Q magazine

quote:

Originally posted by Rasher:
CSM on the other hand has evolved into a serious music journo with the authority and passion to go with it - the John Peel of the music press.

Have you read CSM's Hendrix book, Cross Town Traffic ? Well worth looking out, unlike his John Lee Hooker tome which I thought was overblown.

quote:

Originally posted by Sloop John B:
I had a 40th birthday party lately ( puts me in Dad rock phase I suppose)

The playlist which I did on ITunes was heavily dominated by the years 77-82. A phenominal era musically or just the years when musical puberty was reached? If I was 10 years older would the greatest musical time be 65-69?

anyway here's the playlist for you to devour remembering that i did have to pander to some people who had an eclectic collection of 20 cd's

Great play list of real music without pretentions and why wasn't I invited????????

Seriously, a great time for music and interestingly enough, my 18 year old neice reckons the 80's was "the best" era for music;- she's a HUGE fan of The Police, Talk Talk etc. etc. from that period!

Q was the first of its kind, set up my likeminded journalists it was an enthusists mag with erudite indepth features and good album reviews. Then the corporate machine got hold of it. It had to sell mens fragrances, mobile phones etc etc and so it "ladised" itself and filled with t&a atomic kitten articles and incessant lists. Mojo too is now having to tow the corporate line, Uncut remains ok but Word is unmitigated tosh it too is just list after list. NME does feature the latest darlings but at the expense of puerile un-readable tosh. Comes With a Smile on the otherhand steers away from the mainstream, gives a good cd away and features intelligently written articles about interesting artists. It does I fear pander to its music biz advertisers but then its not full of ads for cars, beer, banks or electrical goods.

quote:

Originally posted by bhazen:
Rasher,

Is there some kind of law that these mags must have a Pink Floyd special issue every six months??

Yes, it's called the law of circulation. Put the Floyd or Led Zep or the Beatles on the cover of Q, Mojo or Uncut and they sell more copies. In the same way that putting Kylie or Kate Moss on the cover of Grazia or Heat boosts sales; or Kelly Brook or Rachel Stevens will give the circulation managers of Nuts and Loaded cause to smile.

Kevin

PS Q have a (another) Led Zep special out later this month...

quote:

Originally posted by j8hn:
Q was the first of its kind, set up my likeminded journalists it was an enthusists mag with erudite indepth features and good album reviews. Then the corporate machine got hold of it. It had to sell mens fragrances, mobile phones etc etc and so it "ladised" itself and filled with t&a atomic kitten articles and incessant lists. Mojo too is now having to tow the corporate line, Uncut remains ok but Word is unmitigated tosh it too is just list after list. NME does feature the latest darlings but at the expense of puerile un-readable tosh. Comes With a Smile on the otherhand steers away from the mainstream, gives a good cd away and features intelligently written articles about interesting artists. It does I fear pander to its music biz advertisers but then its not full of ads for cars, beer, banks or electrical goods.

Not quite correct - Q made a Faustian pact with the recrd biz from Day (ie, Issue) One. In return for unprecedented access to Macca, Rod, Elt and the rest of rock aristocracy, they had to be nice to them. Look back at any issue of Q, going all the way back to '86, and you won't find very many hard-hitting or probing interviews - it was very much the Hello! of rock 'n' roll. Except in the "Who the hell does [insert name here] think he/she/they is/are?" section, but even that ran out of steam. A much better mag was IPC's rival, Vox, which had a bit more edge, at least in the first two or three years of its existence [I'm biased, as used to write for this publication occasionally during the period 1990-92].

Part of Q's other problem was its irritating tone, which is due to the Mark Ellen/David Hepworth axis which started up Q, Mojo, Smash Hits and Word - you know the kind of thing I mean - the rather smug public schoolboy humour and the liking for really shite folk musos, over-the-hill hasbeens like Van Morrison and Stephen Stills, as well as clever-clever Alan Partridge-esque FM radio fodder like XTC and Crowded House. It's the Heppo/Ellen influence which occasionally renders Word unreadable - it'd be a great mag otherwise.

Mojo used to be good when my mate Mat edited it (he did things like putting Abba on the cover, for which he received a lot of unfair stick from dadrock-obsssed old farts), but it's lost its way a bit in the last few years although I still buy it. Otherwise I think Uncut's about the best of the bunch, followed by the Observer mag.

Kevin

J8hn,

Bad news, received this email last week:


--------
A Final Smile? A letter from the Editor

Due for mid-January '06 publication, Comes with a Smile's landmark
twentieth issue looks likely to be our last.
--------

I only C/P-ed the first sentence, the email goes on for many paragraphs, explaining why. The website (comeswithasmile.com) will stay open.

Peter



Peter

quote:

Originally posted by Kevin-W:
...as well as clever-clever Alan Partridge-esque FM radio fodder like XTC and Crowded House. It's the Heppo/Ellen influence which occasionally renders Word unreadable - it'd be a great mag otherwise.

Hmmm.... XTC and Crowded House were my two favourite bands from the 90's; I think I understand the controversy now!

Another reason I love Q is those great photo captions (hilarious). A U.S. rock mag could never come up with that.

CP - thanks for letting me know there'll be no more CWAS. It was the only mag left I could read from cover 2 cover.
And Kevin I too find Word un-bearable, however, they did surprise me the other month with a good interview with that doyen of dad-rock Roger Waters.
Was recently bemoaning the state of magazines in general. I used to flick through my girlfriends magazines and wonder what she found to read in them. Now I find the same with mine and have to buy 3xhifi mags and 3x music mags to get anything worth reading per month. Thank god for HiFi+.

If anyone here mourns the passing of the days when girls were strange and men were men or girls, then I can throughly recommend Tony Parson's latest book Stories We Could Tell, which is basically based on his teenage years as a writer on the NME. You will recognise him and other characters in thin disguise together with the musos of the day. Fab book, extremely funny and if you are my age, it's about you too. If you are reading this thread, then this is for you. Trust me.