Music magazine case-study 

The history.

Vibe magazine is a popular music magazine which included information about music and entertainment that is issued out every other month with double covers and a larger online presence. The magazine started in 1993 by musician Quincy Jones and partnered with time Inc. to ensure that his magazine would launch.  The magazine was originally called Volume before The founding editor; Scott Paulson-Bryant gave it the name “vibe”. Both Quincy and time Inc. owned the magazine for 3 years until they sold it to Miller publishing but shortly after that Spin magazine bought it. Spin owned vibe magazine for several years until 2006 when it was bought by Wicks group.

The magazine in 2009, it  was announced that Vibe was ceasing publication immediately but Quincy jones stated that he would like to keep it alive online. After the shutting down of Vibe, Intermedia partners who were partners with Wicks group bought Vibe to resurrect the magazine. They added Uptown magazine vibes parent company, vibe holdings. Later on Vibe holdings merged with black book media, an arts and culture magazine, to form Vibe media in 2012. In 2013 it was announced that Vibe magazine and its online websites were sold to Spin media for an undisclosed sum.  Vibe was likely to shut down the printing of the magazine near the end of 2013.

The content

Vibe magazine is targeted at listeners to R&B, hip-hop and rap. The magazine features R&B and hip-hop artists, actors and other entertainers. It predominantly targets young, urban followers of hip-hop culture. Vibe has several things that are included in the magazine. The magazine devotes several pages to photo spreads displaying high-end designer clothing and sportswear by urban labels such as Roca wear and Fuba which also feature popular singers and artists. When the vibe advertises clothing brands they link them to hip-hop celebrities or they are created for hip-hop celebrities and they use popular singers to model their clothing, an example of this is the women’s clothing “apple bottoms” which was launched in2003 by the rap artist Nelly, Yomi martin and Ian Kelly.  The magazine includes reviews music and artist; it also contains a celebrity gossip column and also a page that includes up-coming artists. Vibe tries to make a consistent effort to feature models of all ethnicities in their pages.  The magazine featured a launch of “the best rappers alive tournament” in 2008.