Questionnaire

1. What music magazines do you read?
2. What music genres do you listen to?
3. What music genre do you like to read about?
4. How mucyh would you pay for a magazine?
5. Out of these names which do you think is the best?

Rhythm, Notation Nation, Chord, Riff, Beat

Textual Analysis 3

Q Magazine August 2009

Overview
This magazine is specifically aimed at all music fans, not so much metal and heavy rock fans, but it still contains articles with rock groups as well as ppop singers, like the cover star of this issue. Q is very much a lifestyle magazine, as it is quite gloosy and more 'clean cut' than others on the market; i'd say it was aimed at people in their 20s and up. Q is a mass market product and is published by Bauer London Lifestyle Ltd.

Front Cover
We have no banners on the front page of this issue except the regular one at the top of the page stating that Q is 'the UK's biggest music magazine'. We have a very basic colour scheme on this issue of black, grey, red and white. The background is formed by a large picture of Michael Jackson, which is the cover story for this issue; there is also a cover line for this story: 'Michael Jackson unmasked - inside his mad, bad world...' We have, as usual, the Q logo in the top left hand corner and cover lines along the right hand side; informing us of articles on The Horrors, Blur and The Killers. The artists' names are in bigger and bolder font which helps make the stories stand out on the page.

Contents Page
The contents page takes up two pages and has shots of the featured articles within the magazine, along the bottom, to show some of the articles people might be interested in. Q also uses an original system of sorting theres contents' lists between "regulars" and "features"; the "regulars" section is for everything that is usually in Q, and the "features" is for everything specific to this issue. For most of the articles lsited, we have a title for each and a few sentences that form a cover line. The only excpetions to this is the "Q review" section which gives a cover line, but gives specific examples of what is being reviewed, it entices the reader in with examples of the most anticipated album reviews. The centre of the page is taken is taken up by another shot of Michael Jackson and a series of images taken from inside the issue, on these images they have put the page numbers. There is no editorial on the contents page.

Feature
The feature out of this issue i have chosen, is Q's review of Florence & The Machine's album Lungs. e have the name of the artist in large, bold text at the top of the page, with the album name in much smaller letters beneath it; then, just under that we have the record label, the formats this album is available on and it's release date. then, under that, we have Q's rating for this album and a brief comment summing it up; in this case that is 'This year's most unique voice.' At the start of the article, the first letter, like every article in Q, is thoroughly enlarged to draw attention to the beginning of that particular article. we have in the centre of the review, a brief quote from the article in a box, we also have reccomendations for similar albums for people whoa re looing to hear more of this sort of music. In this mini column on the left side of the page, we have the album covers and a very short description of each. After the main review itself, we have a tiny section called Downloads, which suggests the best tracks off of the album. The spread itself has one page of text for the review and then a large mid shot of Florence on the opposite page. This gives an equilibrium between both images and text.

Textual Analysis 2

Q Magazine December 2009 issue

Overview

This magazine is specifically aimed at all music fans, not so much metal and heavy rock fans, but it still contains articles with rock groups as well as ppop singers, like the cover star of this issue. Q is very much a lifestyle magazine, as it is quite gloosy and more 'clean cut' than others on the market; i'd say it was aimed at people in their 20s and up. Q is a mass market product and is published by Bauer London Lifestyle Ltd.

Front Cover

We have the banner showing us the highlight of this issue - The Q Awards results. We have a very royal and majestic colour scheme on the page of Red, Gold, Black and White; these are co-ordinated colours as they compliment each other. There are two banners on the page: one across the top informing us that this the awards issue, and one two thirds of the way down the page, informing us of the winners, but not the awards they won. This is cleverly used to lure the reader in so they can find out who won which award. There is also a cover line incorporated into the second banner, telling us about an interview with Arctic Monkeys. We also have cover lines at the bottom of the cover, informing us of articles about Oasis and Robbie Williams. Q being quite a glossy and upmarket magazine, feature some of the most popular artists in music today, hence why it can charge £3.90; just on the front cover the list of artists featured in this issue alone include Lily Allen, Muse and Lady GaGa. For the background, we have a long shot of the Arctic Monkeys in black and white, to keep with the colour scheme, all except the Q award which is in gold, yet it keeps with the colour scheme also.

