NME - 'the ultimate guide to the week in music'

HISTORY
The paper's first issue was published on 7 March 1952 after the Musical Express and Accordion Weekly was bought by London music promoter Maurice Kinn, and relaunched as the New Musical Express.

It was initially published in a non-glossy tabloid format on standard newsprint. 

On 14 November 1952, taking its cue from the U.S. magazine Billboard, it created the first UK Singles Chart. The first of these was, in contrast to more recent charts, a top twelve sourced by the magazine itself from sales in regional stores around the UK. 

TYPICAL CONTENT

The typical cover of a NME magazine will be of a single artist with there name as the prominent writing on the page. The colour scheme used are normally tailored to the magazine and take inspiration from the artist on the cover. The colour will normally be taken from something insignificant, for example, on a previous issue the colour scheme was derived from the artists nail varnish. I think this is so clever and gives the magazine a fresh look each month! The covers aren't normally too busy as everything is clear and easy to read but they are never to empty either. They often will have a burst such as the 'Blur comeback interview exclusive!' to highlight interesting things that are inside.
The typical NME magazine consists of around 70 pages though this will sometime change with special editions. Artists such as Oasis, Rihanna, Kasabian, Lady Gaga and many more have graced the cover and inside pages. The issue will normally start with news relevant to the time of release concerning the world of music. Which will then be followed by feature articles of different artists and pages for letters from the readers. You would also find advertisements, competitions. An unusual feature of the magazine is that it doesn't have a contents page but instead a band index which alphabetically lists all of the artists appearing in the magazine and which page to find them.
The typical layout of a page inside NME is very similar to that of a newspaper. This is especially evident on the news section where the prominent colour scheme is black and white, fitting with the conventions of a newspaper.


TYPICAL READER
The national readership survey is a website that is very helpful for finding out these sorts of things but only to a certain extent. From the web page we can tell that around 253,000 people brought the magazine between October 2010 and September 2011. This only shows who brought it though as many others may have read it, either in the shop, a copy of someone elses or even sitting in the hairdressers. The website also breaks down who brought it into ages. The two age ranges are 15-44 and 45+, these, especially the first, are very broad age ranges. If you take the two extremes from the first one, 15 and 44, their opinions and views on a magazine would be very different. So to have them in the same category doesn't really seem sensible, it's kind of like taking the views of Christians and Catholics as the same, it just wouldn't work.
The survey does however tell us the amount of men and women that buy the magazine and 0.4% more of the male population buy the magazine than the women population. This seems plausible as the magazine does seem to be aimed more at men due to its sometimes provocative images of women and the authority the male artists present when they're on the cover. Though again, this isn't totally representable as some women may read the copies that a male has brought and vice versa.


READER FACTS; 

• total readership spends £326 million on audio equipment per year
• 52% working full-time
• 29% are still studying
• 71% of readers think it's important to look well dressed

HOUSESTYLE
NME's housestyle is similar in nearly every magazine. The masthead 'NME' is always found in the top left corner  which allows the readers to identify it straight away. The main artist of the issues name is normally always the most prominent thing on the cover. This will help in establishing creditability for the issue. The magazine is quite loud and in your face to comply with its 'indie rock' feel. This is because the ideology of indie rock is quite a calm loud, although that sounds absolutely absurd, it works. 


PRODUCTION AND DISTRIBUTION

NME is published by IPC media ltd. This is a UK publishing company which produces over 60 iconic media brands. With print alone it reaches almost two thirds of UK women and 42% of UK men, totalling almost 26 million UK adults. There male portfolio consists of brands such as Nuts, Rugby World and of course NME. As well as this their women's division also holds brand names such as Marie Claire, Look and Chat. 

As well as the magazine NME now also stretches across many different media platforms such as nme.com, NMETV, NME radio and many live events and awards.

SOCIAL GROUP REPRESENTATION
NME creates quite a realistic view on the celebrity culture that we have become accustomed to and also often presents it from their point of view. Although NME will vastly only represent a small cross section of the music industry - the 'indie rockers' - it will sometimes venture to produce articles with more commercial artists as the muse. Previously this has included artists such as Lily Allen and Lady Gaga who are obviously international starts, a great reason to have them on the cover of your magazine.
I think the way in which NME presents its reader is in a quite intellectual way by the format and content of its articles. The use of sometimes offesive images on the cover does manage to keep the edge that NME has created. Although many people may like to read it, it doesn't appeal to all due to its sometimes 'bad boy' nature.

ANY INTERESTING?
NME is mainly focused on selling to men. This is quite expected by the amount of attention paid to females within its pages.

And nothing else as of yet. If i find something, it'll be here shortly after.