Double Page Spread (2)

Rap/R'n'B Artists

Using google I researched on a couple of the successful Rap/R'n'B/HipHop artists to get a good understanding of an Rap/R'n'B/HipHop artist.

Drake whose full name is 'AUBREY DRAKE GRAHAM' was born on the 24th October 1986. He grew up in Canada and was discovered from a very early age playing the character Jimmy Brooks on a television series - Degrassi: The Next Generation. Around June 2009 the known rapper Lil Wanye signed Drake to his record label (Young Money Entertainment). The following year (June 15) Drake released his 'THANK ME LATER' album and debuted at number one on the Billboard 200, the album has since gone platinum. 

Review of two songs from Drake's latest album

We start with ‘Over My Dead Body‘ immediately entering the world of Drake, with soft piano chords cushioned by a steady filtered beat where a female sampled vocal leads the hook. Drake immediately touches on ‘Find Your Love’ model Maliah Michel claiming he thought she was the girl of his dreams, but we know that never worked. Instrumentally ’40′ has provided Drake with a door of honesty and humbleness to spit his verses over, which adds to his meaningful words. This track really delivers to listeners where Drake believes he is now is, telling us a story of his thoughts, from the joy of being taxed six figures to the feeling of ‘killing everybody in the game last year’ the most iconic line being “I think maybe I was numb to it last year, but you know I feel it now more than ever” highlighting the chronic effect of fame and fortune.

‘Shot For Me‘, for the first time we get to see the fruits of Drake’s vocal talent, immediately entering the song with a more high pitched approached, most likely influenced by Abel Tesfaye, better know as ‘The Weeknd’. Drake juxtaposes our views by arrogantly yet softly telling the girls in question ‘Alicia’ and ‘Catya’ that nobody will ever give them what he did. He enforces regret on them, and definitely shows his dominance expressing his bravado by stating that he is ‘the man’ “B***h I’m the man, yeah i said it, I’m the man”. Telling them that he is written all over the girls, and reminding them that they are listening to him because he knows they are going to hear this. The hook relates to Drake demanding they take a ‘shot’ for him, for the simple reason that he’s made it and they let him go. Drake’s retro style singing is a charming and modest approach to express his vocal talent, as he has stated many times that he is not the greatest of singers, however he overpowers the listener with outstanding melodies that will stick in their minds and are likely to be sung or repeated by the individual, music is easier to relate to if one can regurgitate what is being said, and Drake utilizes this in all of his songs. He is just simply a relative artist.

Rick Ross whose full name is 'WILLIAM LEONARD ROBERT' was born on the 28th January 1976. He derived his stage name from a drug trafficker 'Freeway Ricky Ross' (although there are no connections between him and the man). Ross founded his own record label (Maybach Music Group) on which he released his studio albums Deeper than Rap and Teflon Don. In early 2012, MTV named Rick Ross as the 'HOTTEST MC IN THE GAME'

Inside look at Rick Ross latest mixtape
(a few strong words)

Location

The locations of my photography for my magazine is an important element in constructing my music magazine. I went to places such as :-

• Kingston university 
• Butlins (the lighting was beautiful in this place)
• Wolverhampton 
• Charing Cross skate park 

Whenever and wherever I went someone where, I always ensured had a camera with me in case across any beautiful scenery. Even if I weren't with one of my models I still took the picture because I could use it as a background.

Target audience

The target audience for my magazine will 16 - 26 year olds who love/interested in Rap and R'n'B music. I choose the age range because from generations to generations the love/interest in R'n'B and Rap music has started to gain the interest of younger years. However this particular age range of my target audience incorporate individuals that are not only interested in Rap/R'n'B music but interested in it to the extent of buying a magazine of its genre. Moreover I believe the age ranging from 16-26 are people interested enough to buy my magazine and may look up to artists such as these:-

Time Management

During the construction of my magazine, time management was very important to me. In order to help with my time management, the construction was split up into five parts which made it easier for me to complete my magazine.


Monday 5th December - Photos for front page, contents and DPS
Friday 14th January - Front Page complete
Friday 27th January - Contents
Friday 3rd February - DPS article draft 
February 27th - DPS complete.


Theses deadlines helped me to review whether I was being efficient enough with my time. Although I must admit keeping to some of the deadlines seemed harder than I thought (due to me carelessly losing my USB a couple of times). Also the first deadline out of the all five of them was the most hardest because my model was in university and was in his exams season, moreover it cost me around eighteen pounds, fifty-six to travel from my house to his university. Also because I wanted to make sure all the images I take come out very vibrant and detailed in colour, I used my friend canon camera. However in order to get the camera I had to wait three days as she does a photography course therefore her camera was unavailable to me, and that took up a lot of my time. Altogether the deadline did give a good structure, and contributed very well to my time management.

Flat plan - Front Cover

Before making my magazine in photoshop, I created a flat plan on the computer of what I wanted my front cover to look like.

As you can see it is quite basic, this is because I wanted a basic structure which I could play off, be creative.

Strapline - while researching magazines, the format of Vibe magazine stood out the most to me.

As you can see their strapline it quite chunky with a bright contrasting background ensuring it stands out. However I would want my strapline to stand out but to the extent of deterring the focus from the image of my artist, therefore I am going to use a black background, using the colour white (contrast beautifully with black), red (bold colour, usually symbolises urgency and it is the colour of my artist hat) and blue (to slightly calm down the remaining colours.

Masthead - I want blue to be the dominate colour on my magazine, therefore I would like my masthead to incorporate the colour blue. I also want it to stand out so I will add a gradient effect on the colour blue to also make it vibrant. 


Coverlines - I want my coverline situated around my artist (making my artist centre of focus), I also want my coverlines to be controversial to catch my target audience attention making them want to pick the magazine up. Nonetheless I am going to use the colours red, blue and black, am going boxes to emphasis certain coverlines that I believe my target audience would love to read.


Bar code/Competition - From my research I found all magazine both successful and failing have bar code, so I must include one. However to stop it from taking up space I am going to put in a rectangular box, positioned horizontally. I also want to add a competition into my magazine which many well-known magazine do as a unique selling point. Although I do not want my competition to be as ordinary as text so and so to see if you have won, but to make it more adapted to our modern technology. Moreover from my research I discovered that owners of a blackberry as of:-
2010 - 47,452
2011 - 62,600
2012 - 79,335
It has been predicted 2015 - 122,864
Overall the amount of people owning a blackberry which could scan a bar code has increased and is set to continue to be increasing, so I made up my competition based on that.


Featured Artist Album - I want to add a free giveaway inside of magazine rather on the front as a cover mount because it would take up too much, although to make my readers aware that there is a featured artist album as a free giveaway in my magazine. I will make a small box at the bottom of the magazine using the colours - black, dark red, and grey. I would add a small description of what the album is 

Evaluation Question - Five

How did you attract/address your audience?
In order to find out whether my magazine attract/address my audience, I got one female and one, two different personalities as you will see from video to answer this question.