MUSIC MAGAZINES: MEDIA LANGUAGE

 

Look carefully at the front covers of MOJO and RNR magazines. 

QUESTION: How far do MOJO and RNR use different media language to create different connotations? (CONNOTATION meaning: an idea or quality that a word makes you think about in addition to its meaning.)

Answer on your blog. This is a high-value question and should take all lesson to answer. You can use the class blog search engine for more examples of how to analyse music magazines.

In your answer you should have 2 paragraphs:

• analyse the media language in MOJO and RNR magazine. 'Media language' includes the placement of the main image, the type of photography, lighting, colours, fonts, how busy or restrained the cover is, the layout (such as alignment to the margins), how serious or playful 
• make judgements and draw conclusions about how far the media language is used differently in both extracts to create different connotations. Are there similarities in both covers? What sorts of audiences are they targeting? You could think about MOJO's rock aesthetic of living loud and dangerously compared to RNR's folk, rock, blues vibe. 

In the mojo magazine, there is lots of bright, electric colours, which pops out at you and grabs your attention. For example the words "Foo Fighters", which is printed onto the magazine, has a bold red and white colours with a font, they have placed it into the middle of the cover to make sure it has your attention. David Grolh is in the middle of the cover, with his hands reaching as, as if they are holding the words "Foo Fighters". David is shown as quite aggressive as his face is all scrunched up, one eye brow up and he is showing his teeth off to the camera. The cover has many different pictures, titles and statements and this makes it a very busy cover. Towards the bottom of the cover, there is a neon and vibrant green CD cover, this really pops out the reader cause of the neon colours. The lighting is very harsh and bright which presents Dave appear striking and bold to the viewer. The quote 'We've been to funerals, we've been to jail...' presents Dave as very hardcore and brave and also shows how devoted Dave is to his music and how far he would go for it. It makes him seem the bad boy, who fought for his music.

In the RNR magazine, there are lots of neutral colours like brown and white that give a more neutral tone to the cover. Christy Moore has a slight smile on his face and the lighting is very warm and kind presenting him as a heart-warming and loving person. The cover is very plain and nothing exciting or eye catching is on it. The quote 'These days it's yoga, camomile tea and three Our Fathers' shows that Christy is a very simple and basic man who does the everyday things that most people do. In the bottom left there is a simple CD cover with a slight pun of 'Un-herd' which relates to the zebra in the corner and being 'un-heard of'. This presents Christy as kind and funny. This cover is more simple and boring compared to the MOJO one which has bright colours and popping images that catch the eyes of each reader.