Contents Page

The contents page takes up two pages and has shots of the featured articles within the magazine, along the bottom, to show some of the articles people might be interested in. Q also uses an original system of sorting theres contents' lists between "regulars" and "features"; the "regulars" section is for everything that is usually in Q, and the "features" is for everything specific to this issue. For most of the articles lsited, we have a title for each and a few sentences that form a cover line. The only excpetions to this is the "Q review" section which gives a cover line, but gives specific examples of what is being reviewed, it entices the reader in with examples of the most anticipated album reviews. The centre of the page is taken is taken up by another shot of Arctic Monkeys and a series of images taken from inside the issue. There is no editorial on the contents page

Feature

Part of the main article of this issue, which is the Q awards results, is an interview with the winners of the Best Live Act award - Arctic Monkeys. As this is such a 'big' award to win they receive an eight page spread. Compared to the other articles on the winners of big awards ( Lily Allen - Best Track, Sonic Youth - Q Innovation In Sound and Kasabian - Best Album), they all have a spread varying between 2 and 5 pages. This shows how important both the award and the band who won it are, to our music industry. On most of these pages we have a 60/40 split between images and text; the images in this article mainly refer to the award that they won, as most of the images are of them warming up on stage before a gig or relaxing back stage. Throught the pages we have quotes from the article that are enlarged to grab the readers attention, lines such as 'one of ourmates was goin to get our faces tattooed on his arse' draw the reader in as they are quite obscure and make the reader want to read more of the arrticle.

Textual Analysis 1

Q Magazine April 2009 issue

Overview

This magazine is specifically aimed at all music fans, not so much metal and heavy rock fans, but it still contains articles with rock groups as well as ppop singers, like the cover star of this issue. Q is very much a lifestyle magazine, as it is quite gloosy and more 'clean cut' than others on the market; i'd say it was aimed at people in theur 20s and up. Q is a mass market product and is published by Bauer London Lifestyle Ltd.

Front Cover

We have the banner showing the most important article within this issue, which here is an interview with Lily Allen. This headline states "sexy beast Lily Allen & her wicked ways...", using a colour scheme of black, white, blue and red. This is used to lure the reader in, so they can read about Miss Allen and her "wicked ways". We also have a clever use of graphics on this page as the image behind the headline is a metaphor for the headline; which states "sexy beast", which compliments the picture she is accompanied by two black jaguars. The "sexy" part is shown by the fact that Lily is topless. If we look at the actual co-ordination of the image itself, Lily Allen is positioned directly in the middle, so she stand out to pasers by. We also have use of cover lines in the top right hand corner and along the bottom of the page; using quotes and then explaining, very briefly, what the article is about. We also have an exclusive article with The Stone Roses.

Contents Page
The contents page takes up two pages and has shots of the featured articles within the magazine, along the bottom, to show some of the articles people might be interested in. Q also uses an original system of sorting theres contents' lists between "regulars" and "features"; the "regulars" section is for everything that is usually in Q, and the "features" is for everything specific to this issue. For most of the articles lsited, we have a title for each and a few sentences that form a cover line. The only excpetions to this is the "Q review" section which gives a cover line, but gives specific examples of what is being reviewed, it entices the reader in with examples of the most anticipated album reviews. The other exception to the above rule is the cover story of Lily Allen, which has a much larger cover line, forming a fairly large paragraph. The centre of the page is taken is taken up by another shot of Lily Allen's exclusive photoshoot for Q and an exclusive shot of Guy Garvey for Q. There is no editorial on the contents page.

Feature
The main article of this isue of Q is that of an interview with Lily Allen and rather than it being a double page it takes up 9 whole page within this issue; this is simply because Lily Allen is so popular in modern day culture, that the editors of Q know the issue will sell because of her being on the cover. On most of these pages, there is a 50/50 split between word and images. The images in this article do not just relate to Lily's music, it also refers to her entirelife, her social life, her sense of fashion and her music. in the shoot she changes outfit in each shot; each is very fashionable and quite sexy, which links to the theme of the article as "Lily Allen - Sexy Beast." Through the article we have quotes from the text on the page, enlarged and placed in the image. We have a basic colour scheme of black, purple and white, which is shown in the background, the colour of the jaguars and Lily's clothes. The article itself has many themes: sex, wilderness, animalistically and fashion. Each of which is presented in both Lily's word and the images provided with it.

Action Plan

I’ve been asked to make the front cover, contents page and a double page spread of a music magazine. This is what I plan to do 00000

Action Plan
Ø Research and analyse at least 3 different types of music magazines, focusing on different types of music
Ø Using my textual analysis’, I will form a questionnaire to find out what types of music people like and what they want to read about.
Ø Decide what music my magazine will feature and use this create to create a suitable name for it
Ø Decide what my double page feature will be about and ask for feedback on this topic
Ø Acquire suitable images for my magazine and its articles
Ø Design about 3 templates as possible designs for each the cover, contents page and the feature
Ø Use feedback given to pick one and improve it
Ø Post final designs on my blog and ask for improvements
Ø Apply any improvements people have suggested
I’ve been asked to make the front cover, contents page and a double page spread of a music magazine. This is what I plan to do 00000