Planning Ideas for Music Magazine

These are the flat plans for the first planning draft of my music magazine:

Cover - 

I have worked using the principle of thirds, having the model's eye line resting on the top intersection. I also liked the idea of a sticker, but I'll need to work out how to do this. 

Contents Pages - 

I went for two pages to make the magazine a lot more laid out instead of mimicking one of the many magazines I've seen which pack all the information together which makes for a very hectic page, and is therefore hard to access as a reader. 

Feature Article - 

I wanted wrap around text as I liked the way it integrates a picture into a page, and so decided to use the technique in my work 

Research into the Music Magazine Industry

Looking into circulation figures in 2013, I think that magazine readership has declined due to:

1. the expansion of internet article which are both free and easier to transport as people can access them at any time on their phones.
2. Bands have their own websites and social media pages so there is simply no need to buy a magazine.
3. Arguably, due to the recession and more economy of today, people just don't have the money to spend on a magazine: especially when they could have the contents for free on the internet.

These are the circulation figures as reported by The Guardian:
'Rock title Kerrang! fell under 40,000 monthly sales in the final half of last year, as sales dipped 4.1% to 38,556. The Bauer Consumer Media magazine is down 8.4% compared to the final half of 2011.

Mojo remained the market leader among the paid-for music titles, with sales at 83,676 despite a modest fall of 1.7% compared with the previous six months. Bauer Consumer Media's monthly rock title slipped 4.4% year on year.

The number two in the paid-for music market, IPC Media's Uncut, slipped just 1% on the previous period, to 62,361 – although circulation was up 0.1% on the final six months of 2011.

Bauer rock rival Q shed 4.8% of its sales in the second half of 2012, to 61,485, as circulation dropped by a fifth compared with 2011.


NME reported another sales squeeze, with period-on-period circulation down 3.7% to 23,049. The IPC Media music title, which appointed Mike Williams as editor in May last year, saw its circulation drop 16.6% compared with the six months to December 2011.'

Looking at Media Theory

In today's lesson we've studied and explored Maslow's Hierarchy of Needs and Uses and Gratifications theory.
The theory states that human behaviour reflects a range of needs, from basic to higher aspirations. The theory ranks these needs as follows:
We then applied what we learnt with the Uses and Gratifications theory, which is an extension of the Hierarchy of Needs, in groups to a front cover of music magazine Kerrang. The four categories are diversions, personal relationships, personal identity and surveillance. On the cover we found that the 'surveillance' category was used the most to make the reader feel like the magazine had to be bought for them to be in the loop and therefore they had to buy it.

Key learning point: The magazine I produce must employ the Uses and Gratifications Theory to make my magazine seem to have vitally important information that the reader must obtain.