2. In the mid-1800’s, monthly magazines were
gaining more and more popularity – although they
were a general interest to begin with, with their
collection of news, vignettes, poems and historical
events. The development of the magazines
stimulated an increase in literary criticism and
political debate, moving towards more
opinionated pieces from newspapers.
Mass circulation magazines became much more
common after 1900, some with circulations in the
hundreds of thousands of subscribers. It was an
age of mass media, because of the rapid expansion
of national advertising the cover price fell sharply
to about ten cents. Various coverage on political
parties or coverage of corruption in the
government gained big business as they were
journalists who wrote for popular magazines to
expose social and political sins and shortcomings. Magazine stand, Sweden 1941
3. Even within the earliest of magazines
they tried to appeal to audiences through
free gifts and monthly admissions
4. The first issue of ‘Billboard’ magazine was printed in 1894 but it was in 1936 that it
became well known. This is gradually evolved throughout the radio age and within
their record sales chart. TBC provided different music genres and was the
foundation for slots on the radio. The magazine is aimed at music professionals
however, it is available to the general public. Melody maker began in 1926 and
covered all aspects of the jazz scene. By the 50’s it had competition from New
Musical Express which was appealing to more of a younger generation as it had
coverage on the up and coming rock and roll scene. Both printed productions
offered weekly music information and this worked in their favour. A glossy
magazine format for melody maker was introduced in 1999 and merged with NME
in 2000 which are both owned by IPC media. In 1967 Rolling stone magazine was
created as an important part in the culture of youth and the individuality of that
music genre – however it was less about factual information and more about the
culture of music.
Since then however, magazines have sufficiently become less popular as nowadays
everything may depend solely on digital versions of products and it changes their
formats entirely – allowing a more digital age audience to grow and replenish
within recent years of the mass media.
5.
6. Q Magazine was first published in the UK
on October 1986, the magazine is not set
on a specific genre as it looks at all
different types of music from different
perspectives however in that sense it is
entirely different than other magazines
and has a larger and wider target
audience. Every issue of Q has a different
message on the spine, readers then try to
work out what the message has to do
with the contents of the magazine –
illustrating their unique selling point. The
circulation of the product is 44,050 (ABC
July to December 2015) print and digital
editions.
