Q magazine - advertisements

This is the issue of Q magazine (March 2009) I will be using to annotate and understand more on how the magazine works, along with it's advertising which is linked to the publishing company and the target audience.












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Q magazine - facts and figures

- Q magazine is an alternative music magazine.

- It is published monthly in the UK.

- It's publishing company is Bauer Consumer Media (Emap).

- Mark Ellen and David Hepworth founded the magazine because they felt it was a niche market as there wasn't a magazine for the older generation who were still buying CD's.

- Q was first published in 1986 and was different from other magazines due to it's high quality photography and printing, as well as having an older target audience.

- It was originally going to be called 'Cue', however it was changed to 'Q' due to possible confusion with it being a snooker magazine, plus a single lettered title is thought to be more prominant on newsstands.

- The magazine includes a very wide reviews section (music, reissues, television, films, games etc) however most of the magazine is filled with interviews and compiling lists.

- Promotional gifts are given away quite often, such as CDs and books.

- Q has a history of association with charitable organisations.

- Q launched a radio station in June 2008, however it is only available on digital TV.

- Q also has it's own music channel called Q TV.

- They hold Q awards every year.

- It's circulation figures are 103,017. (81,240 being in the UK and republic of Ireland) 01-Jul-2008 to 31-Dec-2008.

- It's cover price is £3.90.

- It's single copy subcription figures are 22,798. (19,097 being in the UK and republic of Ireland) 01-Jul-2008 to 31-Dec-2008.

- The target audience for Q magazine are the older generation such as people in their 30's and 40's who are looking for a different mode of address, more sophisticated and just want to know more about the music instead of what colour pants so and so is wearing (which would be mentioned in Kerrang). Although the founders state that they want to appeal to all the older generation, it seems that Q magazine doesn't appeal to many woman of that age.

Rock Sound Magazine - Advertisements

This is the issue of Rock Sound magazine (Issue 119, february 2009) I will be using to annotate and understand more on how the magazine works, along with it's advertising which is linked to the publishing company and the target audience.












- The first advertisement is on the inside of the front cover, which is a very expensive place to advertise due to it being one of the first things you see in the magazine. It is the first of most likely many music adverts. It is a record label advertising albums and EPs from artists that are signed to them. The advert seems very eyecatching with a quirky background image of many CD's and text along with images of front covers of albums and EPs overlapping this background. The advertisement is very article like as it tells the reader a bit about the band and the album in the first place.

- The next advertisement is a few pages after the contents page, it a full page spread advertising the new 'Deathstars' album with a huge picture of the band accompanied by the name of the band and the name of the album with a picture of the front cover of it so the reader can recognise it when it shops. The advert is very dark, which relates to the band themselves as they seem to hold the 'goth' image with very pale, white faces and black eyes and black hair. The advert may appeal greatly to 'Deathstars' fans as fans tend to follow the same image as the bands they enjoy.

- An advertisement is used on the next page in the letters section, however it is only quite small and taking up some room on the page. It is a 1/3 page advert and is for 'Attitude clothing' (which has a huge number of adverts in Kerrang magazine). For a small advert, it takes up most of it's space by listing the brands they sell and with a picture of a girl with many facial piercings, however her clothes aren't on show which defeats the purpose of the advert as the reader can't tell if the clothes 'Attitude' are selling appeal to their taste.

- Rock Sound does a little self-endorsement a few pages later with a small column advertising what is showing on Rock Sound TV (such as acoustic sets, interviews etc...). Tempting readers onto Rock Sound's digital advancements and to gather more reader satisfaction.

- Another music based advertisement is used in the magazine similar to the size of the 'Attitude clothing' advert. It is for an album released by a band called 'The Tyrant Lizard Kings'.

- A whole page is dedicated to an advertisement by Cargo Records who are trying to ge the word out about bands new albums who are signed to their label. The list of bands and albums are unheard of, I certainly haven't heard of them, which is why the record label also provide shops in which you will find the CDs as they are obviously hard to come by.

- Yet another music advertisement is used on a full page spread by a record label, the advert follows the same conventions, however looks a lot more proffessional than many of the others. It also includes tour dates for the bands they are promoting, suggesting that people who are interested in the bands would be keen gig goers.

- A whole section in the magazine is used similar to the two pages in Kerrang! (Introducing: new music coming your way...). This section in Rock Sound magazine is about 10 pages and called 'Exposure: the best new music' which also can be seen as advertising that won't cost any money to the band as the magazine is just trying to fill its content and help out its readers by introducing them to new bands and music, which the magazine is famous for.

