Jacqueline KwofieAS MEDIA EVALUATION

Music Magazine Evaluation

‘Urban Music’ magazine is an Alternative R&B (Alt R&B) magazine which focuses on upcoming and familiar alternative R&B artists. After researching various R&B magazines such as Clash, Vibe & Billboard, I decided to use and develop many of these conventional forms and adapt it into my own work. Seeing as R&B music seems to sport bold, confident and sometimes controversial artists, I noticed that many of these magazines would have a striking front cover, so to adapt this into my own work without working too much on the central image itself I decided to have an eccentric, playful surreal background and theme from my front cover, the surreal aspect of the magazine also fits in with my depiction of my artist as I wanted her to appear as a novelty Alt R&B artist.

One of the familiar conventions that I noticed in R&B magazines was that the artists were placed in the centre of the magazine usually in a close mid-shot, mid-shot, or close up. I added this specific convention into my front cover and placed my artist in the centre of the magazine in a mid-shot frame; the central image being in a mid-shot frame, automatically draws attention to the artist, as it is the biggest picture on the front cover as well as reflect the artist’s confident demeanour. I placed my artist on top of the title block ‘URBAN’ which I felt efficiently tied in as it reflected the post-modern, chic style of my artist as well as accentuates my central image which is my artist. The other additional magazine conventions that I added were buzz words which attracts the audience “Free PND poster inside”, anchorage text “Mulan” which gives recognition to the artist, sky lines “Jhene Aiko / Sza / Jahkoy & Childish Gambino” which also features and gives recognition to other artists who also fall in the same category of Alternative R&B music, puffs such as “Fka Twigs branches through” which adds context into the front cover and gives the reader an insight into what is to be expected in the magazine. I also added a barcode and date line which is essential to a music magazine as it’s able to distinct to the audience the ‘latest’ magazines. I added these different conventions into my front cover specifically as it instinctively gives recognition to the audience by its layout that my product is a music magazine.

Even though my artist is placed in front of my title block the title of my magazine does not fail to stand out, from also looking into various R&B music magazines I figured that it was possible to also have a bold striking image in front of a title without throwing off the title, this is due to also having an eye-catching title block. The capitalized outline of the word ‘Urban’ is a font which is bold without masses of colour, the choice of pink in the first letter and a light blue backdrop adds a splash of character into the simplistic font as well as follows through with the colour theme of my front cover. The use of ‘MUSIC’ vertically being written in the letter ‘N’ ties the whole title block together and allows my target audience to understand that my music magazine revolves specifically around the music aspect.

I aimed ‘Urban Music’ to be of a mainstream music magazine but also wanted to adapt a niche style into it, this being that it would stand out amongst usual ‘R&B’ magazines that features the normative R&B artists such as Chris Brown, Rihanna, and Beyoncé. ‘Urban Music’ specifically targets youngsters

Jacqueline KwofieAS MEDIA EVALUATION

whom are all about their music, they would fall into the UK tribe of Stylers & Trendies meaning picking up the latest mixes online to flaunt on social media or their blog, enjoy finding new mixes and new underrated artists as well as enjoy going to Festivals and are also excessive bloggers on Tumblr and into other modern social networking sites such as Instagram.

My primary audience for my music magazine will be females ranging from the ages of 16-23 and my secondary audience will be males also ranging from the same age. The title ‘Urban’ and the specific music genre of Alternative R&B stereotypically is something which would appeal to a social group of lower to middle class students in or coming out of education, whom are technology pro-active, social media fanatics and into mainstream music which are normally playing on TV channels such as MTV, Capital Extra, and Viva and usually being played on Radio Channels such as Kiss, Capital Xtra and Kisstory. This specific target audience may have a fairly good job which enables them to purchase minor luxuries such as music magazines. My magazine represents this specific social group from its eccentric front cover - as the different mix of colours illustrates a different blend of characteristics and personalities of which all teenagers seemingly have.

The puff “Win tickets to iTunes Festival” on my front cover also appeals to my audience as local festivals and music concerts sporting a variety of mainstream, and upcoming artists are something in which teenagers seem to enjoy going to. The colloquial language used in my double page spread article distinctively draws a line between lower and middle class teenagers with upper-class teenagers making it clear that lower and middle class teenagers are my social group target audience.

My contents page represents this specific type of audience by featuring artists whom of which all represent the same genre of Alternative R&B music, this is evident by the featured article artists as well as images used. I shot pictures of artists of different ethnicity backgrounds and ages. I also continued to follow through the conventional themes of different R&B magazines and used the specific camera angles of Mid-shot, close up and a long shot. The costumes included in the images on my Contents page are also costumes that depict an inner-city, retro chic kind of style – ripped skinny jeans, crop top, 90’s mom jeans, leather jacket and a baseball jersey tied with a plaid checked shirt. I also edited these images on a website called Pixlr by adding a nice rose-washed tint to my image which reflects the novelty style of my music magazine, and used Photoshop on my featured to centre my artist on a Pop-Art background which doubles up as a border which does not only make my featured artist stand out on the Contents page but also adds to the quirky, creative characteristic of my artist. The four other images on my contents page have also been edited to an extent as of two of the images are in a black and white, and light sepia colour which also contrasts with the two other images on my page which are in a vibrant high-key light colour.

These different factors have re-enforced the conventions of my social group as being loud, outgoing, and in the creative stages of life where they are open to explore almost everything and everything,

To attract my audience I featured artists and interactive features that would appeal to them which would result in my audience being drawn towards the magazine. On the front cover I added various Emoji’s, (emoticons used for texting on smart-phones on iphones) which many teenagers are fond of, I felt that the use of playful characters would make my front cover more interesting as well as easily make the magazine more relatable to the audience. On my contents page I have also added social interactive networks such as ‘Soundcloud’, ‘Facebook’ and ‘Twitter’ and ‘Instagram’ the use of adding these networks makes it easy for my target audience to connect more with the magazine and

Jacqueline KwofieAS MEDIA EVALUATION

find out more latest news and music. I also included ‘Available on the App Store’ which would be a new feature for people to purchase some of the issues of the magazine app on their smart phones, this again compliments the whole concept of this magazine being something fresh, new and different as well as allows my audience to be more interactive and connected with the magazine.