muzik magazine to close

Robin I don't think it was like the NME - if anything it reminded me of the NME back when I first read it, though.

it certainly isn';t market-leading in terms of sales, when a 'specialist' rock mag like Kerrang! trounces it in circulation every single week.

What they should have done,

get rid of films from Uncut and get rid of Alt.country/ Americana focus.
take the best bits of Muzik
take the best bits of Uncut
look back at what made Melody Maker work so well in the late 80s
and then rebrand this combined new magazine as an essential music monthly ...using Melody Maker as the brand !

as I understand from sources in the past 12 months both IPC and EMAP intend to launch new magazines within the music sector.

PLEASE let the NME go down next...

first 30 issues of Muzik were brilliant - a real education for me. in 1995 i still had no real idea who Derrick May really was or why he was so important, i'd never heard Hardfloor's 'Acperience', 'Sueno Latino', didnt know about the Heavenly Social, didnt really like glitzy house music, didnt appreciate Kraftwerk much, knew my onions about the rave and subsequent jungle scene and that was about it.

Muzik changed that with witty and knowledgeable writing from the likes of Calvin Bush, Rob Da Bank, Ben Turner - i had quite an education from reading the whole thing. despite some initial resistance ("what is the big fuckin deal with Junior Vasquez?") they won me over.

they kicked the other dance mags up the arse for me somewhat. DJ was okay but lacked depth, Mixmag irritated me (probably because of the infamous Prodigy 'killed rave' cover) and their incessant drugs over music stance. Muzik was the document of my fascination with dance music between '95 and 2001 so its a shame its no longer 'successful' enough to sustain.

ahem, muzik did not wilfully ignore both jungle and uk garage just coz they didn't fit in with some stunted, cretinous and retrograde musical worldview they deemed important over everything else

(That Puffy article was creepy, by the way, great and creepy. Puffy's like the internet: everyone suspects he will change their world so they rush to make sure they're on board for whatever happens. It's like 1994, "We have to do something with the internet or we'll be left behind forever.")

XLR8R
http://www.xlr8r.com/
Published: West Coast of America

still exists, can be picked up at certain newsagents/tower/borders in London.

That said it's not unscrupulous either.

It's unlikely there is ever going to be a good electronic music publication. I'll expand on this in a minute.

The second thing is that I'm unsure of the right way to cover electronic music. Can anyone here give a definitive answer to this question? Obviously it's not cut and dried with rock either but at least people can point to an age when rock music was covered in a way they enjoyed. I enjoy reading about electronic music, but the fact is that it's a genre for discussing with friends and dancing to and experiencing first hand rather than one which people can aggrandise for the sake of enhancing the cultural value of their interests a la NME. That's not to say people don't try and do this with electronic music all the time.

That can be read as, why is there a need to discuss something which has a fanbase with an understanding of it so visceral they have nothing to learn? I don't think other genres are the same as this, I think though they sometimes fabricate this visceral understanding through discussion, their real strengths are perhaps that they are intended to create personal relevences and not collective ones.

Furthermore the people who don't have this connection with dance music are probably the ones who enjoy reading the magazines more, and this is the only reason I can think of for dance music journalism to exist.

oh ronan, for the first time in a long time i'm disagreeing massively here. it needs to be written about, documented, discussed, criticised as much as any other for of music. i have had/still have massively visceral reactions to rock but still recognise the importance of music journalism in that genre, so why not this one. dance/electronic music is a vital part of our culture and should be afforded the same respect as rock - not writing about it lends credence to the argument that it is somehow less "real", inferior, a passing fad. it's simply a matter of doing it well...

Dance music is more about discussion with others and experiencing first hand because it's tied directly to social lives and events more than any other genre. Experiencing first hand in this context=when dj whoever mixed whatever into something else.

Furthermore the people who don't have this connection with dance music are probably the ones who enjoy reading the magazines more, and this is the only reason I can think of for dance music journalism to exist.

This is why though to some degree I'm happier now writing about dance for an indie magazine than I might have been doing it for a dance mag.

but that is no different to how rock journalism tends to revolve around the live performance no

I disagree, I think rock revolves around the album.

ok with rock, i'd say its pretty split between albums and gigs/touring/live....seems like a reasonable balance and one that would work just fine with most dance music in my view.

dance music journalism for rock fans-the only way it should be being done. I don't consider that a sellout either. (I don't think we disagree that much Dave)

Also the "tied to social lives" part means more than I suspect you realise, most dedicated dance fans don't do anything else except go out and recover from going out, and listen to records. I think dance music through drugs dominates peoples lives in a way other genres can't ever really do. And that was my point, what can mags tell people about something which is already their motivation for getting up in the morning or their job?