- The magazine carries on with a bit of self-endorsement by using a 1/3 page spread dedicated to letting readers know about their subcription deal. The advert includes back issues of the magazine and the front cover of an album they are giving away for free with the subscription, plus a low price in bold to attract audience attention.

- The music advertisements continue throughout the magazine, however still adapting to the theme of the magazine being underground as it is many small bands that the readers haven't heard of. A whole page is conquered by 4 advertisements, one half page one, one 1/4 page and 2 1/8 page. They all hold the same aim; to advertise their new album and hope for readers to be interested.

- Another music full page advertisement from a record label is used, this time a well known record label, however it is advertising bands that aren't heard of in other more mainstream magazines such as Kerrang. The colour of the overall page is very dark, like that of the album covers, relating to them.

- The next page of advertisements are a bit different to the ones seen earlier in the magazine, about half the page is bright and quirky promoting tour dates for the band 'Polar Bear Club', whilst the second half of the page is dark, dull and smoky promoting an album with a similar artwork for its front cover. However, at the bottom of the page, a banner with band tshirts is used aswell to advertise a company selling clothing merchandise. This suggests that fans of the magazine will want to follow the bands they like as much as they can by not only buying their CDs and going to see them live, but also wearing tshirts with the band's name on them.

- Another full page of adverts are used, however this time the bands are more well known. Such as British band 'Architects' (absolutely amazing band) who are doing very well with their new album and another band called 'The Eyes Of A Traitor'. Again, the 4 adverts follow the same conventions, the colours adapt to the colour and style of the album artwork and there is a picture of the band to put faces to the music.

- The adverts are starting to get more 'commercial' now as a half page of a big American band is seen promoting their new album. However, this one breaks the rules of the layout as the whole advert is the band artwork and a picture of the band is not seen at all.

- Rock Sound use the rest of the page for more self-endorsement as they promote their digital advancements, this time with rock sound mobile, promising the latest news, reviews and gossip.

- The next article can be argued to be an adverisement as it is simply pictures of clothes and where to buy them from. This article is quite a new addition to the magazine called 'Off the peg' which adds fashion to the magazine. The clothes included are mainly tshirts with a massive picture on it and shoes such as 'vans', 'converse' and 'Dr Martins'. There is only a small section that is dedicated showing girl's clothes which are dresses and bikinis. This suggests that Rock Sound expect most of their target audience to be dressed in certain brands and are mostly male.

- The next advertisements are situated just before the reviews section of the magazine which is an expensive place to put your advertisements due to many people turning to the reviews section just to see what albums they are being recommended and these advertisements can catch their eye. The advertisements are for two new albums that have only just been released or are coming out and (very handy) have just been reviewed in the same issue of the magazine.

- The next two adverts are situated in a very uncommon place as they sit at the side of an article in the reviews section. One of 1/4 page adverts are simply, plain and promoting tour dates for yet another underground band, whilst another is promoting an album from band of the moment 'Rolo Tomassi'. However, the advert promoting the album is very different, the background is a picture of half of the girl vocalist's face with all attention on her eye and the only words in the space are on her cheek and reviews from magazines such as kerrang, Q and Rock Sound. Using the girl in the picture immediately grabs the attention of the supposed male target audience and it seems quite 'sexy' as her eye is very big and is staring at the reader.

- Towards the gig section of the magazine, a lot more adverts are used that are also promoting tours from bands themselves. Many are just 1/4 page and from bigger bands as the underground bands can't afford to do so.

- The last 3 pages of the magazine are dedicated to advertising clothing companies such as 'Attitude clothing', 'darkside clothing' and 'loud clothing'. They are the same adverts that can be seen in Kerrang, however are less cluttered as they are all half page spreads and therefore bigger giving each advert space and the reader a chance to be able to see the adverts.

- The back page of the magazine advertises the latest addition to 'Guitar Hero' game. It suggests to the reader that the target audience are musicians or dream to be like one and therefore will like playing the game due to being able to play a guitar, bass or drums to their favourite songs.


Unlike Kerrang, the magazine tend to include a lot less adverts, probably to not bring on the image of a 'sell-out' magazine. Again you can argue most of the magazine is an advertisement. As the magazine has sections such as reviews, exposure and gigs that allows new bands to be advertised to music fans for no price. Of course, this is the aim of magazines, (especially this certain magazine) to inform the reader of new subjects from their particular hobby.

The magazine has a lot less advertisements and appears thicker than the weekly kerrang magazine that is always packed full of badly placed advertisements. Being at only £3.80 per month (Kerrang readers would be paying more for just 2 weeks worth of the magazine), the magazine is very good value for money as it doesn't try to force advertisements down your throat and the advertisements themselves sometimes act as articles in the magazine due to how many music promoting ones there were.

