NME Magazine Analysis

NME

NME stands for the new musical express and it has been published since March 1952 by TimeIncUK. It has overseen a lot of changes to content and the type of music it has shown, however it remains the worlds most recognized, iconic music magazine. It has become recognisable by the red masthead which has remained similar- with only slight variations- since 1978.  Only 25 years later after it first became published, it had become a music newspaper which gave the youths of the population a place to keep in touch with the latest music throughout the years. The company transformed from a newspaper format to a magazine leading up to 1998 and after that it has remained a popular magazine, even due to complications with competing brands at the time. Keeping up with the modern days, they also created an online version- NME.com- which has accumulated since 1996, to seven million users online every month. They have had an app made and it has also joined social media, with 586,275 likes on Facebook and 790,000 Twitter followers. NME created the first ever UK Singles chart and it now focuses on the latest rock, alternative and indie music. Statistics show that the median age of readers is 25 and the majority of readers are men, however the magazine is loved by all and even won the “Music Media Brand of the Year”, recently in 2013. Another recent change has shown the current editor, Mike Williams, giving away the magazine for free from September 2015 due to the lack of funds the magazine had produced, despite its popularity. NME has been described as: “The magazine at the forefront of music culture”, and they have known to launch the careers of some of the largest acts in the world, such as The Killers, Arctic Monkeys and Florence and the Machine. They have not only displayed popular acts in the magazine, but also created the NME Awards, Shows & Tours to spotlight their acts to over 215,000 music fans annually.