The front cover of Hip-Hop Weekly magazine reveals a compact page filled with multiple images, along with a large variety of colour and unorganised text. This gives the audience a connotation of informality and shows that a younger audience is being targeted. However, the masthead contrasts this as a bold serifed font has been used which are rarely seen in music magazines as sans serif usually connotes a more modern and established theme towards the readers. Main imagery used on the front cover conforms to the stereotypes of music magazines as the masthead is partially covered by Hip-Hop icons Rihanna and Chris Brown who also feature in the main cover line.

Front Cover Analysis

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The main image of Chris Brown and Rihanna show to give HHW a serious story behind it, and also connote that rumours are lingering as they appear in a paparazzi shot rather than a professional photo shoot, suggesting that both celebrities did not want to comment on the subject, which supports the connotation of this being an informal magazine, and also shows conventions that have been followed by other magazines such as ‘In Touch’, ‘Heat’ and ‘OK’, which could highlight that HHW could be a convergence between music and gossip.

The covering of text and the abbreviation of “HHW” on the page show us that this is a well-established and modern magazine, along with only a small amount of the selling line being visible. The main cover line “DEATH THREATS?!” covers the main image and is of equal font size to the masthead underlining the importance of the story. It also contains a boost containing another image being used as an addition to the cover line and main image, and bullet points that could be recognised as subheads to it, also supporting and enticing the reader into buying the magazine. Sizes of cover lines on the front cover appear to follow the common convention of reducing in size as the page continues. This contrasts what was said about the disorganisation of text, as this is made up by fonts being sized in order of importance that still leaves an attractive and intriguing aspect to the page.

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HHW is priced at £2.95, which is a suitable price as it is a weekly magazine. This also reveals that the target audience are lower-middle class young adults aged around 17-21. This can be told because of this group being able to spend this much per week on a magazine, and as it being a well-established magazine, this suggests that the majority of the audience purchasing HHW are regular customers as the institution relies on regular purchases of the magazine to make profit. The front cover is significant to how the Hip-Hop genre is portrayed and overall whom it is targeting. The lack of sexualisation on the cover of a magazine targeted towards this age group shows that both male and female readers exist in HHW, however, content in the magazine show women being more sexualised than men which denotes the magazine to be slightly dominated by the male audience.

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