The central premise of it all and dance music's greatest triumph is the sheer amount of its disciples whose careers and lives it claims, temporarily or permanently.

the thing is that all these genre divides do exist when there are points of connection. and I've come to conclusion that things like music mags don't really exist bcz they don't cover the range or even try to.

i agree with blueski and stelfox.

Of course it's nice to say screw the genre apartheid but the downside is you then end up with people who happen to dabble in your favourite genre making hamfisted approaches at understanding it, which is surely the problem in the first place, hence my belief that the segregation is a good thing.

the fact is that it's a genre for discussing with friends and dancing to and experiencing first hand rather than one which people can aggrandise for the sake of enhancing the cultural value of their interests a la NME. That's not to say people don't try and do this with electronic music all the time.

but isn't this what rock and pop is about too? If anything, dance music is even more noodled over what with dj culture etc.

if its good writing it shouldnt even matter whats being covered to an extent - i'd want to read about stuff i know nothing about as much as the stuff i'm into.

hear hear! I remember when I first started reading Select at age 14, 15, it made a point of covering many musical genres while the NME kept banging on about shitty guitar-pop bands. I never gave a toss for the dance/clubbing section towards the front of Select but I still read it with interest for some reason. Magazines should be there to educate and entertain - not reinforce some (insert genre name) fan's already inflated know-it-all ego.

surely a better way is to disregard the notion of 'dance fans' and 'rock fans' completely? some people have re-established these divides for their own convenience and narrow view - not that i'm saying you think that way Ronan, but surely what you'd appreciate best is a magazine that gave as many pages to Girls Aloud as it did to British Sea Power as it did to The Deftones as it did to Bounty Killer as it did to Four Tet as it did to Jacques Lu Cont? or am i just crazy thinking a mag that did that would appeal to ANYONE?

Yes please. Just add some Aborym and I'd be a happy man. The problem we have here is that there is no one magazine that deals with multiple genres. Sure, the NME might do a few pages on the "Summer of Dancehall" or a strip column on Black Metal, but it will be covered in a roundabout, almost sneeringly "but aren't you glad you're listening to indie rock" kinda way. Wire magazine is militant in the opposite stance but contrivedly so. The only time I've bothered to read that mag I was dumbfounded by it's snobbery and the way that one article had to point out who the Spice Girls were. That, coupled with the many reader's complaints about Radiohead coverage ("We don't want that nasty pop music in our hallowed pages" etc), turned me right off.
Admittedly, and as mentioned upthread, it would be very difficult to maintain a good balance between genres, let alone keeping a loyal and large readership.

I don't think it's the same Julio, maybe I'm wrong in saying other genres don't but the manner in which dance music's connection is made is very special to dance music I feel.
Of course it's nice to say screw the genre apartheid but the downside is you then end up with people who happen to dabble in your favourite genre making hamfisted approaches at understanding it, which is surely the problem in the first place, hence my belief that the segregation is a good thing.

So far, I can't agree with what Ronan says. I understand that you are a dance fan and you definitely know a lot more than me about the genre, but I do like to read about the latest D'n'B tunes/nights out/garage crews etc. Sadly, I don't live in a big enough town to be able to access clubs that play what is reviewed in Muzik and Jockey Slut - coming from Dublin, I assume you do. Whilst going out and dancing and being with good company is definitely an essential part of dance music, if there weren't any dance mags then how would the genre prosper except around a bunch of geek djs and their friends? The way you put it is you seem to want dance music to stay in a closed circle. I assume this is an unfair accusation, but a "musical apartheid" is almost too literally fascist for my reckoning.

How do the people wanting this glorious mag which covers everything respond to the charge that it's not possible and also it would end up annoying you in its poor coverage of some things? (if ILM is the comparison then QED surely?)

what stevem said.

every thread i read about magazines, i just think that the best magazine is ILX. I knowl oads of people bitch about it, but just to look down the list of threads, it just reads like a dream contents list. SO i stick to this. ILX = free (and freeish to run - hence possibility of crazy variety); magazines = always disappointing and expensive. ( and this goes for any type of magazine, not just music. the only magazines i like (and that are good value for money) that cover any topic are private eye in terms of current affairs, and when saturday comes for football)

an obvious point, but i have given up on reading print stuff, and will strick to the internet. I bought Deuce, Muzik and Jockey SLtu all in the same month and was depressed and pissed off after reasding 10 pages into each. I dont think that would have been different whether i had read CTCL, NME or Bang, Wire or Gramophone, The Economist, Spectator, or NEw STatesman, Four Four Two or Match etc etc etc; you get my point.

