Magazines that are leaving me. By no choice of their own.

Since I started living in the APT in the BKL, (WTfrak?), I’ve picked up a  mess of magazine subscriptions. Some where through reupping on Salon, other on the stark denial that I really didn’t need to waste a hundred or so bucks on foreign music mags, especially the ones without the pics of hot chicks dancing on drugs that would make Ken Kesey say “No, no. No.”

So I’m letting some go. Just fade away. Who knows? I might even get around to recycling them…
1) Q. Since getting my first music magazine and mixtape back in the UK in ‘92, I’ve always appreciated the English model. Buy a magazine, get a mix tape/CD, pillage said mix tape/CD for the obscure tracks that make your mix tapes/CD’s look so frikkin cool. And while CMJ is the American stand out, the Virigin Megastore at 14th’s street, the Tower in the Village, and assorted Universal News’ could keep you up to date with what was being published/compiled on the other side of the pond.

Select Magazine and Uncut were particular stand outs, Select disappearing from around 2001, Uncut becoming a favorite.
And then there was Q. Q features a very snarky vibe, something closer to a Britisn newspaper or gossip rag. Cheeky ,as the Brits might say. It regularly says nice things about an artist in one issue, than ganks them in the letter column in the next issue. It also featured some decent CD mixes, but fewer times over the years. What benefits I get on keeping up with British pop culture- not a bad thing when you work with tourists, are outweighed by the writers being such utter prats.

So good buy to Q.

2) Reason. Reason is one of the free subscriptions from rejoining Salon. It’s a Libertarian magazine, with a dose of Ayn Rand worship mixed in. The best things tend to be the Pete Bagge covers,

The magazine is kind of a right wing version of hanging out with Nader supporters. They know EVERYTHING IS WRONG, and have PERFECTLY REASONABLE ARGUMENTS AND SUGGESTIONS, but nothing that works outside their narrow frame of reference. If you want to get rid of government in people’s lives, but don’t have anything to protect people in it’s absence, what’s the use?

A last read of one or two back issues may be worth it, but Reason is just the converted preaching to the converted.

3) Plenty A bi-monthly environmentalist magazine. Another Salon freebie.

Never quite got around to reading it, caught an advice column. Someone was talking about how to save paper on wedding invites, and dried elephant dung paper was suggested.

Ok. Thanks. I get how screwed we are, but elephant dung paper? And are those local elephants? Are you telling me you would import elephant dung just for your weeding invites?

Such hypocrisy.

4) The New York Review of Books Literary Porn. Or Literature Porn.
Honestly, it’s smart. There is good writing. I think most bloggers wish they could be what the NYRB could be.

But ultimately, it’s like porn. Instead of watching people do things you may or may not want to do to/with people you may or may not want, you are reading about people reading books you may or may not want to read, and likely will never have the time to.

I wish I had the time to catch up on the NYRB, maybe even read a book or two it talks about. But if I had that time, wouldn’t it be better spent reading newspapers or keeping better clued into current events? The NYRB is the one I most regret letting go, just because it would be so geek cool to actually read it.

There are still magazines I don’t read enough, others that are less worthy, or needy, of my subscription than the ones above. But I have a chance in hell of reading them.

Thus, to each departing magazine in order:

1) bugger off, I’ll buy you when you have a cd worth getting you cheeky bastard
2) Uhm, a narrow philosophical viewpoint is not reasonable
3) sorry, not as scared of the end of the world as we know it as I should be
4) mock me in your mandals and turtleneck. I’ll enjoy and pop culture and not cry while I do it

Tags: Magazines