NME.... what a great magazine! (NME)

Member Name: jackthereviewer

Product:	NME
Date:	13/08/07 (130 review reads)
Rating:

Advantages: All you need to know about the latest goings on

Disadvantages: Can be brief and it ends alot sooner than you want it to. a little bit pricey too

I have found the NME magazine to be an extremely useful read over the last few years. I suppose it does contradict the idea of avoiding the main-stream simply by the fact that it is a magazine, although it is unarguably unique.

Every issue is full of interviews of bands, both familiar and completely unrecognised, allowing you to make comparisons and judge what you may want to buy next with the reassurance that NME has given it the "thumbs up".

Another feature that i love about my wednesday (weekly publication release day) read of NME is that it is all about the music. By this i mean that you wont find the photos and crazy tales of the recent glastonbury festival interupted by a massive A4 sized advert for a new sofa or cheaper car insurance. Every page is about the music and is music related...great! NME will also guarantee to make you laugh at some stage as there is plentiful humourous commentary on the bands and photos of fans.

NME are however fairly stingy when it comes to free stuff. The amount of great close up photos that the NME photographers get of the bands in action is jaw dropping... yet they never think (or very rarely think) to drop in a free poster every week, even a small one. I have to point out that NME did churn out a respectable DVD with every copy of the "NME Awards 2007". The DVD was great because as i have already pointed out, the NME camera men are always where the action was and watching the dvd was probably preferable to actually seeing the awards live.

If anything NME needs to be a little longer. It has sacrificed size and bulk for lots of small, yet fairly detailed, articles about a larger amount of bands. It surely cant be that hard on the NME wallet to make the articles more detailed and expand beyond the horizons of the 70-74 page mark? This all relates back to the price.... well its simply too much. At £2.10 you would expect to be able to grab your free key ring and then sit down reading your NME and barely have enough time to finish it before the next release. however the reality is that when you have finished eading the parts you actually want to read about you will have killed well under an hour in total. the pages are also very delicate and have the feel of a newspaper. I suppose this simply adds to the character of the whole magazine and its not as though there are many pages to turn!

The back pages of NME are full of the latest gigs and festivals and it provides you with numbers to call to get tickets. this is great. Not only will NME sort out what music you should give a listen to but it also sorts out the summer and those dull weekends when you have a spare £20 (for a gig ticket)!

NME does however have a great reputation amongst the new music\ indie rock scene which enables me to trust the opinion of the well written mag. All interviews are conducted with the stars of the indie world, most notably Pete Doherty and the opinion of the bands is expressed as well as the opinion of the guys at the NME H.Q! i simply wouldnt get by without NME it has become a habit now and i am greatful for it, my ipod wouldnt have become the essential thing it is without NME.

Summary: Great magazine for the indie sceensters!