music magazine case study

Music Magazine case study:

Kerrang

Magazine History

Kerrang was first launched on June 6th 1981 as a monthly music magazine. But due to Kerrang’s popularity it started to appear on a fortnightly basis. However in 1987 Kerrang went weekly because it was in high demand this gave a strong indication that Kerrang was going to be around to stay. When kerrang started, during in the 1980s, it focused on the music that wasn’t main stream but was still popular of that era and during in the 1980s and early 90s this was British Heavy Metal, hard rock and glam metal music. However in the mid-90s and 2000s Kerrang discarded these genres in order to stay with the times they favoured more popular genres like grunge and nu metal this produced bands such as Nirvana and sum 41. Kerrang changed its favoured genres again in the late 2000s/00s to emo and metal core they did this in order to keep with the times and not be or become “out of date”. Kerrang continues to focus on popular but not quite main stream music, but obviously features the music of this era. Over the years Kerrang has often been criticised for discarding one musical genre in favour of a new musical genre that has become more popular.

The Magazine Content

Kerrang may have just started as a magazine but has spread out in to other forms of media. This can be seen by the fact that kerrang has its own TV and radio stations. Kerrang also has a website this means that they are always able to reach their demographic wherever the target audience. Kerrang both have a hard copy (an actual magazine that you would buy in a shop) and a digital copy so that people can access the magazine wherever and whenever they like. Kerrang’s radio station is not only the biggest outside London but has managed to captivate 1.3 million listeners and their television channel gets an average of 7.1 million viewers.

The Publisher Of The Magazine

The name kerrang is an onomatopoeic word that comes from the sound that is made when you play a power chord on an electric guitar. This suggest that even when kerrang first started it was interested in how to make thins digital this means that it only seems natural for them to have moved in to television, radio and online.

·         Kerrang website

The kerrang website is dedicated to finding the latest information about the current and upcoming bands and events the website contains an online shop, podcasts, TV and radio segments and a message board. This ensures more opportunities for them to sell merchandise and other related products.

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Kerrang radio

The kerrang radio station plays a sequence of rock and alternative music. The radio has specialists programs dedicated to subgenres of rock music. The radio station also broadcasts interviews with people who firstly affect popular culture secondly affect society and thirdly that are involved in music.

·         Kerrang TV

Kerrang television channel is a music channel that will still cover rock music but the more mainstream rock music it also show the music videos of some classic rock bands and classic heavy metal bands such as AC/DC, Black Sabbath, Deep Purple and Scorpions.

The Typical Reader Profile

Kerrang has a target audience with a median age of 22 years old furthermore 52% of kerrang readers are classed as having an ABC1 profile this means that 52% of the readers are likely to be students that either house or flat share but some of them may rent a small flat of their own. They are said to be cosmopolitan sharers that live in multi ethnic areas that are on low income. 70% of kerrang readers love rock music and because of this are 5.5 times more likely to attend rock concerts. Kerrang’s audience is mainly male as only 40% of their total readers are female.

Layout  And Trademarks Of The Magazine

Kerrang gets a lot of people advertise in their magazine they say that their advising space is perfect for government messages, games, mobile technology and films their name is in a white text with a smashed glass effect to emphasize the fact that this magazine is going to be about rock because it suggests the music’s that rocky and that loud that it breaks the sound barrier. Furthermore the main colours kerrang use are white red and yellow this is because all of these colours contrast and stand out against their main back ground colour which is black because black in music magazines connotes rock music. Kerrang are also famous for using lots of images in there magazine this is because their target audience is young and would not be interested in reading lots of text. 

How Does The Magazine Reflect The Values Of  Its Audience

Kerrang’s brand value is Live Life Loud this is reflected in Kerrang’s audience by the fact that Kerrang’s audience is young this means that they tend to be in to themselves as they are most likely to be into music clothes technology and music so they haven’t really got any core values.