Detailed Analysis of Q music magazine

By: Sabah Babamiya

This is Q magazine. I know that this is Q magazine as the masthead displays a huge Q. The masthead is bold and very eye catching. This is so that the magazine stands out between the many other magazine in the shop. The masthead is placed where it is generically placed on a magazine front cover. The letter Q shows us that the magazine has shortened its name. The magazine producers have done this because they must be very well known/ popular in the magazine industry that they are sure that their target audience will still buy the magazine. The magazine has a strapline which is attached to the masthead, which states: ‘ The world’s greatest music magazine’. This gives extra information about the magazine to the audience. It tells the audience that the magazine must've in retail for a very long time for it to state such a bold statement.

The colour scheme for this magazine is black, white , grey and red. The colour scheme connotes to us that the genre of this magazine is rock. This is because the magazine front cover denotes a very dark colour scheme, stereotypically people that like listening to rock music wear dark colours. Also, we know that this is a rock magazine as the model on the front cover, Thom Yorke from the band Radiohead, is wearing dark clothes. The camera shot of the model is a medium shot. This type of shot shows us what kind of clothes the artist wears and this connotes to us that he is from the background of rock. The mise en scene is the artist wearing dark clothes and holding a microphone, which shows us that he is a singer. The front cover can connote what kind of lifestyle the target audience of this magazine live. The target audience will be age 25+, as the artist on the front cover looks very aged as he has wrinkles, beard and long hair. Also, the people that will mostly read this magazine are males. This is because there is a male presented on the front cover. The social class for this audience will be c1 lower middle working class. This is because the target audience would have not cared about education and stopped education after college. They will be working as a retail assistant, plumber, gig worker,etc. The target audience of this magazine doesn’t care about anyone's feelings and don’t like listening to people that want the best for them. They like to be rebellious and out going around people they know personally. They listen to rock music as it is a form of entertainment for them, as they can escape from the real world. This represents the audience in a negative way. This is because they stereotypically the people that listen to rock music are horrible and not nice. This represents the genre of rock as bad and turns the audience into rebels. This specific edition of Q magazine will have a niche audience as not many like the genre of rock.

The main cover line shows a quote from Thom Yorke saying how much he cherishes the band. It shows the audience a different view of a rock artist. It shows that rock artists also have emotion and they do appreciate the people around them. This makes more of the audience want to read that magazine. This subverts the stereotypical representation of people who love rock, as it shows the audience a side of rock that they have never seen before. This magazine wants to represent rock in a positive way as they have a huge advantage on getting a message through to the audience. The quote makes the readers feel like they are in a conversation with the artist, as the producers have used a quote in which the artist has used first person. It shows the audience that the artist is talking about himself and not another person re phrasing the artists words. This is mode of address. This magazine breaks conventions as they do not include as many cover line as a magazine would generically. However, on the top right hand corner they have added a cover line which tells the audience about a specific person and which page they can find him on in the magazine.

The layout out of this front cover is very original and unique. This is because it has a lot of space on the front cover and very little cover lines. This means that the audience doesn’t get to know much about the magazine articles until they actually purchase the magazine. This can lead to some people not buying the magazine, as some people want an insight into the magazine. The bold font catches the audience attention. They have used the rule of thirds. This is because they have used the hotspots to target the main cover line which is unusually placed in the middle of the artist portrait. It shows us that the magazine producers want the audiences attention to firstly go onto the main cover line and not the artist. It tells us that the main cover line is more important that the artist. This makes the main image look like it is anchored with text. They have not included a barcode on the front page.

This is the contents page of Q magazine. They have included a dateline above the masthead, which includes the magazines name and contents page title. The producers have uniquely put the magazine name ‘Q’ next to ‘contents’. This makes the magazine very unique as it is an original idea. The masthead and dateline go with the colour scheme and the font of the front cover. The contents page uses a variety colours for its colour scheme and many different fonts. This is unique as usually the producers follow the same colour scheme and font type that they used on the front cover.

The main image of the contents page is placed on the top right hand corner of the magazine. I know that this is the main image as this image is the largest image on the contents page and it comes first if the audience reads the contents page in chronological order. The image is of two rock artist, the shot type is a long shot and the image is anchored with a caption and a page number. The image being anchored with a page number and a caption helps the audience navigate themselves around the magazine. This is because if they want to know about the specific picture then they can look at the page number, as well as getting some detail upon the artists. The caption will give an insight of what the image is based on and what the article on that page is going to be about. The mise en scene of the rock artists convey a musical instrumental background and it seems like they have been placed in a studio. This shows us that their life revolves around music. The rock artists are males and they have an angry expression on their face. This represents the males as having a harsh and angry personality. Stereotypically, males are meant to be harsher and stricter than females. Also, the facial expressions that the artists have made go with their musical genre, as stereotypically they will never be seen with a smile or doing any good for the world. Also, all the other images placed on the contents page are mainly males . This tells us that the majority of the target audience will be males.

