Kerrang Magazine Front Cover Analysis

Kerrang Magazine Front Cover Analysis

This Magazine is called Kerrang! The target audience at teenagers to young adults aged 15-25. It is aimed at a niche audience that listen to the music and bands that are shown in the magazine, which are mainly rock/metal. This is also shown by the images and fonts used that seem more violent and aggressive; this is the kind of image that is associated with that genre of music.

The pugs include pictures of ‘Paramore’ and ‘Deftones’ in the bottom corners. In the top corners there is a picture of something to do with ‘My Chemical Romance’s New Album’ and a grab quote reading ‘ WIN a £700 guitar’ are located in the corners of the front cover. This draws the attention of the reader as they have been placed in ‘The ‘Z’ Shape’ which is ideal as it is the way the reader will first look at the magazine. The barcode is placed at the bottom of the front cover but just above the strapline. The barcode is angled vertically and includes the date, issue number and the price, which is helpful to those who want to collect each issue. There is also a website included with the barcode, which is good because it is good for today’s generation of digital natives and is used for interactivity.

The masthead is in a font that is made to look cracked, this links to the idea of onomatopoeia that ‘Kerrang’ sounds like the crashing sound of a symbol, connoting the style of music the magazine is based on. It also creates a house style that is well known, so it can be covered by the main picture but the customer would still understand that this is Kerrang! With the white colour for the text it also stands out on the purple background.

The main image of ‘Black Sabbath’ is spread across the cover to show that this is the main article inside, if the band is unknown to the audience then the cover line is the anchorage text. The clothes that the bands are in portray a ‘normal’ feeling as they aren’t dressing in, out of the ordinary costumes, this is done to show that they are rockstars and they have white faces and they’re dressed all in black. The image is quite serious as none of the members of the band are smiling and there is a dark and depressing feel to the image. The member in the middle appears to be the lead singer as the rule of thirds has been used to define him from the other band members at a different position as he is stood slightly more forwards than the other two members. The image is definately a direct mode of address as the band members are looking directly at the camera which gives the impression that the band are looking directly at the reader. This is done so that you can engage with the band and really understand the image.

Kerrang magazine has a lot of pull quotes which creates more anticipation and also help to draw the reader in to the inside material. The magazine includes lots of buzz words, for example ‘world exclusive’ and ‘revealed’ shows to the reader that it is only found in this magazine therefore it is special. The use of bold white text stands out really well on the dark image and background. The use of different fonts is really effective as it shows something ‘different’ in this case a poster.

The genre of music is once again emphasised by the images of performance, bands that look like typical rockstars with the clothes they wear and their long hair. The images used have been used to show samples of the posters and images to be found inside.  Almost all the other images have been placed on the lower half of the cover so it doesn’t draw the attention away from the main image, they are also separated away from the main image by a white border to really make it stand out.