Re the dilletante issue, Simon R and Phil Sherburne have both done some quite interesting exploration of this idea and I'm actually firmly down with being something of one. After all, when most music leeches off, feeds from, fuses with a vast amount of other genres, then it's good to have at least a slight knowledge of other styles than the one you dedicate yourself to e.g. where do those samples come from? where were these sounds/ideas originally developed/is any kind of cultural dialogue being carried out within a given piece of music beyong what it explicitly states (v important in instrumental music as it don't actually say anything until you start to interpret it). Foe example, if i didn't have a v good understanding of UK garage, R&B, hip hop and British street culture , plus a limited knowledge of South Asian music (bhangra etc) then the piece I'm working on right now about the desi music scene in the UK would be shite - it would have no perspective. Plus with me not being a on-genre fanatic I can actually write about it and give it context for a wide variety of people. Fair enough, there's a huge potential to fuck up to a spectacular degree on a piece such as this, being a dabbler in the South Asian side particularly, but that's where research and real journalism comes in and personal wanking off takes a backseat. Find good, reliable sources to talk to, check your facts, involve yourself in the culture you are documenting and good writing is possible about just about anything. Diverse content DOES NOT goe hand in hand with ill-conceived/poorly realised writing if youyr writers are GOOD, do it PROPERLY and give a shit beyond looking cool and getting their cheque. There's still a few of us out there willing to put some time into our work and take pride in it, not that you'd notice from most of the shite that gets printed.

now, under rob young it has a really snobby atitude i guess.

there are many one genre fanatics so the thing is to get them writing for the mag and so you could get to cover, if not all, at least a lot of genres.

just misses the boat on so many great things - man, Dizzee Rascal should be their COVER STORY, not something I don't even get a reply about and it's a shame when there's so many spectacular writers working for it...

"Yes, it's good to extend your readership, but Radiohead, Bjork, Pulp et are overexposed in other areas and are essentially popular artists. If your brief is to extend into this area, where are Grandaddy, Sparklehorse or the Beta Band? Also, is Hip Hop a progressive musical form? Your mag seems to think so, yet often it appears juvenile lyrically and puerile musically. More genuine experimental art musical interfaces please."

I know The Wire is supposed to review the more leftfield side of music, but having people write in and complain about Kid A-era Radiohead as being "too pop" for their sensitive ears and then say that HipHop is "musically puerile" made me want to throw up. Without turning this into a rant about The Wire, I found it strange that they split their reviews sections into these categories: Avant Rock, Critical Beats, Dub, Electronica, HipHop, Jazz & Improv, Outer Limits. I mean, that's just retarded. Why call your section "Avant Rock" just to appeal to the artwank snob when a simple "Rock" will do? Similarly, having a "Dub" section is fucking limiting, especially when the section reviews everything from Cornershop to Greensleeves Rhythm samplers -- neither of which count as Dub. And what exactly are "Critical Beats"? These sections are so limiting in what The Wire can review.
Surely it would be nice to see a mag that reviews all the stuff that the NME et al don't seem to cover while being scoffed at by the Wire? A magazine that gives space to the latest Autechre without going "ooh, they don't even play guitars! ooh, it sounds very insectoid". It could review the latest releases on Soul Jazz, Candlelight, Planet-µ and Domino - all fairly big labels with interesting and diverse artists, without making it seem like a token effort or falling into the trap of trying too hard.

i love the Critical Beats column in the wire coz of the stuff Phil sneaks in that wouldn't make it anywhere else in the mag... they should double his space...

the mag you suggested will just be full of music i hate - virtually every label/artist listed drives me nuts! a good magazine needs to be populist, relevant and not sweeping up the stuff that doesn't make it into NME and The Wire - this IS NOT fertile ground!

I could go on if you like ;-)

I think I agree with Ambrose. The only place I can imagine finding enough stuff I'm interested in reading is the web. My ideal magazine wouldn't have a musical brief, it would simply give the writers I like best room to write what they feel like (actually it would give some of the writers I like best restricted room to encourage them to be a little more concise). My ideal mag would have a readership of about 3 and would be able to attract niche advertising, obv. We'd know our demographic because we'd know all our readers. It would still be populist, mind.

I understand you have a vested interest in print journalism, Mr Stelfox (in so far as the getting paid element is much clearer) but I can't even imagine a publication which would meet my wants / needs anywhere near as well as the internet does.

