw my target audience in. As on the cover of rock magazines they aren’t heavily text based.