Magazine Proposal

Magazine Proposal

The name of my magazine will be $wank as of popular demand in my questionnaire in which I distributed. $wank is a good name for a magazine because it is a rising term in hip-hop but is not extremely mainstream yet and wouldn't look too cheesy. The  dictionary definition of the term 'Swank' is "display one's wealth, knowledge, or achievements in a way that is intended to impress others", which is in perfect relation to hip-hop because most rappers rap about their achievements and boast about their image and how they can afford expensive clothes. The  use of the dollar sign instead of the 'S' is a good addition because it enhances the image of the name and the magazine, because ones wealth is constantly being rapped about in most hip-hop tracks and the simple association can  be made between an dollar sign and hip-hop (see mood board). 

$wank magazine is going to be a hip-hop magazine covering all forms of hip-hop, presenting not only the big names of the genre, but underground artists on their ‘come-up’ which will not only aid the artists as they may gain some publicity from being featured in the magazine, but it will aid the magazine as it will introduce a whole new branch of the hip-hop genre to the hip-hop fans who will be reading the magazine, which will ultimately make the magazine become a source for good hip-hop music to the reader, which is what I want to achieve by releasing this magazine. Due to multiple areas of the genre to be covered in the magazine, the magazine will have multiple sections and a lot of content for the reader. Different sections in this magazine will include interviews with artists, tour dates, bios on artists and album reviews. One feature I would like to include which will separate $wank from other hip-hop magazines such as ‘XXL’ and ‘Vibe’ will be something that has been used before by other magazines, most notably, men’s magazine ‘FHM’ who faced intense competition with male magazine giants ‘nuts_­’ before they began to release an annual list known as the ‘FHM top 100’ which lists the top 100 beautiful women in the world, which not only enticed men but also women as the topic was their gender, then FHM was on a much higher pedigree to other men’s magazines. I too want to construct an annual list of the top 100 rappers as the whole world of hip-hop would be interested as there is currently nothing like that on the market, there is a top ten made by MTV but it only covers artists who are big and currently popular, whereas the $wank top 100 would cover all rappers, and their fan base size will not be a factor.

With regards to my audience, realistically, when making this decision it was quite simple, I had to take the public representation of the genre into account, which is quite negative. Most hip-hop artists came from rough backgrounds and rap heavily about their actions in the past whilst incorporating a lot of bad language which you wouldn’t hear in other genres, meaning the music isn’t usually played on radios and is rather restricted and reaches fans by true hip-hop fans hunting down an artist’s music rather than the music coming to them (over the radio and television). This magazine cannot appeal to the higher class of people as the higher class of people do not like the genre, most of the time, meaning this magazine with appeal to lower and middle class. $wank will appeal to this class as the price of the magazine will not be extremely expensive like the pricy magazines for the upper-class such as fashion magazine ‘Vogue UK’ which costs around £4.10. I would like $wank to appeal to men mainly because if you look at the genre, most rappers are male, and they rap a lot about girls (see mood board) in a very masculine way. Baring this in mind, hip-hop is slowly becoming the largest genre on the market, and a lot of female rappers are breaking through such as Nicki Minaj and Iggy Azelae, and their fans are mainly girls, meaning they are bringing girls to the hip-hop fandom and further showing how some girls will purchase this magazine. Considering hip-hop is a relatively new genre, making its major breakthrough in the late 80s with artists such as Eric B and Rakim becoming the first rappers out, the rappers inside are young, meaning it will be very rare seeing someone 35+ being a hip-hop fan, so I will make my magazine appeal to 17-27 roughly, by having young artists who are the same age as them being presented in the magazine. 

I have previously spoke about the public view on hip-hop and how it is looked upon differently than other genres, I plan to embrace this strange look and make the artists seem like they are quite powerful beings and are able as individuals, which represents the genre as quite an individualist genre, contrasting other genres where they will need a band to make music. The representations of others I will use will be negative to those outside the genre, but inside the genre they will seem positive. If female rappers are covered, the stereotypical female will be challenged as they too will look as powerful as the male rappers because all rappers try to make themselves to be represented as powerful, recent examples of this can be seen in the Kanye West BBC interview where he claims he wants to become a massive clothes designer and an architect and he claimed that he will be as big as Michelangelo, showing the power rappers nowadays believe they have. They are people that can influence millions of people through what they rap, and are idolised, an example of this is was the hologram of the late Tupac which rapped at the Coachella festival and the video of it went viral, showing how influential they can be. $wank will challenge the stereotypical rapper, most hip-hop magazines will show black rappers, only recently there have been only a few white rappers breaking through and making the covers such as Eminem, Mac Miller and Macklemore. I want to include some white rappers on mine so it will appeal to a wider audience and not only the Afro-Caribbean community 

