Top of the pops is a young teen’s music magazine mainly aimed at young teenage girls.

Colours of a magazine are not just chosen because they look nice however they are chosen
because each colour has a different meaning. The colours of the magazine are quite bold
colours the colours include white which symbolize Purity and Cleanliness, yellow which
symbolizes wisdom, joy, happiness, intellectual and energy, pink which symbolizes love and
beauty and blue that is the symbol of youth, spirituality, truth and peace .These colours are
used as they are youthful and cheerful.

The design used on the front cover is pretty basic as there is just one main enlarged image in
the centre of the page with the masthead at the top and all other taglines and images
surrounding it on the outskirts of the cover. The images are of well known stars that most
young teenagers would either recognise or maybe even look up to. Much of the text used
on the front cover overlaps the images of the celebrities with either speech marks or
taglines of the stories included inside this is done because as the target audience are of a
younger age they are more likely to look at the pictures first then read to text beside or on
top on it. However the main image is overlapping the masthead of the magazine the reason
for this is because as this specific magazine is well known there is no need to the masthead
to stand out. Also to make the magazine look more youthful and less boring many different
fonts and text sizes are used.

All of the images on the front cover are well suited to the target audience as they are all
younger celebrities. Joe Mcelderry, is the main image on this magazine, he is young and very
new to fame. Joe is what we would call a reality pop star as he is just a normal person who
has reached his dream to become a famous pop star, this is the reason that many of the
children and teenagers will look up to him as they may have the same aspirations. He is not
the only reality pop star used to attract the readers on the front cover other celebrities such
as Aston Merrygold, Cheryl Cole and NDubz have also been used.

Altogether the celebrities that have been used are happy and smiley this is to look friendly
to the children, who will be buying the magazine. The hairstyles, make-up and clothes are
very fashionable, youthful and modern. This again appeals to the younger target audience
as they will be able to think that they too can look that glamorous.

T o all of the strap lines used on the front cover there is a human side element as the
readers are getting an insight into the celebrities lives for example “Robert: I was crying with
my dog”. This will automatically make the readers want to find out why a celebrity idol was
crying. Another example is the strapline “GUESS WHO?! Find out inside” this will also make
the reader want to buy the magazine to find out who the celebrity child is. From the front
cover we can also see that this magazine is not just full of celebrity gossip but also real life
events for example there is a strapline which says “Frazzled by a sunbed” which suggests
this is not just a music magazine but also includes other bits of information. The straplines
used by this magazine have been well suited to the target audience as young teens are
impressionable an example to show that the editors have taken advantage of this is the
strapline ”wanna be famous?” as it is very unlikely that they will actually become famous
but this is what many young teens want. From a glance at the front cover you can see that
the magazine is mainly about pop stars lives but also includes some real life stories and
appealing information to the target audience. The font size and large pictures are big
enough to read from a distance so this will attract the reader’s attention and stand out on
the shelf.

Language plays an important part in grabbing the reader’s attention. As the target audience
of this magazine is young teens the vocabulary mustn’t be too difficult for the reader to
understand. A lot of slang is used for example “wanna be” this will seem ‘cool’ to the
readers. The word “budget” is also used as it aimed at young teens they may not have a lot
of money. The tagline “Joe needs you!” makes the reader feel as if they are directly spoken
to.

Overall this front cover is well suited to the target audience, it gives a good impression of
what the magazine includes. It is designed to appeal to young teens and appeals to the
readers interests by using well known reality celebrities and includes stories about their
personal lives. Misleading taglines are used as young teens are easily influences and the
popstars images on the front are of people that the target audience are likely to look up to.
This front cover would not appeal to many people other than young teens as the images,
colours and fonts used are very youthful and also slang is used and this would not appeal to
an older generation.

This music magazine is unconventional of all other music magazine as the front page is also
the contents page. As you can see each of the taglines and photos have a page reference
next to them. The reason that this specific magazine does not have a contents page is
because as this magazine is aimed at young teens and children many of them will not bother
to look for a contents page however they will just flick through the magazine to see what
they are looking for or are interested in.