History of Music Magazines

Kerrang!

Kerrang! commenced publication on 6 June 1981 and was edited by Geoff Barton, initially as a one-time supplement in the Sounds newspaper, which focused on the New Wave of British Heavy Metal phenomenon and on the rise of other hard rock acts. Angus Young of AC/DC appeared on Kerrang!'s first cover. Launched as a monthly magazine, Kerrang! began to appear on a fortnightly basis later, and in 1987 it went weekly. The original owner was United Newspapers who then sold it to EMAP in 1991.

The contents of this magazine is is usually musical information on the next up coming bands in this genre or new albums by the band featured on the front of the magazine. This band or artist changes every week but is still within the genre of this magazine. Sometimes they have the artist more than once in a few years but always ask different questions about a new album or a new tour.

Kerrang! has an average of 294,000 magazine buyers per week. Within the magazine 135,000 of these are part of the ABC1 section of their buying audience. The ABC1 section are the higher class of the UK and therefor should be higher than the C2DE section as they have more money to spend. But in this case 159,000 of total buyers are C2DE. This could be because these parts of class in the UK prefer this type of music, where as maybe the A or B band would prefer classical music.

When it comes to the age of the buyer, the NRS are very limited. With the age band of 15 - 34, 222,000 of the buyers are between this age. This may narrow down the target market but not by much as the age gap is so large. With buyers of the age of 35 and over, the buyer number drops dramatically to 72,000. Although this number is still high, it is much lower in comparison to the ages of 15-34.

The 'housestyle' through out this magazine is consistent. The master head font is kept through out for headings and sub-headings. The fonts used all have the connotations of 'danger' as they are all scruffy and cracked in some way. This would help get across the type of genre of music instantly is a reader or buyer were to pick it up.

Stereotypical socials groups that read this magazine are thought to be 'emo' or 'gothic'. Although this may not be for most readers of the magazines this image is portrayed by the use of the front used (Sans Serif) and the images on the front, which represent some sort of violence.

Q

Q was first published by the EMAP media group in October 1986, setting itself apart from much of the other music press with monthly production and higher standards of photography and printing. In the early years, the magazine was sub-titled "The modern guide to music and more". Originally it was to be called Cue (as in the sense of cueing a record, ready to play), but the name was changed so that it wouldn't be mistaken for a snooker magazine.

The magazine has an extensive review section, featuring: new releases (music), reissues (music), music compilations, film and live concert reviews, as well as radio and television reviews. Much of the magazine is devoted to interviews with popular musical artists.

The magazine is well known for compiling lists. It has created many, ranging from "The 100 Greatest albums" to the "100 Greatest '100 Greatest' Lists". Every other month, Q — and its sister magazine, Mojo, have a special edition. These have been about musical times, genres, or a very important/influential musician.

The typical amount of buyers for this magazine is 384,000. This is higher than Kerrang! because it has the latest charting artists within it. Within the ABC1 section, 266,000 people buy this magazine, where as only 118 buy the magazine from the C2DE section. The numbers are closer because charting songs and artists are usually liked by the majority of the population so the band in which people live doesn't really effect their love in music. When i comes to the age band of the buyer of the music magazine, 15-34's buy 238,000 where as 35+ buy 145,000. This could be because when you get older your taste in music changes or never really liked chart music to begin with, and much prefer music from when they were younger.