Next if we look at the front page of each magazine we can see many similarities. Both have a masthead and a slogan. The slogans for both have a theme of music. ‘Kerrang’s’ being ‘Life is Loud’ and ‘Terrorizer’s’ being ‘Extreme Music-No Boundaries’. Both are short and have an ‘in your face’ atmosphere surrounding them. Both have Headlines and sub headlines which tackle some of the same bands but ‘Terrorizer’ choose to use and feature bands which play more extreme forms and genres of music hence the slogan. Both have the whole page covered with one single photo of the lead story with all other text being placed on top of it and also have a barcode. A difference between the two is that ‘Terrorizer’ is throwing in a free CD with songs from bands that are featured in the magazine where as ‘Kerrang’ is not. This gives ‘Terrorizer’ an advantage which could help them to a bigger sale.
Thirdly we can turn over and look at the back page. Both of the back pages have one large advert of an album of a band that is probably listened to by a great many of the readers. It gives details of when the album comes out and what the album is available on e.g. vinyl, CD, cassette, etc. The background of the page is mainly filled with some form of picture which has relevance to the album cover.
Both have a single page of contents, located on the first page, which highlight certain stories and where they are with different use of size and colour. There is also a small article from the editor talking about what’s going on in the issue. This also usually reminds you of an event they are organising or an event coming up which is sponsored by them.
Fifthly the advertising in both magazines is incredibly similar. The adverts are the backbone of a magazine. It’s what gives magazines a much larger profit than just simply the profit of sale. ‘Kerrang’ is much denser with advertising than ‘Terrorizer’. Both have lots of different advertisements but are all for the audience who are reading the magazine. There are only four different types of products being advertised. These being: music in the form of CD’s, videos and DVDs; Cloths and clothing accessories; mobile phone accessories (tones, screensavers, pictures); and rock concerts. Most of the adverts will appeal to readers so this shows that the magazines are well aware of who buys their magazine and who doesn’t.
Lastly I shall talk about the reviews sections where the editors give their opinions on music/bands that are already out in the shops or will be out in the near future. Both reviews sections feature nearly identical lists of CDs, films and videos but not in the same order. Also both seem to take the opposite views on nearly the entire CD reviews IE ‘Terrorizer’ praises one band where as ‘Kerrang’ doesn’t. Also ‘Terrorizer’s’ reviews are almost twice as long as ‘Kerrang’s’ and go into more detail with particular songs. They also give constructive criticism and praise where as ‘Kerrang’ just gives an opinion and doesn’t go into much detail with regards to the actual way the music is sounding. In other words they don’t even give a remote description of the music unless it’s an opinionated description.
You can see why ‘Kerrang’ is popular in the same way you can see the ‘Sun’ is popular but personally I would rather go out and buy a magazine which offers more to read; a free CD: and constructive reviews with less advertising rather than buy a magazine with fewer stories; less informative reviews; bias stories; and one which costs an extra pound. So I would buy ‘Terrorizer’ for all the reasons above and for a generally better read.