My magazine will be an independent publication rather than part of a publishing group because the content of the magazine could easily make 3 or more full magazines if separated, so it would be easier if it was in a lone publication. The main competition with our magazine would be regards to the relevance in rap music, would be ‘XXL’ because ‘XXL’ is regarded as the premier hip-hop magazine and it has been referenced in many songs, most notably J.Cole and Kendrick Lamar’s ‘Forbidden Fruit’ where J.Cole says how hard you have to work just to get on the cover of the ‘XXL’. But with regards to versatility in the genre and the surrounding genres, the other main competitor is definitely ‘Vibe’ because ‘Vibe’ covers not only hip-hop but occasionally R&B and even pop once, meaning their audience is a lot larger than other hip-hop magazines. I would like my magazine to be sold firstly at all newsagents and major supermarkets, which would place it on the same level as all magazines and newspapers, I would then like to stretch the distribution levels further and sell it in all major music stores such as HMV and Play.com, as I want it to make the readers be extremely engrossed in it and rely on it for all information regarding their favourite genre, hip-hop. 

Reader Profile

Reader Profile of $wank Magazine

Shawn, 19, lives and breathes hip-hop. He doesn’t listen to any other genre but hip-hop, branching off into all forms of it, enjoying the latest stuff on the market and the old-school classics. When he is  not listening to music in his free time he is either watching hip-hop movies, his favourites being ‘Get Rich or Die Tryin’, ‘Notorious’ and  ‘8 Mile’ or reading up on the internet hunting down album/mixtape  rumours, concert news or new up-and-coming artists. He has a job with a rather low-pay salary, meaning the low cost of ‘$wank’ appeals to him greatly. When he is not spending his money on concert tickets or albums he is always ensuring that his wardrobe is in prestige condition. Although his income isn’t great he needs to make sure that the clothes he is wearing are perfect, he aspires to dress like some of his favourite rappers but is restricted sometimes financially when his favourite rappers are wearing 20,000 dollar gold chains. He likes ‘$wank’ magazine because it provides him with all of the news he needs in one place, saving him all the internet browsing time he uses. The magazine will provide him with a monthly summary of everything in the hip-hop world and he needs to be staying up-to-date.

Draft Sketches

 DRAFT SKETCHES

(Captured on a camera not a scanner due to technical errors)

The cover is good because it follows standard conventions of a music magazine e.g. the masthead at the top of the page and the barcode in the bottom corner. It also uses all the space possible and presents all of the main content inside the magazine which is what is going to sell the magazine upon the first glance. The magazine cover also uses bold writing for the masthead and the name of the main artist. There is one image on the cover of the artist in question and he is dressed in very typical hip-hop attire.

The contents page is very different to other contents pages as the layout is rather revolutionary in the sense that it includes more pictures that most hip-hop magazine contents pages. Conventions that it does actually follow are the size of the title of the page as 'contents' which is the largest piece of text on the page. It also has the page referenced number next to the article. There are four images of artists on the contents page, all of which have been referenced on the cover page with their name as an artist.

The double page spread is good because it follow the conventions of common double page spreads as the picture takes one side of the two pages and text takes the other page. It also has an individual quote in larger letters and highlighted than everything else from the article. The image used presents the whole body of the artist and depicts him in a setting, contrasting the previous two images on the cover and contents pages

Double Page Spread Article

Double Page Spread Article

Eazy J has taken hip-hop to new heights after the release of his latest album, Eamatic, which went platinum in record time. We caught up with Eazy J and asked him how he got to where he is today- "Being a kid in the city of Compton, life was hard. I have had a lot of friends who died and ended up in jail due to the evils of gang life, I knew I needed to escape. I always liked English in school, particularly poetry, and when I got entered into a rap battle by my friends that is where the story began. I was exposed to hip-hop, living where we were, so I always loved it. I won and got asked my rap name and a sample of my mixtape, I responded that I didnt have neither, they asked me how I won and I just said it was easy, and that  was my first ever rap name 'Easy'. I made the mixtape, entered more rap tournaments and then got scouted by a representative from Sock Nation and the rest was history, I left Compton now I live in LA, and I have never looked back." 

