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Jacob Sundeen Brady Bergeson ENGL 358 8 February 2011 A Rhetorical Analysis of Rolling Stone From its iconic 81 cover picture of a naked John Lennon embracing Yoko Ono to its sometimes-controversial political coverage begun by the always inscrutable Hunter S. Thompson, the U.S.-based magazine Rolling Stone has always been a present force in popular culture. The magazine was founded in 1967 and covers everything from music and movies to politics and national affairs. To any movie buff, Rolling Stones movie reviewer Peter Travers is an instantly recognizable name, and anyone who regularly buys movies and music will find that more often than not a Rolling Stone quote of approval will be present on the packaging. Rolling Stone has been around for a long time, and it has become evident over the years that both visually and textually, the magazine has attempted to maintain its credibility on the political front while simultaneously trying to appeal more to the younger audience with a strong focus on rock and roll culture. When it comes to visuals, simply put, Rolling Stone is a loud magazine. The in-your-face visuals are accompanied by colorful text that is large and, at times, stilted; the text clutters the entire page, and the placement changes from issue-to-issue: sometimes there will be text along

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the top of the page while other times, there will be boxed information in the lower corner of the magazine. The iconic title itself is presented in big, red letters (the colors can vary at times) and in a wavy font that gives off a more laid-back feel to the magazine. The pictures that grace the covers of Rolling Stone are nearly always so large that they cover up the titular header, but they grab your attention right from the start with their often eccentric, even sexual, looks. Take for example a recent issue of Rolling Stone that featured on its cover the young, attractive stars of the popular TV show True Blood naked, covered in blood and looking way too comfortable about the whole thing as they hold each other in an erotic pose. This image sets a significantly more laid-back and casual tone for the magazine than, say, The Economist or The New Yorker, and this tone automatically lends itself to a style that would appeal to a much younger audience than either of the latter magazines mentioned. Just from viewing the front cover, Rolling Stone seems to be targeting the pathos of their audience with their focus on appealing to enjoyment. Young people want to read about the things that give them pleasure: music, movies, celebrities, etc., and the visual component is just as important which is why Rolling Stone is also so visually appealing. However, this focus on pathos can have a negative effect on the magazines ethos, and, more specifically, its credibility. Rolling Stone doesnt just want to be thought of as an entertainment magazine; they want to be taken serious as well which is why in every issue there are political articles printed that are serious in both topic and diction. However, when you have a picture of Guns N Roses looming over The Ethanol Scam along with the yearly Hot List snugged nicely into the corner, then ones ability to be taken seriously might

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start to drop. Rolling Stone has received similar criticism before despite their best efforts to juxtapose two very different subject matters, but this has, in effect, allowed them to create a unique identity for themselves. In a way, theyre comparable to Bono from U2 or The Daily Show/The Colbert Report in that they are the cool kids of politics: they balance being a rock star that can crack jokes but at the same time, talk seriously when it counts. The advertisements present in Rolling Stone play right to the publications younger audience, but even more specifically, they seem to be targeting young males. Advertisements dealing with mens cologne, shaving razors, and video games are largely prevalent throughout the magazine. Specifically, an advertisement by OS Signature cologne shows a young man smiling while a similarly young, attractive woman is pressed up against his body, apparently turned on by his OS-approved odor, and in small print reads: effortless appeal. Many of the cologne ads in Rolling Stone take a similar approach, as this one did, in that they show young males with beautiful women. This sends the message that if you use the advertised cologne, then you will score big with the ladies. Plenty of ads dealing with alcohol and cigarettes are present as well. One cigarette advertisement for Kool XL shows a young man in a leather jacket while an undetermined city serves as the backdrop. The man, who is too cool to look at the reader, casually holds a cigarette in his hand while he seems to be intensely contemplating the meaning of life or maybe just how awesome he looks. In fact, the ad tries painfully hard to ooze coolness from every corner which is assisted by the chic black and white colors emblazoned with a greenish-hue that adds a layer of sophistication. The ad is obviously telling its young male readers that if you smoke Kool XL then you can be just as cool as this guy unless you get lung cancer, of course. The rest of the advertisements are largely compromised of music and technology-related gadgets and toys. Phone ads, in particular, are frequent throughout along with

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ads for new cars, and when you take the advertisements as a whole, you can see that they play perfectly to the rock and roll culture that Rolling Stone exemplifies. Furthermore, what does the magazines audience, the young males, like? Easy: girls, alcohol, fast cars, video games, and really big TVs, and you can find these advertised in spades in Rolling Stone. The textual content of Rolling Stone is varied and more often than not stays true to the spirit of sex, drugs, rock n roll: Interviews with popular bands, popular culture-related stories, music and movie reviews, and political essays all make up the magazine. The majority of the content pertains to popular culture which gives the magazine an overall informal feel. The opening pages of the magazine will remind one much of an internet site: there are short blurbs of information scattered about the pages, and pictures take just as prevalent a role as the words. Most of these stories relate to topics in the music industry: whos going on tour, what artists are doing outside of the music realm, etc.; national news does make an appearance, but it takes a backseat to the entertainment content. Music and movie reviews populate the back section of the magazine, and considering that Rolling Stone has always been an influential voice in critical reviews since its inception, this section serves as its backbone. Currently, music releases are covered by David Fricke with Peter Travers reviewing the movies, and the opinions of these men are respected by many people which gives Rolling Stone a highlevel of credibility in these areas. In fact, the reviews are so crucial that they sometimes even make the cover page such as was the case with Peter Jacksons King Kong. It is also in the Review section that the humor and informality of Rolling Stone really becomes the most apparent. However, since these are reviews, they dont need to be written like theyre a