Many of the images on the contents page are anchored with a caption and the page number. The captions all give out some sort of information about the image. Also, the producers have used bold subtitles so that the audience can easily notice what they are looking for. The sub titles help the audience navigate themselves around the page. The subtitles are in a bold black font. Some of the subtitles are anchored with a caption and have a black border around them. The magazine producers have done this to some of the sub titles as they might have been more important than the others. The magazine producers have also smartly used straight lines to section of each image and its caption so that the audience doesn't get confused in which caption goes with which image. Magazine producers have used the lines to make the text and images seem like they are in columns.

The article titles that they have used on the contents page are: Radiohead, m83, air, the kills, Neil young. They have used names of people/ bands as their article titles as they are what the whole ,magazine is purely going to be based upon. This will excite the target audience as they will be familiar to some of the artists mentioned as they are all from the background of rock. The house style of the contents page is preferably the way in which the company behind this magazine likes to set out all their contents pages. It is very unique and bold. The name ‘Q’ suggest to us that this is the companies brand identity as this is how they want their audience to address them and how they want their audience to remember them. The language used in the caption is very rock, such as: ‘punk-electro-blues’. This is the language that punks/rock artists use to communicate with their people and only they will understand what it means. It shows mode of address however, it has been embedded so discreetly that anyone that didn’t like rock music wouldn't understand that form of address. Also, they have added an editorial/ editors letter which is on the back of the contents page and it talks about the editor and some of his opinions.

These are the double page spreads in which it shows articles upon the artist that was shown on the front cover of the magazine. I will not be analysing all the double page spreads. I will be only analysing page 32-33. This double page spread is the beginning of the article.

This is the double page spread based on the artist that was on the front cover , Thom Yorke. The main image is on page 32 and it goes onto page 33, the image is of the rock artist Thom Yorke. It shows the male in his natural form, as being a musician and performing on stage. The image of the male is captioned by who the singer is and where it was taken and when was it taken. This tells the audience extra information if they wanted to know when and where the image was taken. Also, on the image there is a grab quote which is off Thom Yorker saying how much he cherishes his band but he doesn't expect anyone else to. This can show how much passion he has put into music and how much he loves his band. Stereotypically you do not see rock artist appreciating anyone. This quote represents the male on the magazine as being nice and spreading positivity and love in the world. This could show people that not all people that listen to rock music are outgoing and evil. The artist is being looked up to and idolised for a very good reason. In addition, on the double page spread there is a secondary image which is captioned. It talks about the band posting this leaflet to fans. It promotes a song that the artists must've written.

The layout for the double page spread is basic. However, it is not basic in a bad way as it is clear for the audience to help navigate themselves across the two pages. They will read the article from top to bottom. This is because the magazine produces have used a drop cap to start the article. This catches the audience attention immediately as they will know where the articles starts. Also, they have used another drop cap for the paragraph beneath the first one. This is very unusual for the producers to do as generically in both magazine/ newspapers they use only one drop cap in an article. The producers have used bold text for the first few words of the first paragraph to make sure that the audience knows where exactly the article starts. The font is small throughout the rest of the article. This is so that the article is in as much detail as possible and the audience will feel like they are knowing a lot about this artist. The audience is kept engaged and entertained throughout the article. Between each sentence, the producers have kept very little space . This shows the audience on how much detail they have gone in to talking about the artist and his lifestyle. Overall, the artist shows that rock music isn't actually bad, as they connect with their fans with this type of music, and they all relate and let go of whatever is going on at home.

The producers have not written necessarily in columns on this double page spread however, when the article continues onto the other pages they have written in columns. This shows how structured they keep the article so that it is easier for the readers to follow the sentences. On this page they have written in paragraph formats which look very neat and structured, making the magazine look sophisticated and shows how much hard work has been put together to produce the magazine. The structure of the text can show that the target audience of this magazine like to be neat and not messy as they do not like the text to be everywhere and the font to be all different sizes and types. They have also used page numbers on the bottom of the page to help the audience navigate themselves to the correct page.

The colours that are used are: brown, black, white and blue. They have used this colours in a deeper format. They have done this because they want the target audience to feel like they are at the gig and are watching the rock artist in person . In the article, it sounds like the artist is making a dairy entry as he is stating the date it is and describing what is happening on that day. This makes the audience feel involved in his life, as he talks about fans and partying. It denotes that the artist lives just like any of us humans and he isn't any different. The target audience love reading about his life as it connotes to them that they make a huge difference in his life as well as they get to see the passion he has for music.

The elements that connect these three different parts of this magazine are: colour scheme, masthead, artist, images, text, font. The colour scheme connects all three parts as they all have black, white and red in cooperated into each and every page. They contents page and double page spread have additional colours however they all include black, white and red. These are the colours the Q magazine are very well known for. They use them in every addition of their magazine in the masthead. Also, the masthead is used on every page of the magazine. The masthead is ‘Q’. This reminds the readers as to which magazine they are reading. Also, the artist on the front page is mentioned on the contents page and double page spread either in text for or image form. This links the magazine together as we know that the magazine is going to be based of this artist in particular. All three parts have images on them. It makes it more exciting for the readers as they wont be constantly reading but they will have something to look at. Also, they all have text on them, as the producers want to constantly give more and more information out to the readers. They all in cooperate the same font, and similar sizes to the font. They put some text in a bold font on all four pages, so that it stands out to show the reader that it is important information.