Jenny Forrest
Front page analysis #2
Q MAGAZINE
'Q' magazine is produced by Bauer Media and addresses a target audience, often aged 30 and older. One of the main ways in which the magazine attracts it's target audience is through its vast musical content; with artists ranging from being established, present and upcoming. This would mean that the content is varied and so has 'something for everyone'.
The magazine is sold monthly and retails at £3.99.
The masthead of the magazine is the title ‘Q’ which is simplistic yet eye-catching. The ‘Q’ is in a strong, bold font and is in white, which can represent formality and the tail of the ‘Q’ flicks, suggesting elegance. The masthead is also neutral, so does not represent a specific genre of music or gender. Despite that ‘Q’ magazine often presents a hybrid of rock and popular music, the magazine has a wide variety of musical artists of which they can feature. The background of the ‘Q’ is red, making the title stand out further and adds to the brand identity of the magazine, as the white and red is the constant colour scheme throughout. The overall size of the masthead is large on the magazine, and is also a constant throughout all copies of ‘Q’ magazine.
The strapline of the magazine is the catchline of the brand, ‘discover great music’. The wording of this is also written in white and is positioned upon the red squared background, showing a correlation between the title and catchline for the brand. The strapline is mysterious, and gives little away as to the magazine’s content. This is also slightly covered by the cover girl of the magazine, which is the popular music artist Adele, showing that she is prioritised on the front cover.
This label stands out upon the front page, as it does not fit the constant colour scheme of the magazine. The changes in colour suggest that this is unusual for a copy of the magazine, perhaps showing further that this is unique to the magazine, giving it to a unique selling point (USP).
The main image on the front cover of this magazine is of ‘popular music’ artist, Adele. The photograph is a medium/close-up shot of the artist and shows a side profile. The look that Adele portrays is very sophisticated and formal, this is reflected by her facial expression, and simplistic, clean makeup look. The way that her hand slightly covers her mouth could suggest to the reader that she is vulnerable or holds a lot of secrets, which are perhaps revealed in this issue of the magazine.
The cover lines on this front page fit the colour scheme of the entire front page, with a mix of red and black, therefore maintaining the house style of the magazine. The text is perfectly aligned and the size of the artists names are much larger than the other words given. This adds to the theme of formality. These cover lines also avoid the main image on the front page, only slightly covering Adele's arm, keeping the main attention and focus on her.
The barcode box gives generic information including issue number, bar code, date, price and a website for the magazine. This information is displayed on the front page, put of the way of the main image, for easy access when the magazine is being bought, but does not affect the information regarding the magazine’s contents.