It's the usual story of attempting to extract a final result from discourse. I just personally feel less in love with music theory than with fanatics who are able to write well about how their fanaticism and hence the tunes fit into their lives.

It's the same thing to me as the way when I was trying to start a website I'd take 1 guy who loved and understood dance music above 300 people who were excellent writers but didn't have much passion.

But I don't think it's necessary to know about other genres greatly, you may research them for a particular piece or whatever but truth be told noone is really and truly knowledgable about loads of genres, and more importantly fanaticism does not mean ignorance of other genres either. It just means a lack of interest in covering them.

I can 100 percent say I think I could write reviews of anything in the top 40 and loads of stuff outside it and feel I'd given it a good shot and made good points, and yes in that sense I'm a dilletante. And in that sense loads of ILXors are because we're by and large a smart bunch of people who listen to things for the most part with a desire to like them. But that said it doesn't matter how much you know, sometimes you just have no right to write about something because you are totally and utterly prejudiced and in that sense ignorant.

Ie don't give me an artist I hate already to write about. this is a massive problem with music discourse at the best of times and I think the dilletante thing only fuels the fire.

sean
groovesmag.com

I think there are plenty of Wire readers (self inc) who know who Dizzee Rascal is and (roughly) what he's abt, w/out having to see him featured in a magazine primarily dedicated to/focussed on avant-garde/experimental music. No doubt Dizzee Rascal will get covers/props a-plenty from all the other 'happening' mags that aren't 'missing the boat' - but what other mag, apart from the Wire, is ever going to give Keiji Haino the cov shot?

(Obv it does matter who is on the cover from a sales POV - and from a sales POV yer typical Wire reader will go for a middle-aged Japanese noise mystic over a black London teenager every time I'm guessing)

(Also who's saying Dizzee would even do the Wire, cover or not?)

don't care, either but since it was talked abt...

For your average music magazine reader (who will not be reading ILM because their interest is far more casual) a broad sweep is what they want.

Magazines are a popular format. They have to be commercially viable. ILM has less readers than poor old Muzik.

I'm quite gutted it's shut down (not only as a source of income). I thought tehy had a good team and they were managing to cover a good variety of music seriously, but without suffering from a sense of hummour failure.

ILM is never going to be happy with any music magazine, because if you come to a forum like this then by default you care more about music than your average magazine reader.

you are a hero mark!

Here endeth the lesson! Anna, you're so OTM it hurts my brain. So can we stop shooting Every Fucking Magazine down in flames the moment it has the temerity to arrive/exist please?

The sly fuckers are all about "french house revival" now, when yours truly was saying this 9 months ago on internet hotspot NYLPM.

I don't know you anymore!

(Les Rita Mitsouko is not a person it's band, apparently; ANYway...!)

august's was meant to be a '100 best dance singles ever' edition.
a good way to end i guess. bless em.

does this mean that we have 2 read mixmag again now ?

the bloke who does the bit at the back (20 reasons why...)
should have his own show or something.

hey good luck muzik chaps.

Re: does this mean that we have 2 read mixmag again now ? NO ...there is still DJ Magazine, every fortnight

I'll be sad to see Muzik go.... their Erol Alkan CD last month was blinding.

So NME has two ex Muzik editors now !

also new deputy editor [Alex Needham] appointed last month NME APPOINTS DEPUTY EDITOR

One can only hope these changes mean a shift in direction from the awful trad rock tripe of NME in 2003 [Retro garage rock, Southern bar boogie, Ex-tremo and other generic britrock chancers]

?! i don't see any other evidence for this as yet...

why is this happening (the market for such mags contracting, I mean)? OK there were too many titles a couple of years ago, but now it's gone too far the other way IMO, to the point where there seems to be a gap in the market for a mag for non-clubbers like me that's informative about new dance releases

Keep On
http://www.keeponmagazine.com/index.htm

Issue 2 is now in the shops, and includes interviews with:
David Mancuso, Bill Brewster,
Doc Martin, Atjazz, Nathan Haines,
Phil Asher, Inland Knights,
Tim Lawrence, Inspirit Music,
Jon Burgerman and Rainy City.
Features on Italo Disco, Arthur
Russell and Drum Programming
for house music. House, Disco,
Broken Beat Tech House, Funk
and Soul Reviews, Events DJ Charts,
Listings, Competitions and News.

