From the front cover, you can tell that there the main feature is going to be an interview with Zac Efron. This is clear because the main cover line reads “THE NEW AMERICAN HEART THROB ZAC EFRON”. He is also featured on the main image of the front cover. There are also going to be articles about “Clapton’s guitar goes festival” and “Punk rock fight club”.The target audience for this magazine is probably younger people, between 16-27 years of age. They enjoy reading about the latest music gossip, yet they are still interested in what is happening in the world. The target audience for this magazine in particular is female and probably between 16-20 years. This is due to the person that is on the front.

Zac Efron is a mature teenager, known for being an actor, dancer and singer. Although he is well known to younger children for being in films such as High School Musical, it is clear that this interview is aimed more at older teenagers, due to the photograph where he is standing in quite a suggestive pose. As this magazine appeals to these older people, it is appropriate to have him on the front, as long as he was being presented in this way. Zac Efron is extremely famous at the moment, and a lot of people want to know about him. By having him on the front, it will attract attention from people and make the want to buy the magazine.

The main cover line reads “THE NEW AMERICAN HEART THROB ZAC EFRON”. This implies that this artist is new to the music scene. It also implies that he is going to be liked by a lot of people, probably due to his good looks.There are not any groups in particular being represented on this front cover.
The words ‘HEART THROB’ stand out extremely well on the page, probably due to the large font and bright red font colour. This draws the user’s attention to them, causing them to want to make their own opinion as to whether they believe he is the latest ‘heart throb’, as this magazine makes out.
The masthead for this magazine is normally always covered slightly by the main image. This is because their masthead is an extremely well known design, they do not need to make it stand out. However, the masthead can still be seen slightly. It is in quite a professional looking font, especially because of the 3-dimensional effects that have been added to it.
The colours used on this front cover are quite simple. The masthead is written in grey, the background for the image is plain white and the coverlines and kickers are written in grey and yellow. These colours do not stand out very well, yet the Rolling Stone probably feel like they don’t need to make the colours stand out, due to the reasons I explained in the question above.
The font remains the same on the front cover, making it extremely consistent. It is a sans serif font, to appeal to the younger members of the target audience. The font is also extremely plain and basic, meaning that the user is forced to focus directly one what they are actually reading, and not the distracted by different font styles.