ARTHUR - the magazine

Message Bookmarked

Bookmark Removed

Not all messages are displayed: show all messages (453 of them)

View Previous Page...

Mike - Nah. "C & D" is a tip of the hat to "A & B" from Gabe Alvarez/Brent Rollins-era RapPages.

― JayBabcock (jabbercocky), Tuesday, 5 July 2005 17:37 (twenty years ago)

one year passes...

Um, so I just got word that Arthur is apparently RIP.

― Ned Raggett, Friday, 23 February 2007 19:00 (nineteen years ago)

really, ned?

― bb, Friday, 23 February 2007 19:04 (nineteen years ago)

From Jay B. himself.

― Ned Raggett, Friday, 23 February 2007 19:04 (nineteen years ago)

that would be news to me. I know they've had some difficulties (Laris vs. Jay FITE!) but when I spoke to Jay about a week ago I was given every indication that Arthur was in the clear and getting back on its feet.

― Shakey Mo Collier, Friday, 23 February 2007 19:06 (nineteen years ago)

!!! wtf

― Shakey Mo Collier, Friday, 23 February 2007 19:07 (nineteen years ago)

Really? Damn. A sad day. Even with all the hippie crap, I always looked forward to reading it. With the exception of anything related to "majick" and the totally useless ColeyMoore circlejerk , it was a damn fine way to spend an afternoon. Plus occasional Marc Bell cartoons! What more ya want(ed)?

― Pye Poudre, Friday, 23 February 2007 19:09 (nineteen years ago)

Really? Damn. Even with all the indie crap, I always looked forward to reading it.

heh, j/k.

still RIP if this is the case. a GREAT read, rare these days.

― BATTAGS, Friday, 23 February 2007 19:22 (nineteen years ago)

what the heck i finally subscribed to this

― The Macallan 18 Year, Friday, 23 February 2007 19:23 (nineteen years ago)

yeah i heard that arthur's toast, too. super bummer.

― hstencil, Friday, 23 February 2007 19:43 (nineteen years ago)

its true. I can't comment further tho.

― Shakey Mo Collier, Friday, 23 February 2007 19:52 (nineteen years ago)

Godsmack strikes again!

― mcddcm, Friday, 23 February 2007 19:53 (nineteen years ago)

well, balls...

i know people didn't always dig byron/thurston's flim-flam, but it always gave plenty of stuff to look into with the endorsment of a coupla guys that have been trawling through that sort of muck for a deadlong time without telling you what to think of it. it was a nod and a suggestion, at best.

it takes guts to pour yr pockets and yr guts into something that sholdn't work and try and stand up for the kinda culture you think is worth highlighting when you know damnedwell even the people that probably agree with you are gonna spend most of their time throwing stones. a paper like Arthtur is an important thing for us to have in this day and age. it was a paper with personality and a vested interest in trying new things without always selling something or being right in the eyes of the hordes in this culture of selfish mediocrity.

― bb, Friday, 23 February 2007 19:58 (nineteen years ago)

That really sucks, enjoyed this mag from issue 1.

― Mark Rich@rdson, Friday, 23 February 2007 20:12 (nineteen years ago)

bb otm. I love the Thurston/Coley column. And I'll miss Arthur. Maybe they should have charged for it?

― mcddcm, Friday, 23 February 2007 20:13 (nineteen years ago)

I would have paid for it. And I'm a thrower of stones.

― Pye Poudre, Friday, 23 February 2007 20:21 (nineteen years ago)

it was a good mag .... after the "levitating the Pentagon" issue I was hooked

― dmr, Friday, 23 February 2007 20:27 (nineteen years ago)

was issue 25 the final one?

really enjoyed the TV on the Radio interview, and the AK47 pieces.

RIP.

― Cameron Octigan, Monday, 26 February 2007 00:15 (nineteen years ago)

An LA Times story that briefly outlines the deeper situation.

Also, news of a wake on Thursday:

Come celebrate the happy, all-too-brief life of Arthur Magazine with free giveaways and a reading featuring Molly Frances, Oliver Hall, and Peter Relic.

Thursday, March 1, 7:30pm

Family Bookstore, 436 N. Fairfax Avenue (across the street from Canter's Deli), Los Angeles, 90036.
Arthur's "New Herbalist" columnist Molly Frances incited a revolution nationwide by informing readers of the true powers of almonds, sprigs of mint, and Lord Byron's secret potion (a.k.a. apple cider vinegar). Molly's eerily prescient horoscopes have been known to strike the melodic funny-bone of even the most determined non-believer. Tonight Molly will be giving astrological readings as well as tripling any double entendre at hand.

Oliver Hall penned Arthur's cover story on Kim Gordon and memorably profiled folk radicals Faun Fables. He is the statuesque guitarist with L.A.'s newest psych-rock sensation E.S.P.S., and is seldom seen without his trusty Patsy Cline t-shirt. Tonight Hall will be dispensing priceless aphorisms as well as deconstructing the pungent, multi-faceted phrase "no money, no honey."