"After I dropped this album I have no choice but to live-up to my potential and become the best artist I can possibly be." Eazy went on to saying how he is very careful about his approach to the hip-hop game, he said: "I have seen many artists not make it or be torn apart financially by agents who take all of their money, not me. I'm here to stay. When I die I want to be remembered like my idols are and I want to be remembered not as a rapper, but as an artist or a revolutionary. I want them to think, Leonardo Da Vinci, Pablo Picasso and then there was Eazy J, the young kind from Compton, USA." Eazy J definitely has a lot going for him right this moment and we can see a lot of potential in this young man, what we have seen already there is definite talent, but will he live up to his potential? Only time will tell.

My Logo

My Logo

To conclude from the analysis of the logos,  I needed a logo which was bold, colourful and used all of the masthead. Which I achieved by using dafont.com which is a service that provides a logo generator and allows you to produce a logo in anyway you want.

Here is the finished product:

I wanted to incorporate black and red into my logo but I was restricted when it came to placing it all into just the word '$wank' without it looking very tacky and unprofessional. The font, like all of the other magazine logos, is very bold and looks very strong, which is what I wanted my magazine to seem like. What I have in my logo that the other magazine do not is that small circle between the words '$wank' and 'Magazine' which ties them both together and makes the magazine look more fashionable and appealing to the eye.

Logo Analysis

Logo Analysis

When deciding the logo for my hip-hop magazine, I would have to look at the existing logos of hip-hop magazines to see a common feature between them and see how it can be reflected in the one in which I will produce.

1. Hip Hop Connection:

Hip-hop connection was one of the first hip-hop magazines and so really was the first to produce a logo (still hasn't changed since the launch of the magazine in July 1988). Hip-hop connection takes a very bold approach, and has only one standard colour, but the colour changes from issue to issue depending on the look of that particular issue. I can also notice the use of the lower-case 'i' which stands out as every other character is in capitals, showing it to be quite unorthodox, which is what hip-hop as a genre is as far as genres go.

2. XXL

XXL is what is seen as the optimum hip-hop magazine on the market. This can somewhat be seen in the logo because if you compare it to that of 'Hip-Hop Connection' you will see that is much more advanced; it contains more colours, a bolder font, and would stand out much more on a page.

3. Vibe

Vibe was originally an R&B magazine, but has recently entered the genre of hip-hop, most likely because R&B is fading as a genre and hip-hop is slowly becoming the most popular. This logo, similarly to 'XXL', has only a little amount of characters, but selected a very large and bold font, which makes it easy to read for someone looking upon the cover, and it is much more fitting rather than a long name like 'Hip-Hop Connection'.

4. The Source

The Source is a very old magazine which started as a newsletter in 1988. It is also very bold and colourful logo like that of 'XXL'. What separates this from the others, and makes it my personal favourite is that it stretches and could take up the whole masthead and use all of the space, it is also 3D and would look very appealing to the target audience.

MAIN ARTIST PHOTOS

As outlined in my costume analysis, I took an array of photographs of my main artist in different costumes to add some variance on my pages. Here are the best three that I will be using:

 This image is representing the artist as an original kind of rapper who wears hooded apparel and loiters in public areas, in this case a balcony which overlooks a basketball court. It represents him as quite cool, and intimidating at the same time. This intimidation is enhanced by his lack of emotion in his facial expression.

 This image is representing the artist as a very ambiguous artist at first glance. When you look at him there is nothing that strikes you to interpret what kind of rapper he is. His clothes would suggest that he is quite a formal rapper but his posture and 'laid-back' look contrast this and make him look very 'street'. His setting looks very urban as well which enhances this 'street' look.

This image is my personal favourite as he is very smartly and formally dressed, and his sitting stance looks as if he is sitting on a thrown and he looks like a king or a leader but the fact that he is placed on apartment stairs, in a very urban area, would suggest he is the king of urban and the music that derives from this urban scene is hip-hop which fits in with the background for the artist, Eazy-J, as he is presented as an artist who has come through the urban areas to get to the top.

Cover and Contents page images

Cover and Contents Page Photos

MAIN ARTIST (EAZY J):

These pictures make the artist look serious, but not aggressive as we want to display him in a positive light and not an intimidating one. His attire is the most important feature in this as he is wearing a lot of dark colours e.g. grey and black but he is also wearing some gold, which is a connotation of royalty (fitting with the headline 'The low-down on the new king of Compton), making him look important, likewise, no-one else on the cover are wearing that much gold which makes 'Eazy J' look like the most important artist on the page

SUB ARTIST 1 (NANA FRESH):

This artist is wearing much more intimidating clothes and is presented in a way to look very much more intimidating that Eazy J as I wanted Nana Fresh to be an artist who is only rising in hip-hop and needs to be taken seriously and somewhat 'feared'.

