Kerrang! is a
UK-based magazine devoted to rock music published by Bauer Media Group. It was
first published on 6 June 1981 as a one-off supplement in the Sounds newspaper.
Named after the onomatopoeic word that derives from the sound made when playing
a power chord on a distorted electric guitar, Kerrang! was initially devoted to
the New Wave of British Heavy Metal and the rise of hard rock acts. In the
early 2000s it became the best-selling British music newspaper.
The latest issue of Kerrang magazine is published on a weekly
basis. Issue 1533 features “the extraordinary
journey of Laura Jane Grace” who has been awarded the Kerrang Woman of the
Year. Laura Jane Grace (born Thomas James Gabel, November 8, 1980) is an
American musician best known as the founder, lead singer, songwriter and
guitarist of the punk rock band Against Me!.
From the front cover of this magazine we can clearly
see that the target audience is a young group who are interested in the
likes of punk or rock music. We can evidently spot this through the use of dark
colour's in the background, excluding the yellow, white and pink and from the
clothes that the woman in the main image is wearing are of a rock/punk
type. The various images throughout the
cover page like the one of Alexandria are of a rock type, as he holds his
guitar up in the air and sticks is tongue out, which is typically what rockers
do.
The image of Laura
Jane Grace is a straight on look, drawing the reader in with a relaxed
approach. If she was looking down with a low angle shot, the reader would feel
intimidated and if the shot was from a high angle and the Laura Jane was
looking up the reader would feel too superior over Laura Jane.
From the cover lines surrounding the main image we can
see that there is going to be a large feature on Laura Jane who has received the woman of the year award. We can see that Laura has had a tough life from
the line above her name saying“I have my daughter and my band... everything else is gone”. The use of bold
font on the words, daughter, band, everything and gone implies that the first
three things are very important to her and everything she used to have is out
of the picture. It implies that these are also the only people she needs in her
life .
The font used throughout is of a paint like type, so we
get the funky kind of vibe, kind of like paint used for vandalism. The use of
capitals shows us that the cover lines are very important and it makes them stand
out ot the reader as the various colour's used throughout are very eye catching.
We can see from the left hand side that the magazine
have a free enticement of a pull out poster of the artist Gerard Way. From not
displaying the poster stuck too the outside, this is a very good way of drawing
the reader to look inside the magazine, and focus on whats on the inside rather
than whats stuck to the outside. Gerard Arthur Way is
an American musician and comic book writer who was the lead vocalist and
co-founder of the band My Chemical Romance from its formation in September 2001
until its split in March 2013. This shows us that with the genre of My Chemical
Romance being rock, the magazine aim for an audience of people who are
interested in rock music.
The slogan of Kerrang magazine is “Everything That
Rocks” is not
displayed anywhere on the front cover, which is not expected as we usually
expect to see the slogan under the masthead or symbol in most magazines. This
shows us that Q magazine may not particularly have a typical house style.
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