Peter Relic eulogized Jam Master Jay and went on the road with the Black Keys and Sleater-Kinney for Arthur. Relic's profile of the Geto Boys, reprinted in Da Capo's Best American Music Writing 2006, was deemed by Seattle's The Stranger to be "easily one of the most surreal, violent, and ludicrous artists encounters ever documented." Tonight Relic will be reading from his storehouse of pantoums, an unjustly obscure Malaysian poetic form.

We look forward to seeing you there -- dressing in black not a requirement!

― Ned Raggett, Monday, 26 February 2007 02:37 (nineteen years ago)

The response from the publisher if you're interested.

― Ned Raggett, Monday, 26 February 2007 17:52 (nineteen years ago)

more:
http://www.villagevoice.com/blogs/runninscared/archives/2007/02/freak_flags_fly.php

― Shakey Mo Collier, Monday, 26 February 2007 21:31 (nineteen years ago)

Laris still owes me $35 from a piece I wrote for Sound Collector Audio Review in 2002.

― Mark Rich@rdson, Monday, 26 February 2007 21:51 (nineteen years ago)

RIP. I've known of the differences in opinion for some time but never commented, so as not to meddle where I've no business meddling. Sorry they were unable to come to terms, and that things fell apart in such a public, weird way (of course, after the whole Godsmack thing I cannot say I am surprised).

I will miss 'Arthur,' for sure, but I have to say that I miss 'SCAR' and 'Sound Collector' a heck of a lot more. I look forward to seeing MORE LARIS in the publications he works on (and yeah, he probably owes me a few bucks from SC days but it's not a 'Raygun' sized thing with me -- we're talking pennies, relatively.)

― Mike McGooney-gal, Monday, 26 February 2007 22:03 (nineteen years ago)

sound collector was the coolest.

i will miss arthur. and, yeah, i would have paid for it too.

― scott seward, Monday, 26 February 2007 22:06 (nineteen years ago)

that's sad. i liked this magazine.

― M@tt He1ges0n, Monday, 26 February 2007 22:52 (nineteen years ago)

dang.

only read it once (when i found a copy at the late silver spring, md tower), but i liked it a lot.

― Beatrix Kiddo, Monday, 26 February 2007 23:21 (nineteen years ago)

yeah i randomly came across a couple copies at a music store here in maine and happily snagged them. that joanna newsom article was one of the best pieces of music journalism i read all year. 'tis a shame...

― Emily Bjurnhjam, Monday, 26 February 2007 23:24 (nineteen years ago)

Laris Kreslins insisted that I buy him out of his 50% share in Arthur [I own the other 50%] if I wanted to continue the mag since he didn't want to do it anymore, and I couldn't raise the cash and get someone to sign the deal that Laris wanted signed. So, mag is dead. The new issue was 85% done when we stopped work. 72 pages, all color, new art directors. Yoko Ono interviewed by Byron Coley & Thurston Moore on pre-Lennon life and other stuff. The Seth Man on the forthcoming Sly & the Family Stone reissues (12,000 words) with a centerfold poster of Sly from a vintage Jim Marshall photo. Greg Saunier of Deerhoof talking about all-ages gigs. A new column on... Ah well. Maybe we'll post some of the pages on the walls of Family at the Wake on Thursday so people can see what would've been.

― jaybabcock, Monday, 26 February 2007 23:45 (nineteen years ago)

from the Village Voice blog thing
http://www.villagevoice.com/blogs/runninscared/archives/2007/02/freak_flags_fly.php

Keach Hagey | posted 2:14 PM, February 26, 2007
Freak Flags Fly at Half-mast as Arthur Mag Calls It Quits

In the end, there just wasn't enough peace and love to go around.

After five years of publishing consistently interesting music, arts, politics and drug journalism in the mold of the underground rags of the 60s and 70s, Arthur Magazine died last Friday, according to founding editor Jay Babcock. He pinned the cause of death not so much on a lack of cash (although he did mention living off friends' clothing donations and credit card debt) as on his inability to continue seeing eye-to-eye with his partner, founding publisher Laris Kreslins.

Negotiations for Los Angeles-based Babcock to buy out Philadelphia-based Kreslins started last year and reached an impasse last Thursday, both men said. The breakdown locked up the magazine’s credit line, which was tied to Kreslin's publishing company, Lime Publishing, and abruptly halted production on the magazine's next issue, scheduled to lead with a cover article on Yoko Ono and Fluxus by longtime contributors Thurston Moore and Byron Coley.

"The magazine can't be restarted," Babcock said. "It's a done deal. It's dead. The situation can’t be unfucked.”

Kreslins, who controls the website and the trademark for the free bimonthly magazine, took issue with Babcock’s assessment and posted his own last night that the publication was simply on "indefinite hiatus."

He said that five years of working without investors had become too much of a burden, and he had been looking to get out of his half of the business for the past eight months.

"I was focusing my energies on other things, and I was ready to move on," he said.

