NME front cover analysis

This is an NME front cover featuring Lily Allen. The shirt she is wearing is red, black and white, which is very similar to the colour scheme used throughout the magazine. Also, a checked shirt is very typical of the indie rock culture, which the magazine represents. The image of her is a medium close-up and tilted to make her seem more vunerable. The image of Lily is just her on her own, with no props, which connotes that she is lonely and goes with the story “I can't keep on living like this, it's doing my head in”. The font used is very 'punk', which further extends the rock genre of the magazine. The text is quite unusual for a typical magazine as it is white font on a black background. However, this works as it stands out very well against the white background and Lily's pale skin. She is being represented here as someone related to indie/punk mostly, which is very different from her usual look.

NME is a very noticeable name in the world of music magazines. It is published by IPC media, who are owned by Time Inc., who are owned by Time Warner – the fourth largest media conglomerate in the world. IPC Media is also the UK’s leading publisher of consumer magazines and websites. Over 26 million adults read an IPC Media magazine and over 350 million copies are sold each year.

A typical reader of NME lives at the cutting edge of media culture and is quite obviously a big music fan who enjoys going to gigs and other live music event regularly. They also spend a lot of money on audio equipment, as all the readers collectivly spend £326 million on it a year. The majority of them are male (69% male and 31% female), and the adverage age of a reader is 24 years old. 52% of readers are in full time jobs while 29% are students studying in either school, college or university, they spend around 19 hours per week on the internet too. I also found that most readers are very interested in clothing and looks, as 71% of readers think that looking good is a significant part in life and 45% spend a lot of money on clothing.