All the advertisements in the magazine were music or image related, which add to the fact that

Rock Sound Magazine - Facts and Figures

- Rock Sound magazine is known for dealing with more 'underground' music in the rock genre and less commercial (like Kerrang magazine).

- It is a British magazine and the UK edition of the magazine was first launched in March 1999 by French publishers Editions Freeway.

- It established itself in a very competative market.

- Was bought out by director, Patrick Napier, in December 2004.

- It's circulation figures are 20,011. (12,734 being in UK and republic of Ireland). 01-Jul-2008 to 31-Dec-2008.

- It is a popular magazine in other countries aswell, mainly in Europe.

- Single copy subcription sales are 895. (704 being in UK and republic of Ireland). 01-Jul-2008 to 31-Dec-2008.

- It's cover price is £3.80.

- It is a monthly magazine, therefore being less topical and having a lot more worthy content. It isn't full of rubbish trying to make up pages in the magazine on slow news days.

- The magazine doesn't have a top publishing company, it has its own called 'Rock Sound LTD'.

- They describe themselves as the UK's leading alternative magazine.

- Every issue comes with a CD with songs from new or upcoming albums from different bands.

- Many fans of the magazine comment on how they enjoy the magazine because it introduces them to many new bands.

- "Rock Sound is 100 per cent independent and we pride ourselves on championing the underdog and totally encourage the independent scene in the UK and abroad." From the magazine website. http://www.rock-sound-magazine.co.uk/home/

- The magazine includes exclusive features, interviews, gig guides, reviews and competitions.

- As a gift for subscribing to the magazine, readers receive an album for free (the album changes every month).

- The audience are seen as;

- 15 - 24 YEAR OLDS

- 57% up to 17 years
- 31% 18 - 25 years
- 6% 26 - 35 years
- 4% 35 - 44 years
- 3% 45 and over

- 58% FEMALE - 42% MALE
- INTERESTED IN MUSIC, CLOTHES, X BOX - PS
- ATTEND GIGS REGULARLY
- 54% ARE MUSICIANS

Kerrang! advertisements

This is the magazine issue (Kerrang! issue 1248, February 14th 2009) I will be using to annotate and understand more on how the magazine works, along with it's advertising which is linked to the publishing company and the target audience.











Advertisements in the magazine.
- As soon as you open the magazine, you are greeted by a massive double paged advert with an eyecatching border. The double page advert is an advert for the popular metal festival, Download festival, in which the first bands have just been announced and are included in the advert in big, bold writing to gain the audience's attention to who is playing. The advert is incredibly colourful, with the border being very eccentric including random pictures which are most likely to be seen as tattoos and blue, yellow and white being the main colours.

- The next advert is after the double page advert and just before the regular contents page, it is a page spread advertising getting suscribed to Kerrang! magazine using past front covers of the popular magazine and big, bold letters that stand out for the price which gathers audience attention. The magazine is using it's own pages to advertise discounts on their own magazines they are offering.

- The next advert is very small and on the contents page in the corner (most likely to just be there to fill up an empty gap in the contents page) and it is also advertising Kerrang! magazine subscriptions. Again it uses past front covers of the magazine to show what you can get through the magazine and bigger, bolder writing for the price to grab attention.

- The next advert is a page later in the magazine on the letters section in the bottom corner advertising Samaritans Rock For Life! necklace with proceeds going to the Samaritans Charity. The advert may be small, however it is still eyecatching to the reader as it has a picture of a famous band member (in this issue it is guitarist, Iain, from Kids In Glass Houses) wearing the necklace aswell, which prompts many fans to want to also buy this necklace and be like their idol.

- A full page spread is used a page later to advertise the horror film re-make 'Friday The 13th' which was coming in the cinemas at the time of publishing. It suggests that the target audience of the magazine may also be interested in films as well as music, however the film is dark, gory and scary, which may also reflect on the interests of the target audience. It may be seen as a film that wouldn't appeal to females and therefore be for the male audience of the magazine.

- Another page spread advert can be seen a few pages later advertising the new The All-American Rejects album within an advertisement for HMV aswell. The advert is very plain, with a white background, the HMV logo at the bottom right hand corner of the page and the front cover art work of the band's album in the centre of the page, throwing the reader's eyes to the album and how they should buy it either 'online' , 'download' or in 'shop' from HMV.

