Genre/Readership
• Dork genre distinctly falls under the term indie; however
they predominately feature just indie pop/ bedroom pop
artists such as Cavetown and Declan Mckenna. In the past
they have had front covers of indie rock bands such as
Wolf Alice
• The 21st century indie pop industry has a largely female
fanbase and many LGBTQ and other minority groups of
society
• The readership conventionally is the fanbase of artists
featured(usually British) /aficionados of the indie genre in
general. Their ages bracket ranges from 13-20 but skews
towards a British teenage female audience (dependent on
band featured) however their may be some anomalies to
the target demographic
Straplines/masthead
• “down with boring” is the selling line featured under the
masthead. It is a short memorable phrase that has some
humor to it, potentially appealing to the teenage
demographic
• The actual name Dork is explicitly targeted towards
teenagers for a sense of relatability as it is a colloquial
term used amongst them
• “get fresh” followed by short description of the content
inside the magazine (not just wallows)
Indie magazine genre codes followed
• Capitalised masthead
• Minimalistic layout/lots of negative space on front
image
• Limited subdued colour pallet
• Secondary display font for the promotion of the main
artist article
• Artists appearances in typical indie style
• Thick blocky capital fonts for masthead
• Short snappy sell line
• Capitalised small bodied fonts
Front page image
• Shot on a fisheye lens which is a recent addition to the
indie culture and used by artists and fans alike on social
media and album covers.
• Text is mostly positioned on the negative black space of
the image
• ‘candid’ shot of the band as if it was randomly taken by
an amateur, not made to look planned/complicated
• Doesn't feature images of other content
inside/promotional additions leaving the image
relatively raw
Representations
• Dyed hair/mullet hair cut/vintage skater style clothing
are all representations of the indie subculture of gender-
neutral fashion
• White heterosexual cisgender males make up the whole
band which is common for indie bands. No
diversity/representation of minority groups on the front
page
Colours/Fonts
• Monochrome colour pallet
used around the images to
make them stand out more
and draw less attention to
the text
• Same secondary display
font used on the front cover
(‘get fresh’) used again for
the page number, artist
name and date for added
emphasise and to keep the
aesthetic/ theme throughout
• The colours of the actual
images are all limited to 3
or 4 colours only
• The information about each
article is written in a light
lowercase font to match the
lower case of the display
font
• Website is promoted on
every page in a small font
next to every page number
Organisation/General Aesthetic
• The layout is fairly organised and the main focal points
are based in the middle of the page
• Promotional photoshoots are used in a grid formation as
thumbnails to showcase the visuals for each 4-page
article. Each artist is featured equally
• Front page band with main article is not exaggerated in
anyway, subverting conventions of indie magazines
• Simplistic layout with lots of negative space and
symmetry/following rule of thirds to some extent
Index
• Almost like
another contents
page
• Features page
numbers for the
lesser promoted
articles
• Front cover
image featured
again
• Editors letter for
a personal touch
Headline/Subheading
• Headline “with debut album Nothing Happens behind
them Wallows haven’t been sitting about twiddling
their thumbs”. This therefore sums up what the article
with be about (what wallows have been doing in
lockdown)
Content
• Dork has released several promotional covers at once
for each artist (all featured below) with a full article of
the front page artist and a 4 page article on all the
others promoted (everything else is the same in each)
therefore giving the consumer choice.
• General conversation with the band about lots of topics
such as their new album “Nothing Happens” and about
their recent growth in popularity
September’s
promotional
magazine covers
Fonts and colours
• Dork uses 3 colour (excluding the photographs)
which are white, black and blue. These colours all
compliment each other and the white text on black
gives a more modern feel.
• The fonts used for the quotes aren’t display fonts and
just a bold sans serif font that is underlined in blue,
adding to the modern feel and keeping the focal
points the images
• range of different sized fonts used
Language style
• Slang/colloquial language used to suit the young
teenage target audience
• References internet culture such as memes and other
pop culture subjects (intertextuality) that the target
audience would be familiar with
• Conversational tone, as if you were friends with the
band and having a casual conversation with them
• Humorous/casual tone
Layout
• Picture dominated with almost every double page
having one-page exclusively for an image
• Text is small and placed in 5 column rule which the
texts follows but the pictures break the rule and
overlap 3 columns
• Quotes from the band are highlighted amongst main
article
• A thick black border is left on the edges of most on
the pages