SUB ARTIST 2 (YOUNG KNAVE):

This artist is a young artist and I want to present him to look quite innocent and harmless, but not overlooked as he is also wearing black and gold like the others, so the audience know he means business but isn't as powerful as the other two artists on the page.

Costume Analysis

The apparel that rappers of the modern-era wear are extremely varied. When rap music first burst onto the scene in the late 80s the clothes worn were all very stereotypical of what a one would consider to be quite 'chav-like' and not very formal at all. These would include baggy jeans, baseball caps, and plain vests.

As time went on, to the late 90s, clothes rappers wore got slightly more formal. Many rappers included sunglasses and gold jewelry to show to everybody how wealthy they are and used them to enhances their image. Many rappers wore black because black is a very dark colour and it makes them look more intimidating

The image of rappers then got even more formal in the 2000s and 2010s. As time went on rap music or 'hip-hop' as it is now known became more and more accepted and is now one of, if not the largest, genre in world music today and the artists representing the genre now are much more wealthy than the rappers of old.

After long thought, I have come to the conclusion that I need a variance of costume for my artists if I wanted  to change their portrayal. I have two sub-artists and one main artist. One of my sub-artists will be dressed to intimidate and the other will be dressed to express their wealth. For the first artist I wish to dress them in a big black puffer jacket and for the second I wish to dress them in a black sweatshirt and have some gold on them to show off their prowess. With the main artist I wish to take many photographs in many different costumes making him seem like a very versatile artist and show variance on the pages.

Questionnaire Results

1. What is your gender?

This came to no surprise to me as I asked mainly men to complete my questionnaire. This shows that they have a distinct interest in hip-hop and their gender will also affect other questionnaire answers. It will help my magazine because my magazine in male-orientated and their responses will shape my magazine.

2. How old are you?

Again, came as no surprise because I asked mainly people my age, I suspect the '75+' that answered was not actually taking my questionnaire seriously because I do not recall asking anyone who would fall into the '75+' age bracket. This overall will help my magazine because now that I am well aware that the majority of the respondents of this questionnaire are youthful meaning that what they suggest is most likely what is new and what is preferred by the youth of today.

3. What colour scheme do you prefer?

My initial instinct was to opt for Black, White and Red because they are what feature in a generic Hip-Hop magazine as can be seen  as they base the main colour schemes of magazines such as 'XXL' and 'The Source'. This will help my magazine because it shows that the reader maybe does not like white and it means I must use all blank space available. 

4. What name do you prefer?

I initially created a shortlist of ten names and narrowed it down to the top six that I liked and then gave my questionnaire participants the option to pick the best one. I never had a preference so I am more that happy to use '$wank' as a name. This showed to me that potentially, aside from 'Swank' being a good name for a hip-hop magazine, having the dollar sign instead of the 's' makes it much more visually appealing and would be a common feature of hip-hop magazines. 

5. What is your favourite hip-hop form?

This struck me as a very important question because my features of the cover and entire layout of the magazine would differ if the general preference of the magazine would be a different sub genre of hip-hop, e.g. if 'Trap' was the overall favourite, the magazine would be very much clothes orientated and the artists would be wearing a lot more gold, or if it was 'Gangsta' there would be a lot more graffiti used and stereotypical 'gangsta' apparel worn such as baseball caps and baggy jeans.

6. Do you think we should cover only mainstream artists or those underground also?

This question was important because this would ultimately change the philosophy of my magazine. If my audience was only interested in the big artists on the market, the magazine would only present them and not be what I initially wanted it to be as a source of new artists as well as the big ones who are currently at the top. This will help my magazine because it shows that the audience of my magazine will appreciate what I initially wanted my magazine to be about and the ethos is accepted by the audience.

7. What do you most look for in magazines?

This is important because it shows that readers care about the interviews most and it means I must construct a high-quality article on my double-page spread because the double page spread because what is on the double-page spread is what matters most on the page.

8. Would you like to see content covering female rappers?

This is important because even thought the magazine questionnaire results showed that the most common gender who are responding to this are males, it showed that the responses to this individual question was not as a result of gender bias and it is a very accurate and reliable response.

9. Would you want/expect rap hybrid-genres such as grime be covered?

This questions shows me that if the reader wanted a magazine of a hip-hop hybrid genre, they would buy one and I am being advised by the questionnaire participants to not condense it all into one magazine. The magazine will be straightly on hip-hop and hip-hop alone.

