As per the headline in Question #2, was the headline representative of the article? Please explain your reasoning in detail. (4 Marks)
Based on what we discussed in class this headline represents the article very well and has many of the elements that create a good headline including clarity, relevance, power words, uniquely stands out, keywords, and targets its ideal audience well. It clearly states that “Ozzy Osbourne Regrets Nothing About Standing Up to Kanye West” which makes the context of this article very clear and concise and has relevance to those who know Kanye West, Ozzy Osbourne, or are interested in either rap or rock industry. Using action words like “Regrets Nothing” and “Standing up” insights to the audience who know Ozzy and his music to also stand and regret nothing when speaking about Kayne West and how he represents a very discriminative political stance. Politics aside, no one should be saying the things Kayne says or supporting his questionable decisions in the past. Kanye made it publicly known in 2021 that he enjoys working with homophobic artists who have sexual assault allegations by bringing them on stage and performing with them. He has also stated that “Slavery sounds like a choice” in 2018. (https://www.tmz.com/2018/05/01/kanye-west-tmz-live-slavery-trump/)
All of these actions Kanye has done and stood by have made him a very controversial person in the music industry and Ozzy stated that he doesn’t “…want any of (his) work in any shape or form to be associated with anything like that” which is why there should be no regrets when discussing the actions of artists like Kayne West. I think this headline holds a lot of power and influence when you dive into both sides of Kayne West and Ozzy Osbourne. This headline uniquely stands out because Kayne West and Ozzy are never really mentioned together in the same sentence so those who know about these artists, have to know there isn’t a lighthearted aspect of this article and has a unique perspective of speaking directly to Ozzy while Kayne had stayed silent on the topic. You get to hear directly from Ozzy Osbourne on the topic.
Rolling Stone covered this topic in depth because they know their audience is mainly middle-aged men who most likely know about the rock music industry (Ozzy Osbourne included) but are young enough to still know who Kanye West is. This story and headline would be relevant and attractive to both fans of Kayne West and Ozzy Osbourne because even if someone were to only support and like Kayne West, they would find it interesting that Kayne made such a bold move and want to read more about it. Black Sabbath and Ozzy Osbourne combined have around 25M monthly listeners on Spotify while Kayne has around 75M (https://songstats.com/ ) with Kayne’s popularity on Spotify this article would be appealing to his fans regardless of their perspective and just simply based on the number of monthly listeners, whereas the only people reading this in support of Ozzy Osbourne are most likely die-hard fans who still care about him to this day which in retrospect is a much smaller number of people considering his age and audience demographics but still enough to gain impressions and clicks on this article.
Rolling Stone Demographics (Current) https://www.similarweb.com/website/rollingstone.com/#demographics
Spotify Monthly Listeners for Ozzy Osbourne, Black Sabbath, and Kanye West – https://songstats.com/
I think this headline is very representative of this article because it holds a very unbiased opinion and does not state which side of the feud is correct which allows for fans of Kanye West and Ozzy Osbourne to find interest and click to read more about the situation. It states that something big and interesting enough had to happen for Ozzy to come out and say something to Kayne but does not state exactly what happened right away in the headline which leaves readers wanting to know more about the topic. Fans of Kayne West can find interest in this article if they are supportive of Kayne, his music, or his personal beliefs which is a very large number of people compared to Ozzy Osbourne. Readers of Rolling Stone could be potential fans of either of these artists so I think it was a great idea for Rolling Stone to personally interview and speak with Ozzy Osbourne on the topic – this also allowed fans and readers to hear directly from Ozzy and why he had to stand up to controversial artist Kanye West who is known to speak out outrageously. This article summed up the situation greatly and was only a five-minute read which I appreciated greatly. Fans of Kayne are left satisfied knowing Kanye still put out a great song regardless of the outcome with the sample, and fans of Ozzy are satisfied knowing that he stood up for what he believed in and protected his career and his music at the end of the day.