Bauer Media Group are a global giant that have about 600 magazines in its portfolio. Those magazines are: Q (Music); Mojo (Music); Empire (Film) and many more. Each of these magazines have different genres to one another especially Q and Mojo; for Q is a magazine focusing on pop music while Mojo focuses on Classic Rock. Kerrang targets a niche audience of fans of Modern Rock. Kerrang, Q, Mojo and Empire all shared the same target audience which were males aged about 15 – 40. The reason the magazine’s target a male audience because the people who created the magazine were of the same gender so they would be able to understand how to create a magazine fit for the male demographic. Coincidently all of these magazine’s shared the same owner, EMAP before getting sold to Bauer Media Group.
Bauer Media not only deal with magazines, they are a cross-media platform. This means that they showcase information through alternative medias i.e. radio, TV, digital and advertising. As well as magazines, Bauer Media own over 50 TV and radio stations along with more than 400 digital products. Including magazines, Bauer Media own about 107 brands. All this makes Kerrang an oligopoly as they dominate the market with 22 million people, across the world, as its consumers and thus it generates more profit for Bauer.
Kerrang’s first cover issue featured Angus Young from AC/DC and the issue focused on a British wave of heavy metal. During the 80s and 90s, Kerrang focused on metal musicians like Bon Jovi, Metallica and Slayer however when grunge acts like Nirvana and Pearl Jam rose, Kerrang discarded its focus on metal acts and started writing about these grunge acts. By 2000, the magazine started writing about a nu metal genre which involved bands like Slipknot and Korn. Once again, Kerrang changed its writing content and started writing about the rise of emo and metalcore music. Readers often criticised Kerrang for changing the content focus everytime a musical trend was popular. Currently, Kerrang has its focus on all genres of rock like pop rock and grunge rock which makes Kerrang a hybridised magazine. Due to the changes in writing style, Kerrangs target audience have changed as each new trend came with a heavily ardent fanbase. As of now, according to Kerrangs Advertising Media pack, it gave a recount of two fans: one 16 year old female reader and one 17 male reader. This presents that Kerrang’s niche audience has become a mainstream audience by targetting males and females aged 15 – 35.
In addition to Kerrang’s constant change in editors was also essential part of Kerrang’s changes as it would introduce a range of styles to the pages in the magazine covers. Kerrang’s first editor was Alan Lewis who co-founded Kerrang with Geoff Barton. Alan Lewis seperated from Kerrang and was succeeded by Paul Rees in 2000. After working two years at Kerrang Rees went on to write for the magazine Q. He was replaced by Ashley Bird. Unfortunately during Bird’s time at Kerrang, sales went in to decline and in 2005 Paul Brannigan took over the editorial job at Kerrang. Nicola Browne was then appointed as Editor in 2009. From 2011, onwards, NME features editor James McMahon became editor for Kerrang.
Along with the changes in editors and content, the magazine circulation was a key factor in Kerrang. The magazine circulation is currently 24,207 (ABC, 2015) which is a great gap for the figures in 2014 were 33,024. The figures dropped by almost 4% and Kerrang was not the only magazine that dropped. This could have happened due to the availability of magazines online that print copies are becoming hard to almost purchase. Kerrang’s highest magazine circulation was in 2006 with the total circulation of 85,377. This is crucial because it presents the true image of the magazine circulation without the availability of the internet. The statistic shows a clear difference in magazine distribution as 2006 onwards the numbers of print magazine distribution began to drop while the online users began to increase thus as of now Kerrang is viewed 8 million page views per month.
In order to gain high circulation, Kerrang need to popularise their magazine especially due to Web 2.0. This revolutionary stage of the internet transforms users from being passive to an active audience and thus to reach a wider audience. Kerrang need to advertise through cross-media platforms like online, print copy, app subscription and adverts. The internet has transformed the audience by making it easier for the audience to access unlimited content and get a magazine copy without having to buy a print copy. Kerrang have an online website: www.kerrang.com which allows users to view sneakpeaks into the magazines and the freebies. In addition, the website gives you ‘5 REASONS YOU NEED TO BUY THE NEW ISSUE OF KERRANG!’ and this is a persuasive technique to ensure the audience buy Kerrang.
