Magazine Article Analysis

The artist featured in the article suggests that the target audience will be Cheryl Cole's fans, young boys and girls, aspiring singers and the Newcastle community she's from.

The language used suggests its for higher educated people, because the vocabulary is fairly complex. The article uses semiotic codes to communicate about Cheryl Cole and how she's developing as an artist; publicly, physically and emotionally.

When I see the images I get the impression that Cole seems considerably unattainable, for instance her spiked vest top emits an aggressive style and it looks as though its her armor.

Although the magazine seems sophisticated, the writer still quotes Cheryl's profane language.

On all of the pages, the same sans serif font is used. The text looks like a Times Roman font which is quite formal. The text is arranged in columns, its neat and organised. Cheryl’s photo only takes up ¼ of the page and the rest is text; however there are a couple of spreads photos of Cole. This could indicate that the article is more important than her image and for the reader to not lose concentration, because if there's too much text the reader could get bored quite quickly.

The tone of the article is quite friendly, but also direct. They’re trying to convey that Cheryl Cole is this rising ‘Phenomenon’ from the U.K. Cole is presented as a new woman; revealing clothes, red lipstick, dark eye makeup. The setting of the images portrays a rebellious side to Cole. The tight black cat suit accentuates her figure, giving her an ideal female body shape. Her red lipstick symbolises fierceness. The black motorcycle gives the impression she’s adventurous and untamed.

An effective house style is used. Basic colours such as red, white and black are used throughout the whole article. The colours are effective because they’re bold and they bounce off each other. The front page has a big red ‘X’ on a black background. This ‘X’ could symbolise Cheryl’s new persona the article is trying to exploit; she’s more fierce, sexier and untouchable. The ‘X’ represents a sort of barrier or fence that withdraws us from her other side. This isn’t the first time the public has witnessed an artist developing a new persona, in the music industry they call it an ‘Alter Ego’, although Cheryl doesn’t mention anything about her other side, she does say ‘I’m a completely different person’ and the article says ‘Cheryl is happy to become someone not quite herself’. This gives the audience the impression that Cheryl’s becoming a new artist; developing new features such as green eyes (contacts) and ‘new’ feline eyebrows.

The article doesn’t necessarily demand prior knowledge; however it does talk about Cheryl’s previous experience in the music industry. For instance they talk about her former girl band 'Girls Aloud' where she started her name and her footballer ex husband Ashley Cole. The article mentions every aspect of her life, this implies that they're interested in her and so is the reader.