Double page spread design and planning

This Is the layout design for my double page spread how I would prefer it to look like.

Below Is the text that will be filling In the text box spaces.

As the band Gold Scars walk into the room, It’s immediately obvious that they are cocky and rebellious. Since last year, they have released an album ‘Bullet’ and become the fastest selling indie band since Oasis back in the 90s. A recent reader polls suggests that they are one of the most popular bands at the moment and this is mostly down to their following online. The band have reached out to fans in their social media site, such as Facebook, Twitter (where they have started the odd scuffle with other bands and even risked legal action) and posting cryptic YouTube clips of their shenanigans.  We met up with them to find out what their secret Is.

What’s the story behind the title ‘Bullet’?

Jason: Well, there’s a song on the album called ‘War’ which reflects our thoughts about war and the recent situation in Afghanistan. We think that it’s wrong because the government is after money and oil and doesn't care about the real cost paid by the British public. ‘Bullet’ tells the story about a soldier who fought there and experienced terrible things, the bullet going through him represents how he was forced into the situation and how people are manipulated into fighting for ‘ honor’ which I don’t really get to be honest.

So how did you guys meet?

Amy: Well, Jason and I went to the same school in Hove and from a young age, we knew that we got each other and we like the same kind of stuff. We used to listen to The Smiths, The Cure, anything which had an edge to it. We’d sit on the bus with our stereos and cause chaos. The old people really hated us for it!

How did you guys first get famous?

Adam: Well, we used to play gigs in pubs, clubs and at our college and after that we got signed to a record label, we all started to become good friends then we had one massive live performance at the O2 and it all went really well from then, we started getting a lot of followers on the social network.

What are your plans for 2013?

Billy: We’re going to be touring the UK from next month, starting in Bolton and ending up in Inverness. After UK domination, we plan to hit America where we will release our album and see how it goes down.  We’ll be spending time in the studio recording some new material; we want to create a new sound. We really like The White Lies because they have a different Indie vibe. Adam has suggested that we branch out more into different types of percussion and have a heavier bass guitar in our music.

So Amy, what’s it like being the only girl in the band?

Amy: It’s not that bad! The boys are great although they have their moments. Sometimes I get fed up on tour because they tease me and protest against my beauty products but I just tell them to stick it!

Which other bands, other than The White Lies, are you guys into?

Amy: I love Green Day because Billie Joe Is kinda crazy and is fun to watch on stage. The Killers are awesome; I went to their gig at the O2 last week and I thought there energy was mind blowing!

Jason: I like San Cisco, an Australian band who seem pretty neat.

Billy: Palma Violets

Amy: Yeah, we’d love them to support us one day, we’ll see.

So why did you call the band Gold Scars and who came up with it?

Adam: Well it all started when Jason was drunk, I know it sounds bizarre but its true we wanted to make a band name and we could not think of anything so it was Jacobs Idea to write down band names, one each and put them in a hat and the first name we draw we kept.

Amy: Yeah so I got to go first and I picked out Gold Scars. At the beginning we didn't think much of that name but it grew and grew I guess.

Thanks for having you guys on the show! Good luck in the future

 Jason: Thank you and see ya later!

Contents page design

               NME contents page                                             My contents page

        

The design I used for my contents page was similar to an NME contents, as my magazine Includes the same genre as NME, also NME Is the main magazine I've been reading and studying off for Ideas etc.

Design features used In music magazines

I chose this image because the artist has a typical indie look about him and the way he is dressed 

also has a good black and white effect to make it look classic.

A drop cap, I will be including these in my magazine.

This image has a good effect to it, one half of the artist face is dark and the other is normal, so it could suggest that he has two sides to him.

This image has a good black and white effect.

This image has also got one half of the artists face darkened so could suggest two sides to him. 

This image is not too clear but I like the black and white used and may use a black and white image in my magazine.

Another drop cap used.

Music magazine questionnaire

This is my music magazine questionnaire.

I had to complete a suitable questionnaire for my classmates to fill out, and with the results I got back will give me ideas on what my target audience want to see in my magazine.

Comparing 2 contents pages – Mojo and NME

Textual Analysis –

Comparing 2 contents pages in terms of design – Mojo and NME 

The two publications I have chosen to compare are a Mojo contents page and a NME contents page. It is clear from the NME contents page that it is a lot more colourful and the masthead stands out to attract reader’s attention. On the other hand the Mojo contents page looks really original and plain but has a much more interesting image compared to NME. The image for Mojo is a dominant image of Bob Dylan (Folk singer) and Muhammad Ali (Boxer), an image like this is very strange to see. They have been chosen to feature because they’re iconic; both were against the Vietnam war and had outstanding reputations. But Mojo have cleverly used this image because it’s rare to see a boxer with a singer and it will also be eye catching towards the reader. They both have 1 image each however the Mojo image looks a lot more interesting and is a classic picture that was taken many years ago taken with the greatest boxer at that time so the audience would be drawn to the image. The fact that it’s a black and white picture shows that it is significant because it’s old and a classic image that people might respect more, especially older readers who knew them at the time of their popularity. This dominant image acts as a ‘boost’ and as a ‘centre of visual interest’.                                              

Design wise, these two contents pages have some things in common including colour schemes; they both include red, black and white colour schemes. Red, white and black are effective because they are typical colours that music magazines use (Q uses red and white also). Red can be used to draw attention to topics.

The Mojo contents page makes more use of a ‘banner’ which gives basic edition information on the top of the page – it tells us the month and year and issue number. The NME contents page has the date, so provides less information. In the Mojo banner we also find reference to ‘London, Memphis, Wolverhampton’ where Ali’s head overlaps ‘Wolverhampton’. This looks like some kind of tour list. Wolverhampton makes it sound a bit humorous because it’s not as glamorous as places like London or Memphis which has a country music background.

Both contents pages have columns for text, this is convenient because it is neat and provides order to the page. The column on the Mojo contents page overlaps the image and is not transparent, they probably overlapped it because it meant it could fit on the page and cover Ali’s big black coat which didn’t look very good. The Mojo contents page uses ‘Cross Heads’ which are words used to break up large amounts of text, normally taken from the main text. These help indicate the features in the magazine. The NME contents page also uses this to present information.

I found this image interesting because its in black and white to stand out from the other images in the NME magazine its like the odd one out, and i want to use the same idea for my magazine.

I chose this image because it stands out a lot and its very interesting and can give a good idea's to use in  music magazines 

Music magazine questionnaire

      This is my music magazine questionnaire.

In this task I had to make a questionnaire using Microsoft word and give it out to my class, and with the feed back I get I will use it to get an idea on the target audience that my magazine is aimed at.

Magazine front cover

This is a image of one of the tasks I had to to in class

I had to annotate and label different magazine front covers with words we have learnt in lessons