These are the many ways Kerrang will advertise its magazine to males from the ages of 15 -35 as makes are stereotypically connoted to listen to rock music in order to gain a boost in masculinity and ego. Rock music is also relatable to a male audience because it involves aggressive hardocre lyrics which men to relate to. However many females also read Kerrang because it may include popular artists like Fall Out Boy, My Chemical Romance, Panic! at the Disco etc. Females break the stereotypical point of view that rock music is exclusive to men.
The prices to buy Kerrang vary: Issue 1 costed 50p in 1981 which is now an unrealistic price to buy a magazine. Having a low cost would mean less loss of money if there weren’t enough consumers buying the product. The price currently is £2.50 which is really cheap as some music magazines cost £4-£5. The reason Kerrang has lowered its cost is because its magazine circulation has dropped slightly. Lowering the costs will help to prevent a loss of profit when consumers don’t buy the magazine. The price for Kerrang is bad because some of its rival Modern Rock magazines have higher consumer prices: (Rock Sound Mag. - £3.99; Black Velvet Mag. - £2.50 and Big Cheese Mag. £3.99) meaning that it makes the product almost scarce to buy meaning there will be high demand for these magazines and thus more profit. Black Velvet and Big Cheese Magazine are independent magazines with a niche audience so they release bi-monthly whereas Rock Sound Mag is a mainstream magazine which releases monthly so it thus makes sense to have a high price because it is not released weekly like Kerrang.
The magazine cover is issue number 1646 and it features Panic! at the Disco on its front cover. The magazine cover shows the singer of the band, Brendon Urie, holding a rotary phone dial to his ear. He has a smoulder on his face and his hair is combed back. The smoulder is a facial expression which can often attract females so the facial expression subjects Brendon Urie to be an object of sexual interest, its framed for the female gaze. He is wearing a dark pink satin blazer while also wearing a gold ring on his right pinky and a silver band on his left ring finger, which shows that he is a married man. Pink is connoted to be a colour for love, flirtation and playfulness. In the case of the magazine cover, the pink presents playfulness because Panic! at the Disco are known to make upbeat music which often involves lyrics of romantics. The rotary is an antique product as it shows sophistication and almost a creative side of person. The background is white which allows Urie to stand out.
The colour palette uses four colours to help generate the magazine style. White is used for some of the fonts and white is a symbol of light so it helps brighten the magazine and the text in order to attract the readers attention. The masthead is pink which comes from the pink blazer. The black comes from the shirt Urie is wearing and the colour of Urie’s hair. Black is often a colour of darkness so the colour juxtaposes white. Finally the yellow comes from Urie’s gold finger. Yellow is a happy colour as well as a bright colour bringing light. The colours match well with one another and they help Brendon Urie to stand out from the plain background.
The layout is a ‘C’ layout and this helps the reader to visualise the magazine clearly. The layout also enables Urie to stand out as the anchor of the magazine. The front cover presents Urie to be a sophisticated intellectual man. The camera shot is a mid-torso shot as it helps us to draw focus on Brendon Urie as a whole person and more importantly on the facial expressions. Urie is facing directly towards the camera it allows the reader to focus as well as giving full direct address to the reader. All of the fonts are uppercase san serif as it as bold sharp edges to show off being exciting and attractive to the reader.
Brendon Urie is represented as a tall smart intellectual because he is wearing a smart sophisticated attire and the ‘GUEST EDITOR’ is to show that Urie has the highest temporary job in the magazine which is collating the whole magazine together. The phone is in the shot because it relates to the hook of the magazine which is ‘GET ME PETE WENTZ ON THE PHONE!’ Pete Wentz is a guitar bass player from the band Fall Out Boy. Pete Wentz also owns the record label, Decaydance to which Panic! at the Disco are signed on to. Pete Wents and Brendon Urie are good friends and have had a front magazine cover together.
The target audience for this particular cover would be females aged 15 – 29. The female demographic is chosen because the colours are stereotypically attractive to females but also due to the fact it features Brendon Urie. Panic! at the Disco have been known to make songs relating to themes of love and this is often what attract females to the band Panic! at the Disco.
This is a case study for the rock magazine Kerrang!
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