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dissertation on the works of Shakespeare because these are meant to entertain, and this lets Travers get away with saying stuff like: Its a gay thing. That seems to be the excuse most guys use to avoid musicals. Chicago? Gay. Dreamgirls? Supergay. Phantom of the Opera? Dont start. No way is Hairspray going to turn the dudes Brokeback (97). Now this isnt to say that the Rolling Stone reviewers are only using a high-school level vocabulary because if they did, then they wouldnt be receiving the level of respect that they do. There is still plenty of talk of screenplay, choreography and phrases like cannily subversive (97) to keep the true movie critics content. So what about the beef of the magazine, the cover stories? Similarly to the rest of Rolling Stone, the cover stories tend to relate almost exclusively to popular culture: interviews with stars from movies and television along with interviews with both-up-and coming artists in the music industry and legendary ones, such as Tom Petty and Elton John. These interviews are mostly informal in style and format; they dont follow the rigid format of an essay but instead are set up in an interview-style format, and the language used is often conversational-in-tone complete with slang, expletives, and humorous comments. The articles that dont follow the interview format still maintain the conversational feel by providing stories and anecdotes that emotionally invest the reader with the subject matter. The conversational language used in these articles can be easily understood by any audience which gives Rolling Stone a broad appeal. However, this style of language will not be for everyone. Take for example some of the opening lines of the article titled Hinders Great Balls of Fire: Aaaaaaagh! Blower shrieks as yellow flames leap from his ankle to his testiclesGarvey smiles even wider than usual, his blue eyes glowing on an alcohol-and-adrenaline high. That was awesome (Hiatt 108). Garveys frat boy antics will

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largely appeal to, well, frat boys, but in general, the college-aged audience will find this kind of article to be prime reading. Rolling Stone continues to broaden their appeal by providing insightful articles into national affairs, and it is in these sections that the writers try to appeal to the logos of the audience. The political articles are more formal in structure than anything else in the magazine, following a typical essay format, and they offer facts and statistics instead of the drunkard tales of substance-obsessed musicians. However, these facts and statistics are often skewed as many critics have lambasted Rolling Stone as being overly liberal-biased. After reading through a few issues of the magazine, one couldnt deny the left-leaning tendencies present in all of the National Affairs articles, and in many ways they serve more of a purpose to persuade than to inform. These tendencies becomes most apparent in the section dubbed the Threat Assessment in which the good news is listed in blue (Democrat) and the bad news is listed in red (Republican). Despite the obvious bias present in Rolling Stone, the editorials still offer the reader a unique perspective on political issues while maintaining the magazines trademark use of humor, such as in Jeff Goodells article related to global warming titled Can Dr. Evil Save the World? The image on the left, which precedes the latter article, is effective in that it excites interest in the reader. Even if the reader isnt interested in the content where words like paleoclimatologist (Goodell 70) and geoengineering (72) along with talk of cold-fusion nuclear reactors (72) populate the text, there is a good chance that they will read at least a little bit of the article because of its intriguing

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title and, modestly put, supremely epic picture. Articles like this are a testament to how Rolling Stone is able to maintain a level of accessibility in even its more serious, political-oriented articles. They do this by incorporating the aforementioned humor and by the use of both an academic and conversational tone because even in the Dr. Evil article, there is still room for sentences like: In the Arctic, things are already getting freaky (70). Consider how Goodell, in another one of his articles titled The Ethanol Scam, goes from informing the reader on how the Energy Policy Act of 2005, which was pushed by Corn Belt politicians, mandated the consumption of 7.5 billion gallons of biofuels by 2012 (50) to telling greedy sheiks to fuck off (48) because ethanol is not just hype its dangerous, delusional bullshit (48). The use of expletives gives this article a distinct voice because this style might cause some people to question the writers ethos while simultaneously pulling in the people who dont know what the Energy Policy Act of 2005 is or what is meant by Corn Belt Politicians. However, the fact that Goodell serves up statistics and numbers to the reader further strengthens his articles logos which helps keep the skeptical reader believing that this article has a degree of truth to it. Visually and textually, Rolling Stone has come to identify itself with a younger audience with its unique voice that walks the line between the conversational and formal tone. While there definitely is more of an emphasis on the informal in the magazine, it still maintains a degree of credibility on the political front with its more formal articles on national issues. If the balance shifted more to an emphasis on these political articles, then Rolling Stone might lose a vast majority of its readers, but all in all, Rolling Stone has succeeded in serving its audience by featuring the things that interest them first and foremost: music, movies, and popular culture. Rolling Stone is showing no sign of slowing down either, and it can be safely assumed that it will continue to make its imprint on society in the years to come.

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Works Cited Goodell, Jeff. Can Dr. Evil Save The World? Rolling Stone 16 November 2006: 70 79, 140 141. Goodell, Jeff. The Ethanol Scam. Rolling Stone 9 August 2007: 48 53. Hiatt, Brian. Hinders Great Balls of Fire. Rolling Stone 16 November 2006: 106 110. Travers, Peter. Musicals: Too Gay Or Too Straight? Rolling Stone 9 August 2009: 97.