- A page later, the magazine includes another small section to advertise more from the Kerrang! empire, telling the reader what is happening 'THIS WEEK' on 'kerrang.com', 'kerrang! radio' and 'kerrang! tv', making sure their readers also check out their digital mediums.

- The next advertisement is a half page advert for the new 'The King Blues' single with a picture of the band standing infront of a billboard filled with political messages to Gordon Brown from the band, hinting to the audience what the album/single is about. Included in the advertisement is also some tour dates to make sure the readers know when they will be playing the songs from their album live incase they already like them.

- The next advertisement I am talking about can be argued to be an advertisement and not to be one. It is essentially an article, however it is part of a regular section called 'Introducing: new music coming your way...' in which the magazine introduces new artists to the reader. The artist in this section is called 'Hey Monday' and the whole page is a picture of them overlapped with an article on what type of music they play, a bit about the band themselves and what albums or singles they have planned for release. It can just be seen as an article, but it also tempts readers to check out the band if they are interested and may then become a fan generating more revenue for the band.

- A whole page is take up by two half-page vertical adverts, one advertising the film 'Moscow zero' on Play.com, with most of the advert taken up by the DVD with a small banner at the bottom telling you to 'pre-order now at play.com'. The other side of the page is taken up by another HMV advert similar to the one seen earlier in the magazine, only this time smaller and advertising another new album for the band 'Thursday'. The layout follows the same of the earlier HMV advert. With the adverts on the same page, there is a huge contrast as the Play.com advert is very cluttered, colourful and eyecatching, yet the HMV advert is plain, and the only diversity to it is the picture of the album cover. However, this allows the reader to take in both adverts individually rather than associating them with each other.

- Yet another 'Introducing: new music coming your way...' page is used within the magazine to advertise another new band. The layout of the advert/article follows the same of the one a few pages earlier in the magazine.

- Once the magazine begins to include more articles, the adverts die down a tad and are more far apart than towards the beginning of the magazine. This is most likely due to Kerrang wanting to keep all the reader's attention on their own content and not that of others. The next advertisement is for a page spread for the army, in the 3 pictures shown of 3 different people doing army jobs, it strikes me that they are all men and women aren't in the advert at all. This suggests the army is a masculine thing to join and take part in and that the advertisement will appeal to the readers of the magazine because the target audience are largely males.

- The next advert a few pages later is a page spread for the Royal Air Force which is also stereotypically male, again suggesting to myself that the target audience is seen as widely of the male gender.

- Just before the middle of the magazine, there is a double spread page of different advertisements for different tours coming up, with some bigger bands taking more space than smaller bands due to their labels being able to afford more. The band 'Madina Lake' take a horizontal half page advertisement to show tour dates around the UK whilst also subtly mentioning their new album, whilst the smaller bands 'You Me At Six' and 'Cobra Starship' take 1/4 page advertisements underneath to advertise their own tour dates. The next page is a full page spread for worldwide big British band 'Bring Me The Horizon' to show when they are back in their home country. All adverts are reletively the same, with pictures of the band (or album artwork pictures) accompanied by tour dates. However, they all share their own individuality.

- Just after the middle of the magazine, there is a full page spread advertising the album by 'My Son The Bum', with the album artwork directly in the middle to make sure the reader knows what it looks like when looking out for it in the shops.

- A lot more advertisements are directly after this advert like the ones just before the middle of the magazine. Except this time they are a lot smaller as they are either smaller bands or smaller, less anticipated tours. It gets down to the size of a 1/8 page advertisement, however again they all share individuality and are similar in the sense of just showing pictures and tour dates. The reason for the hefty amount of advertisements around the middle of the magazine is due to the posters being situated in the middle of the magazine

- The next advertisement is for another new album, however it is situated in the reviews section where many people may turn to look out for new albums to buy, therefore it is a good spot to put the half page advertisement.

- The next few advertisements make up one page, however 3 out of 4 of them are quite small and 1 of them is a vertical half page. Whilst one of them advertises a new alternative club in London, two of the others are advertisements for gigs and festivals. The remaining is a simple and plain advert for unsigned bands to contact. These adverts are in an essential place due to the upcoming gigs section being just after and therefore they may catch the readers who enjoy going to gigs and going out's eye.

- Kerrang carries on with its self-endorsement as they take up a whole page towards the end of the magazine selling ringtones, pictures of band members and game downloads for your mobile phone.

- The self-endorsement carries on the next page with two half page spreads, one advertising the 'Kerrang podcast' summoning readers to go on their website and watch bands talk to kerrang on video and the next advertisement is prompting readers to listen to a certain show on kerrang radio.

