analysis of magazine adverts that promote the release of new albums

1. Magazine Ads

2. Lana Del Ray – Born to die
This advert has gone for a simplistic look as both the artist and the
background are ‘normal’ in a sense that they do not feature things
that would require a big budget (such as unique clothing/makeup and
no use of green screens, etc.) – the use of such simple features
however, put sole focus on the most important things (the artist and
text) and through this the photographer has taken a low-angle shot of
the artist which makes the audience feel intimidated as we are made
to see Lana by looking up at her which also connotes empowerment
and confidence. The colours have been toned down to a pastel effect
with the blue and white being the dominant colours – the consistency
of the colour palette once again follow the simplistic theme so that
the attention is on the name of the artist and album which is the
whole point of these promotional adverts. The colour palette of this
ad are also the colours that are usually associated with the genre of
music Lana Del Ray sings; Indie-Pop. The ad includes all the
information you would expect to find on a music ad such as the name
of the album, release date and names of songs featured on the album
including the title track.

3. Florence + the Machine -
Lungs
The ad for Florence and the Machine offers different interpretations
of the type of music that is featured on the album – the background
is a dark almost black colour but in contrast to that there is a burst of
colours both from the flowery scene behind the artist and the artist
herself. The flowers are baby pink and the artist is wearing a see-
through white gown which connotes femininity however, the
darkness surrounding her suggests the music has a deeper and more
emotional meaning to it than just the usual girly like songs we are
used to hearing nowadays. Following on from this, the text is all in
white but the name of the band is in a curly font which once again
reinforces this idea that they are trying to infer two different
meanings within this ad as the font for the rest of the information is
in a standard bold font. An effect has been applied to the image of
the artist and the flowery background behind her that make the
whole picture appear as though it is a drawing/painting which adds to
the artistic element as the band are known for being unique and
different. We can also see her lungs which of course is a direct
reference to the name of the album “Lungs”.

4. Katy Perry – One of the
boys
The image of Katy Perry presents her in a sexual way by
having her wearing bright shorts and a pink top that
shows a lot of cleavage, has been tied just above the
waist and is also very tight, bringing attention to the
shape of her chest. Her face is slightly facing the right
whilst her eyes are looking directly at the camera, once
again highlighting how the artist is using her sex appeal
to attract an audience. The image overall looks old-
fashioned in a sense where the artist looks like the
women from the 1950 beach movies where they are all
very feminine and take care of they’re appearances. The
background she is in is the same background as her
album cover which is also featured on this ad, giving the
audience an insight of what they should expect of not
only the songs featured on the album but also the music
videos that are to come along. The text is mostly in
white with the artist’s name and the name of the album
in different colours to separate the information and
make things clear.

5. Ed Sheeran - +
Ed Sheeran’s advert for his album “+” sticks to a simplistic theme as
there are a total use of three colours that give the ad a very ‘earthy’
look leaving all the attention on the actual text which gives the
important details. The image of the artist like Lana Del Ray’s advert is
once again a picture that did not require the use any high-tech
equipment or editing as it is a basic head-shot of Ed Sheeran with a
‘Sepia’ filter effect added in afterwards during the editing process. Ed
Sheeran is known for being an artist that solely focusses on his music as
to his appearance which this ad highlights very clearly since it depicts
Ed Sheeran as ‘normal’ instead of having him wearing expensive
clothing or being surrounded by cars, etc. The colour palette draws
attention to the white text which the image used makes the artist look
like he is also looking down at the information below – this could
possibly be connoting that Ed Sheeran is proud of his album and is
looking forward to his fans and other people listening to it. Unlike the
other adverts, there is also a quote that talks about the artist and his
ability to do something many other artists cannot – this review would
appeal to the audience seeing that they are already aware of what Ed
Sheeran is capable of and the quote only further reassures that they
will not regret purchasing his newest album.

6. Taeyeon– Why
This is a album release ‘teaser’ from Korean artist Taeyeon. Unlike American branded
magazines that contain promotional things like album releases, in the Korean music
industry, they do not have “K-Pop magazines” and thus it is often rare to ever find a
magazine advert. Instead, the record labels of each artist will release ‘teasers’ during
the promoting stages with products like posters, photo-shoot pictures, etc. The
image here is a poster teaser which contains all the information and key features you
would also expect to find in a magazine advert. Since I am considering a Korean song
for my music video, it is important to take note of the conventions that belong to this
particular music industry and thus, I need to analyse a similar product to what my
brief is.
The colour scheme here captivates the audience straight away, the vibrant yellow
accompanied with the main image of the artist in-front of a bush brings about this
sense of happiness due to the connotations of the chosen background colour.
Everything about this poster is simple, the fonts chosen are all common fonts one
could find on Microsoft Word which I think works well for this poster as the font
keeps things neat and stops the poster from becoming overwhelming. The
positioning of the different parts of information add depth to the poster as it does
not look like the traditional type you would expect to see. Having some text vertical
and playing around with different sizing makes the poster more interesting. The only
negative thing I can pull from this is the amount of blank space – the image is small
and the background colour is the thing the audience would spot right away however,
this is not the most important thing that should be seen.

7. IU – Night letter
This teaser looks very cinematographic as though it is a poster
made to promote a film. The image has been edited very well in
the sense that the background colours have been further washed
out so that the red dress and face of the artist is the one thing that
stands out. This editing also makes the concept of the album very
clear – the red dress seems very vintage and the artist is holding
what appears to be a pile of letters, which are typically an old
fashioned thing. To an audience who are unaware of what songs to
expect from this album, the image gives hints as when I initially
saw this, I believed the songs or at least the title track would be a
ballad and surround the idea of lost love. I like that it would be
easy to interpret what songs can be expected in this album just by
looking at the image. The idea of the poster resembling a film
poster is further enhanced through the use of lines along the
corners of the image which make it look like the image is in a film
frame through a camera lens. This is creative and I like the use of
lines, shapes as these help make the poster more interesting. Like
the previous poster, this one also has text that goes vertically
which adds to the theme of it being a film poster. The darkness of
the background allows for the text to be read very easily too.