Rock Sound is a British magazine that covers rock music. The magazine aims at being more "underground" and less commercial, while also giving coverage to better-known acts. It generally focuses on pop punk, post-hardcore, metalcore, punk, emo, hardcore, heavy metal and extreme metal genres of rock music, rarely covering indie rock music at all. The tag-line "For those who like their music loud, extreme and non-conformist" is sometimes used. Although primarily aimed at the British market, the magazine is also sold in Australia, Canada and the United States.
History
The British edition of Rock Sound was launched in March 1999 by the French publisher Editions Freeway. The magazine was bought out by its director, Patrick Napier, in December 2004. The magazines offices are in London. Separate titles with the same name have been published under the same umbrella company in France since 1993, and in Spain since 1998.
The first issue was published in April 1999. Issue 2 featured British band Reef on the front cover, and later issues 3 and 8 featured Terrorvision and Foo Fighters respectively. In July 2011 a host of "Through The Years" articles were written to celebrate the 150th issue of the magazine. 2017 witnessed the first annual Rock Sound Awards where £1 from every magazine bundle sold was donated to the One More Light Fund in memory of Chester Bennington.
The magazine was known for including a free CD in most issues, which had tracks from bands' new albums that have not been released as singles. These were called '100% Volume' or 'The Volumes', with other past compilations named 'Music With Attitude', 'Bugging Your Ears!', 'Sound Check' and 'Punk Rawk Explosion'. Sometimes whole albums were included with the magazine, particularly from bands wanting to gain exposure, including Futures' debut album The Holiday in March 2010, and Burn The Fleet's debut album The Modern Shape in May 2012.
In more recent years, exclusive artist merchandise including t-shirts have been sold alongside the magazine via the Rock Sound web store.
In 2023, Rock Sound became part of WhyNow media group and a special edition magazine was published in partnership with Slam Dunk Festival featuring headliners Enter Shikari and The Offspring on the cover. A weekly digital cover feature, The Album Story, was also launched on ROCKSOUND.TV.
Rock Sound's 300th issue was published in September 2023 with Fall Out Boy, Corey Taylor and Motionless In White appearing on the cover. The magazine will celebrate its 25th anniversary in 2024.
Audience
The magazine had a circulation figure of 15,005 from January to December 2010 auditored by ABC. This includes 10,162 sales in the United Kingdom and Ireland, and 4,843 from Other Countries. The same auditing body said the magazine had a slightly lower circulation figure of 14,227 from January to December 2011, with sales of 10,053 from the United Kingdom and Ireland, and 4,174 from Other Countries. The majority of sales come from newstrade, with some coming from subscriptions.
The main rival to the magazine in Britain is Kerrang! because of the similar types of music both magazines cover.
Album of the Year
At the end of every year the magazine lists their favourite 75 albums released in the previous twelve months.
1999 – Filter – Title of Record
2000 – A Perfect Circle – Mer de Noms
2001 – System of a Down – Toxicity
2002 – Isis – Oceanic
2003 – Hell Is for Heroes – The Neon Handshake
2004 – Isis – Panopticon
2005 – Coheed and Cambria – Good Apollo, I'm Burning Star IV, Volume One: From Fear Through the Eyes of Madness 2006 – The Bronx – The Bronx 2007 – Biffy Clyro – Puzzle 2008 – Genghis Tron – Board Up the House 2009 – Mastodon – Crack the Skye 2010 – Bring Me the Horizon – There Is a Hell Believe Me I've Seen It. There Is a Heaven Let's Keep It a Secret 2011 – Mastodon – The Hunter 2012 – The Menzingers – On the Impossible Past 2013 – letlive – The Blackest Beautiful 2014 – Lower Than Atlantis – Lower Than Atlantis 2015 – Bring Me the Horizon – That's the Spirit 2016 – Panic! at the Disco – Death of a Bachelor 2017 – All Time Low – Last Young Renegade 2018 – Twenty One Pilots – Trench 2019 – Waterparks Fandom 2020 – Yungblud - Weird! 2021 – Twenty One Pilots - Scaled and Icy