10. How much would you pay for a magazine?

This is one of the most important questions from a marketing point of view as it shows to me how much my target audience are willing to pay, and it will not sell many copies if the price is dubbed 'unreasonable' and 'expensive' because, as previously covered hip-hop isn't a very expensive genre as far as music goes and then fans usually come from low income backgrounds

Mood Board

¡Artist (Dizzy Wright) smoking  illegal marijuana- marijuana is usually associated with reggae music, as the reggae figure head, Bob Marley, was known to  smoke it  and it looked  bad for the genre. Although still  illegal, marijuana has become a lot more socially acceptable and  rap artist would have encountered it  as most came from poorer backgrounds  and cannabis sales would be seen as an easy way to make money.

¡Illmatic cover-  Hip-hop artists will often refer to classic albums or artists to show how much they know of the genre and it will relate to true hip-hop fans. This is one of the most quoted albums, Illmatic by Nas, and is regarded heavily as the greatest hip-hop album of all time. This inclusion to my mood board doesnt represent Illmatic, but the hip-hop of old and how the times of such artists like Nas, A Tribe Called Quest and Big L has evolved and  turned into this massive musical genre.

¡Aritst (Joey Bada$$) graffiti spraying- Similarly to the inclusion of marijuana, graffiti is a huge association with this genre. Graffiti is actually quite a dated association with this genre, in the early 2000’s and late 90’s a type of rap known as ‘gangsta rap ‘ came about and gang  violence (most notably the bloods and cripz of  Los Angeles,  California) was a height and gangs would spray in different area to mark their territory, so graffiti and deviant spelling (e.g. Da Lifestylez Ov Da Poor and Dangerous, Big L) became very commonly associated with rap music.

¡Wad of cash and dollar signs-  As previously outlined, rap music comes derives from Black-American culture in which entailed quite a poor lifestyle, and making money was the only concern for most. Hip-hop quotes money a lot due to this profound adoration of money, as opposed to other genres such as rock and pop who very rarely quote about making money.

¡Sunglasses and  Baseball caps- Jay-Z is pictured here wearing a Baseball cap, otherwise known as a ‘snapback’, which were previously worn by rappers to show  where they are  from and what city they represent, in this case Jay-Z represents his Brooklyn roots by wearing a New York Yankees snapback. Nowadays snapbacks are worn as a fashionable item and  people all around the world will wear Baseball caps which don’t represent a team or place of origin to the wearer. Sunglasses are worn by rappers as they stereotypically look ‘cool’ and make them look good.

¡Beats Headphones- ‘Beats’ are headphones made by world-famous producer/rapper Dr.Dre, these represent marketing. A lot of rappers would make even more money by creating companies and products and use their image to sell them, such as P Diddy with his vodka ‘Ciroc’, Jay-Z and Pharrell with their clothing line ‘Billionaire Boys Club’ and Snoop Dogg with his brand of rolling papers, Rolling Words.

¡Beyonce- Another topic most rappers rap about are hot girls. Beyonce is regarded as the optimum of any woman a man can get in rap and is quoted by many rappers for her beauty. She is also married to famous rapper Jay-Z so her image is quite fitting to my mood board.

¡Lamborghini-  Aside from weed, girls and money, rappers also frequently rap about cars. Fast, expensive cars. The most quoted cars are usually Mercedes Benz, Bugatti, Maybach and Lamborghini. Some rappers have even made songs devoted to cars alone, e.g. Kanye West’s ‘Mercy’ (Lamborghini) and Ace Hood’s ‘I Woke Up In a New Bugatti’.

¡Bottle of  Hennessy whiskey- As rappers do like to party and get into a state in which they are not able to drive their Lamborghinis, they don’t all get high, many quote Hennessy as their choice of drink, most notably Nas. Hennessy is an upmarket whiskey which would appeal to those with decent money, rappers in this case, and would drink it to present their wealth to those around them. You will often see the person consuming it, carry the bottle around with them, can be seen frequently at award shows, only to show what drink they are drinking

¡Gold chain- Rapper J.Cole is seen here in a large gold chain as most rappers are purely because gold is regarded as the most prestigious colour there. Chains like that would have been worn by kings and very royal folk of old, and it represents the artist as a king of his own, and all rappers aspire to be the best, hence forth want to be kings.

¡Kanye West’s interruption of Taylor Swift at the VMAs- This was one of the most extremely controversial moment in music history. Young country artist, Taylor Swift, had won the award for best music video, and Kanye West, heavily influenced on Hennessy bursts on stage in an uproar, claiming his good friend Beyonce had one of the best videos of all time. The inclusion of this image on the mood board represents controversy surrounding hip-hop. Hip-hop holds arguably the most controversial artists in the music industry, the actions are somewhat understood by most purely because they hip-hop artist.