If you're having trouble finding a
copy, then check out our current
list of stockists

Paul Johnston

Curtis Mayfield (vol 1. issue #1)
Charles Webster (vol 1. issue #1)
John Buckby (vol 1. issue #1)
Doc Martin (vol 1. issue #1)
Atjazz (vol 1. issue #2)
Introduction to Drum Programming (vol 1. issue #2)

Jolyon Green

David Mancuso (vol 1. issue #2)
Italo Disco (vol 1. issue #2)
Tim Lawrence - Love Saves the Day- (vol 1. issue #2)
Arthur Russell (vol 1. issue #2)

Andy Greenman

Inland Knights (vol 1. issue #2)
Inspirit Music (vol 1. issue #2)

Matthew Clarke

Steve Kotey (vol 1. issue #1)
Curtis Mayfield (vol 1. issue #1)
Leroy Burgess (vol 1. issue #1)
Nick the Record (vol 1. issue #1)
Began Cekic (vol 1. issue #1)
Bill Brewster (vol 1. issue #2)
Rainy City (vol 1. issue #2)

Jon Freer

Break Reform (vol 1. issue #1)
Nathan Haines (vol 1. issue #2)
Phil Asher (vol 1. issue #2)

Reviews

Tom Lingham
Jon Freer
Russell Pollitt
Aine Guiney
Marky Star
Jay Tripwire
Terry Farley
Al Kent
Kelvy Espinosa
Steve Reed
Daddy Bones
Mark Harrison
Jeremy Oakley

http://www.keeponmagazine.com/contact_press.htm
Mark Geldart [Editor]:

Bang - started promisingly, went really awful, closed.

X-Ray - started badly, became mediocre, last two issues a million times better, closed.

Jockey Slut - same publisher as X-Ray, allegedly been losing its grip recently, going quarterly.

Official statement from spokesperson (lifted from here goes thus: "I can confirm that Jockey Slut is to go quarterly as part of a brand development initiative. Whilst the general media trend is for music magazines to 'go under', we are taking a positive and progressive step to establish the Jockey Slut brand further, widening its potential reach by extending through other mediums and developing extensive brand extensions through events, commercial releases and so forth, all brought together via a greater reliance on www.jockeyslut.com."

Sounds like a bit of a cop-out to me.

Bullit - Issue 1 out now, looks way better than the shonky launch issue, but crumbs do they ever need a sub and a design team who can spell?!

Really though: would anyone here consider, or has anyone here considered putting out a newsstand music magazine at the moment? If so are you a billionaire, mad, a genius or a combination thereof?

If they resourced the website, with upfront daily news, features and reviews - then the could reach a significant global readership.

http://www.groovesmag.com

Nearly every issue of Muzik magazine in PDF form:

http://www.muzikmagazine.co.uk/

For some reason I really remember that Junior Vasquez cover.

Whoa. Nostalgia. This is fascinating, thanks.

Is it really more than 10 years since I bought their retrospective of 10 years of dance music (which was already ancient history)? Ouch.

And an advert for a Teletext page in amongst the listings...

Christ, I remember buying the first copy and reading it in the 6th form common room. That and Jockey Slut were essential monthly purchases. I found a few reviews that I'd cut out and slipped into record sleeves the other day. I still have some of their tapes and CDs. J. Padilla's Ibiza mixtape is great. I think I might recreate that mix when I get the chance.

What was so good about Muzik was the music vs. club coverage. Other mags gave such little space for reviews and plastered their pages in pics of girls in feather boas from Birmingham. Ironically most of them are still doing business.

I cut the article from the Disco Punk Explosion issue out and stuck it in my copy of Disco-not-Disco.

The kids were selling their decks and buying guitars.....

Other mags gave such little space for reviews and plastered their pages in pics of girls in feather boas from Birmingham. Ironically most of them are still doing business.

This was kind of confusing to me, as a girl who was just discovering I liked electronic music but who knew I was never, ever going to look like the cover of Mixmag.

(ok, I say "was", but I never really reconciled liking the music and wanting to hear it in its intended setting with that feeling of alienation from club culture)

can somebody put together a torrent of this?

Cool ... it's interesting to scroll through those covers and see how they went from ultra serious to "Dance Music Teen Beat".

I think the "can vinyl survive?" issue was the last one I bought (not a very good article IIRC). I'll second that request for a torrent of the full archive ...

Muzik acid house compilation is still a favourite of mine. Fascinating archive.

Wild! Makes me wish I'd kept my back issues.

Someone would do well to archive all the covermount CDs and cassettes!

I had all up till '98 - http://www.discogs.com/label/Muzik+Magazine I'll have to look for them some day.

Doesn't get too much more 2003 than this one:
http://www.discogs.com/DFA-Muzik-Presents-Disco-Punk-Dance-To-The-Underground/release/124665

It's probably pretty good fun though!