Research - Music Magazine Front Cover - Similar Product Research

By Deanna Hammond-Blackburn and Emma Hall

The central image is of Florence Welch from 'Florence and the Machine'. It is a close up of her face with her hair filling most of the space, leaving very little background visible. She is in direct mode of address, staring out of the magazine. This catches the readers eye and is enhanced by her eye makeup. The cover photo is anchored to the strap line: 'FLORENCE', which is simple but striking. The masthead, 'NME', is in a simple sans serif bold font that is white and very clear against the red image. The price, £2.30, is located above the masthead in a small font so it can be visible when the magazine is in a rack. There is a pulled quote; 'I would never have got through the X Factor auditions', which adds intrigue and arouses curiosity as to why she thinks this. It also gives a sneak peek into the cover story. There is a plug: 'The state of music today', which lists the major articles featured in the magazine. The use of the list structure is simple but effective. The magazine uses a buzz phrase, 'special edition', which draws the readers attention to the differences in house style and makes the magazine seem an essential buy. The classic colour combination of black, white and red is not the magazine's house style, which interchanges colours but keeps the font style and the neutral background the same each time, to show consistency, whilst giving each edition its own individuality through colour, according to what artist they feature each time. The magazine also uses AIDA through its use of several special edition covers. It raises awareness of the new magazine format whilst stimulating interest by changing it each time. This invokes a desire to buy the magazine for its new special edition covers.

Florence is represented in a fairly traditional way for a woman, with her hair curled and make-up on to accentuate her natural beauty. However, her image being the only photo on the front cover of a popular magazine is quite an achievement and  shows her as being quite independent. She also defies the narrow conventions of popular representations by being very pale, and having vibrantly coloured red hair. This in particular relates to the individual style and daring of indie magazines.