I’ve decided to analyse a print based advert of Skying, an album by The Horrors which was released in July 2011. This advert comes from the back cover of the February 2012 edition of Uncut. I think it’s significant that the album is still being advertised seven months after its initial release, especially in a magazine that is aimed for adults. This would suggest that the album had such a good reception that the media think it deserves more exposure. This does fit in with how Still Life, the first single from this album, had far more mainstream radio airplay than any of their previous releases, including reaching the Radio 1 A list.

The Horrors are a British band that could best be described as indie rock, post punk revival, and neo-psychedelic. Though their sound has changed throughout the release of their four albums; the first two releases were arguably darker and more focused on that post punk revival genre some people would be forced to describe them as. However, Skying takes on a different sound and is mostly portrayed as a neo-psychedelic album, taking on the formalities of a band inspired by the psychedelic music from the movement in the 1960s. From this image, you would probably assume The Horrors were exactly that as the colours and effects that are used in the image relate to those genres. The image, which is their album cover, has quite a psychedelic aesthetic with the way the colours are blending together, almost distorting the original image which seems to be that of clouds and a sea. Meanwhile the colours, while still bold, are quite faded from how vivid the colours of an actual psychedelic album cover would be, giving it a calm vibe linking it to neo-psychedelia, dream pop, and shoegazing (all of which are considered to play a part in the Skying genre). Neil Krug, the designer, will have taken this into account and made it so that their sound that explodes into this album is shown through the art.

The majority of the advert displays the album cover for Skying, completely advertising it and making it easier for the audience to recognise it when it would be advertised in the media. This particular advert doesn’t feature the actual band visually which could be a link to how this is the first album released by The Horrors which doesn’t have people on the cover. It’s quite basic, but also serves a purpose as it is there to advertise this particular record. The focus on the album as the product rather than the band as the product makes it so that people would look more into the particular album rather than the band in general. The band name is displayed at the top of this image but it isn’t actually on the official album art. It’s shown here to tell the audience that The Horrors are the album artist if they want to look into them, but still holds the majority of the focus on Skying as a musical album. We can also see this through how the album name is displayed in the centre of the whole page: people are more likely to see this than look at the band name or the recommendations first.

The bottom third of the page shows quotes from well-known magazines: Uncut (the magazine this feature is in), Q, and Mojo. This holds weight behind it because they are well-respected magazines in the media

industry – it will mean more to an audience if popular magazines rate this album highly. It also hints that readers of these magazines will be interested in this music due to the other types of music they advertise. All comments from these prestigious music publishers name Skying ‘Album of the year’. Usually, this would be interpreted as an honourable accolade because it’s a big deal for something to be named the best of its type all year. The praise for Skying is quite favourable, linking how all three institutions describe it as the best album of the year and it’s still being promoted months after the initial release.

“The Horrors have come of age” is an important quote because it tells the reader that this record is almost a breakthrough and says that people should give them a change with this particular album. It does have a different sound to the previous two albums released by The Horrors which is significant because you can actually see it through the change in album art and how their image as a band changed between the albums. The logo for XL Recordings is featured at the very bottom which could show people who are fans of other bands on that label they should listen to The Horrors.

Furthermore, the colour all of this writing is presented on is exactly the same to the back cover of the physical Skying album, meaning it’s following the same conventions. It’s very clever to do this because it keeps the advert on the same wavelength as the actual album so they are easily related to one another.

Back cover of Skying