- The next double page consists of a regular section in Kerrang magazine called 'Small Ads'. This whole section has many different advertisements, mainly for alternative clothes shops (online and around England) and seems to remain the same every week. The page seems cluttered, however allows readers to adapt their image more to the image that kerrang expects from their target audience.

- The next page is the second from last page in the magazine, it would appear Kerrang continue to advertise as they give you a sneak preview into what is in next week's magazine and telling you when it is on sale, by telling the reader what they will expect in the next magazine, they may be inclined to buying it, perhaps if they didn't have any money and wouldn't buy it in the first place, they might have a change of heart due to what they know is in the magazine's future content.

- The advertising in the magazine is finally finished with the back page. A whole page is dedicated to advertising a festival giving two of the big band's names who will be playing it and more information such as what date the festival is and where to get tickets from. Having an advertisement on this page in the magazine is very expensive due to it being either the first or last thing the reader will see in the magazine as it is on the back cover.

It seems that advertisements play a huge part in Kerrang! magazine. When I used to buy Kerrang a few years ago, the magazine was thinner and this was due to less rubbish adverts clogging all the pages. Now, when I picked up the magazine, I thought that the price had increased from the original £1.99 I used to buy it for to the £2.20 it is now because there were more articles. However, it seems that there is still the same amount of articles, just a lot more pages dedicated to just adverts filling up the whole magazine and making the reader turn pages at a time just to read the next article. The answer to this dramatic increase in the number of adverts is of course money. Kerrang has become a lot more mainstream now and is the number 1 UK music magazine due to its content suiting to the scene and due to this popularity, more companies, bands etc are wanting to advertise in the magazine as well.

Of course, you could argue that the whole magazine is an advert itself. With it's 'Introducing' section where new bands are brought into the magazine, it's reviews section where the magazine practically tells you what music to consider and it's gigs section where upcoming shows are advertised to the readers to tempt them into going. All these prompt the reader either to begin to like a band, buy an album, or buy tickets to go see a band live.

Of course, most of the adverts are very music and image related due to the advertisers wanting to appeal to music fans, therefore it would be obvious to publish adverts in a music magazine (especially the number 1 music magazine in the UK). If someone were to go out and buy a music magazine every week, they are most likely a huge music fan and dedicated to buying anything music related to their taste, therefore by putting advertisements for a band's new album or tour dates, it benefits both the advertiser and the audience. The audience gain the knowledge of either being able to see a band that they may like or buying an album that they may be interested in, and the advertiser can 'cash in' from this as they are promoting and gaining audience attention. However, I did find some adverts that were more male related (stereotypically perhaps) suggesting that Kerrang! has a wide male audience and this is their target audience. The adverts I found to be male orientated were the one for the Army and the one for the Royal Air Force, both these jobs are largely masculine and the adverts even suggest so by having men in the pictures and not women.

Kerrang facts and figures.

- Total circulation sales are 52,272 (50,128 in UK and republic of Ireland) - 01-Jul-2008 to 31-Dec-2008.

- The publishing company is Bauer Consumer Media (Emap sold 2/3 of the company to Bauer)

- Cover price is £2.20, which is cheap for the target audience (students, young people with low incomes etc..)

-Single copy subscription sales are 5,523 (5,062 in UK and republic of Ireland) - 01-Jul-2008 to 31-Dec-2008.

- Weekly music magazine of the rock genre.

- First Published June 6th 1981 with Geoff Barton as editor.

- Is famous (and criticised) for repeating the process of discarding bands when new musical trends become popular.

- Kerrang! Australia was launched by Emap in the late 1990's, however it was a monthly music magazine.

- Kerrang! is also published in Spanish.

- The Kerrang! empire has it's own awards ceremony, TV music station, Radio station and website.

- The magazine gives out occassional free gifts to satisfy the viewer such as calenders and CD's, however posters are included in every issue.

- It overtook NME as the number 1 rock/music magazine in the UK.

- Emap advertised the magazine more through its digital mediums such as Kerrang TV and Kerrang radio. This allows the magazine to generate more circulation figures and therefore more revenue. (Masthead Branding)

- The target audience is 16-25 year olds and specific towards rock music fans. However in recent years, the age of the audience has dropped and it is more 14-17 year olds who tend to buy and read it due to its featured bands being more poppy. (Elliot Minor, We Are The Ocean, 30 Seconds To Mars etc)

USING THIS FOR NEW MEDIA STUDIES SUBJECT - MAGAZINES

This will now be used for my new media studies subject which is the magazine industry and possibly my other subject which is horror films...but I doubt that.

I need somewhere to backup some of my notes on magazines.

Zing.