Magazine Publishers (RESEARCH)

Magazine	Publisher	Details
Kerrang	Bauer	Revenue: turnover: €1.79 billion. (2006) They are German and based in Hamburg. Their brands include Women’s weekly, TV listings and they own 4music, smash hits TV and kiss TV. They have offices based in 16 countries worldwide.
Smash Hits!	EMAP	Revenue: £1.154 billion (2006). They are British and their headquarters are in London. It has 20 magazines including: nursing times, retail week and health service international. Smash hits had its final issue in 2006.
NME	IPC	IPC are based in the UK with a large portfolio selling over 350 million copies a year. They publish women’s weekly magazines such as ‘Look’ and music magazines (NME) and also ‘Loaded’.
Vibe	InterMedia Partners	Total assets: $1 Billion. InterMedia Partners was founded in 2005 where they took over Vibe magazine. The firms most noticeable investments include: Universal sports, WAPA-TV and InterMedia Outdoors.
XXL	Harris Publications	They are located in New York and publish over 75 titles including: Juicy, XXL, Celebrity hairstyles and men’s workout etc. They also published some comics when the company first took off.
Mixmag	Disco Mix club – the DJ mail out service.	Mixmag began in 1983. DMC is a DJ remix service and began as a radio show in 1981. Not long after this they published the first Mixmag issue.

Questionnaire for magazine (RESEARCH)

Questionnaire:

1. List three genres you would like to read about in a music magazine:
   1.
   2.
   3.

2. What ratio of Images : Text would you perfer?
   50:50
   40:60
   20:80
   30:70

3. What is your age group?
   13-15
   16-18
   19-21
   22-40
   40+

4. Would you prefer to read about upcoming new artists or recent mainstream artists?
   NEW and upcoming
   Mainstream

5. What catches your eyes more in a magazine?
   The bright colours
   Professional images
   Clipart
   The amount of text
   Advertisements
   Freebies

6. What magazines (if any) do you usually read?
   Heat
   Vogue
   NME
   Nuts
   442
   Loaded
   Take a break
   Other_____________
   None

7. What is the most you’d be willing to pay for a Music Magazine?
   50p - £1.50
   £2.00 - £3.00
   £4.00 - £5.00
   Other____________

8. Would you like to read about talent from around the world or just UK based artists?
   UK
   Worldwide

9. How often do you read a magazine?
   Always
   Often
   Hardly
   Never

10. Do you receive any money?
    I work
    Weekly income from EMA
    Parents

Other (Please Specify)_______


-----------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------


I asked 15-19 year olds the above questions. From this questionnaire I found that the genres of magazines that most students in the sixth form would like to read are: RnB, Indie , Dubstep and Rap music. Also, the ratio of images to text they would prefer is 60:40. I asked a few of the students why and they said that it is not very interesting to open a page in a magazine just full of words and they like to read magazines to read and look at and not for study. Most of the people I asked would prefer to read about upcoming new artists rather than recent mainstream artists which is why I wrote my interview in my double page spread about a 'new artist' not worldwide, but in the UK mainly. This helps me to understand what people want so I can create my magazine around what people want to appeal to them.


I also found people find bright colours and professional images the most eye-catching in a magazine. So for my front page, I have included bright colours and professional images. I Asked a balance of boys and girls and the results of the magazines most read were: Heat and NME. I also asked about price, the results found that people would be willing to spend an average of £1.00 - £3.00 on a magazine as they will only read it once and will not keep it forever so anymore money seems unnessasary. The average income of these students was from EMA so they wouldnt have much money to spend on a magazine (unlike the students with jobs). This helps me to understand students' financial situation and gain an insight into what they would pay for a magazine.

Magazine Cover Analysis. (RESEARCH)

To start, I looked at a dance magazine to get a broad view of what is in the front cover of a dance magazine as dubstep could come under the 'dance' umbrella. Mix mag is also a magazine produced by the institution I would like to distribute my own magazine, so I felt it was appropriate to look at a magazine produced by the company.



I think that the images of the artists is a positive representation of them. They look happy in what they are doing and look casual, one of the members has a drink, but the audience do not know if it is alcoholic or not which shows that they like to have fun.

I then looked at a dubstep magazine, which is the genre I would like my magazine to be. I looked at what the cover had on it. I noticed that the title of the magazine is in the middle of the page, showing it is big and the eye cannot escape it. it has the regular conventions of a magazine, for example, featured artists, and a group it will be focusing on in the first few pages. I wanted to look at a dubstep magazine as I wanted to ensure that what I put on my magazine would appeal to my audience.

Music Genres (RESEARCH)

Alternative

Dance

This caters for the Pop genre

Dubstep

Electronic

Grime

Hip-Hop/Rap

Jazz

Pop

R&B

Rock

Singer/songwriter

This caters for the Jazz genre

This caters for the Rock genre



This caters for the R&B genre

There are many genres in the music industry, I need to make sure that mine caters for the specific genre as all of the magazines clearly show a specific genre.
























The genre I will most likely be creating my magazine around is Dubstep. Dubstep is a genre of electronic dance music that originated in South East London. Dubstep can fall under the umbrella term of dance music. The earliest dubstep releases date back to 1998 and were darker, more experimental, instrumental dub remixes of 2-step garage tracks attempting to incorporate the funky elements of breakbeat, or the dark elements of drum and bass into 2-step, which featured B-side of single releases.