Babcock, 36, and Kreslins, 32, co-founded the magazine with little more than their credit cards in 2002 while living on separate coasts. They didn't even meet until after publishing their first issue, which, in a manifesto-like gesture outlining both the form and content of things to come, featured a 16,000-word essay on the 1967 Yippie exorcism of the Pentagon.

Both co-founders hailed from the dank basements of underground music fandom. Kreslins, a Maryland native, had previously published the popular music journals Sound Collector and Sound Collector Audio Review. Babcock contributed to Mojo magazine and the LA Weekly and once helped his girlfriend run a pirate radio station out of LA’s hipster Silverlake neighborhood.

In the beginning, both lived cheap – Kreslins even moved into his parents’ basement for a while – and enticed mostly unpaid contributors by offering a venue for things other publications wouldn’t run. This promise attracted regular contributors like Douglas Rushkoff, Alan Moore, Erik Davis, Kristine McKenna, Trinie Dalton and Model-T Ford.

Moore and Coley wrote their hyperactive must-read roundup of recent underground music releases from the first issue. “They’ve never been paid a dime,” Babcock said.

Although Los Angeles and New York were the magazine’s major markets, a network of volunteers distributed many of 50,000 copies to highly targeted countercultural outposts in cities and small towns across America. Kreslins said that in the end, this distribution network, which echoed the touring networks for punk and alternative bands in the 1980s, is one of the things he’s most proud of. “The network kept growing,” he said. “That's why I was so excited about the possibility of a new publisher taking it to the next level.”

Arthur was oversized, free, colorful, patchouli-scented but whip-smart, unapologetically political, sometimes silly, often anarchist and always willing to listen to voices way, way outside the mainstream. Above all, it was prophetic, usually about two years ahead of the rest of the country in its loves and obsessions.

Case in point: Arthur ran the first feature ever on songwriting virtuoso and harp sprite Joanna Newsom in 2004. Rumors are she’ll appear in Vanity Fair before the year is out. So perhaps its appropriate that the 12,000-word cover story on her for the Winter 2006 issue – written by Erik Davis with a trance-like devotion that would overwhelm a more conventional magazine editor – will be the magazine’s swan song.

“The tragic element is that we were doing better, year by year,” Babcock said. “This was going to be our first all-color issue. We were staring to get inquiries from all the important liquor companies with their huge ad budgets, and yet we maintained complete editorial autonomy.”

“We were almost at this point where you were going to have a full-color nationally published culture magazine, with the editor-owner being a firm anarchist in the tradition of Noam Chomsky. That was the ideology of the magazine. That would have been a unique thing in American publishing at any time, but in 2007 . . . ” His voice trails off, in a combination of wonder and frustration.

But in 2007, he seems to imply, when announcements of the death of print alternate hourly with news of yet another media merger, it would have been like something out of the magazine’s regular column magic.

― jaybabcock, Monday, 26 February 2007 23:47 (nineteen years ago)

ouch.

― scott seward, Monday, 26 February 2007 23:48 (nineteen years ago)

it is indeed sad-- a good mag with lots going on for it, WITH ONE EXCEPTION: it was fucking ugly. really really hard to look at. the writing in it made up for that, thankfully.

― the table is the table, Tuesday, 27 February 2007 00:05 (nineteen years ago)

Don't agree with that -- I loved the look of it. The style suited the content.

― Mark Rich@rdson, Tuesday, 27 February 2007 00:08 (nineteen years ago)

whatever man, let's smoke a bowl.

― the table is the table, Tuesday, 27 February 2007 00:10 (nineteen years ago)

The uncompleted issue features the debut of a whole new approach to the art direction of Arthur by new art directors Mark Frohman & Molly Frances. Maybe we can put some of it online sometime, I just don't know.

― jaybabcock, Tuesday, 27 February 2007 00:11 (nineteen years ago)

i gotta admit i'm curious what the 50% added up to, money-wise. couldn't have sold arthurshares to a kosmic kollective of friends and family?

― scott seward, Tuesday, 27 February 2007 00:38 (nineteen years ago)

aww this sucks.

a picture i took once appeared on the cover (not as the main photo but still it was kinda cool)

― s1ocki, Tuesday, 27 February 2007 00:54 (nineteen years ago)

scott - it wasn't the money. it was, amongst other factors, the wording of the contract. the investor's lawyer said it was full of loopholes and the investor had to walk.

― jaybabcock, Tuesday, 27 February 2007 01:10 (nineteen years ago)

hay jay you should still have arthur fest every year anywayz~!

― chaki, Tuesday, 27 February 2007 01:12 (nineteen years ago)

chaki - i'd love to but i can't afford to go any further in debt

― jaybabcock, Tuesday, 27 February 2007 01:24 (nineteen years ago)

Damn, this sucks. Do you do the Magpie blog Jay or is that Laris? Any chance of doing anything online in the future?

― walterkranz, Tuesday, 27 February 2007 01:42 (nineteen years ago)

walterkranz - I've been doing the Magpie blog since before Arthur started. We incorporated it into the arthurmag.com website for kicks. Another too-trusting move on my part, it appears.

― jaybabcock, Tuesday, 27 February 2007 01:45 (nineteen years ago)

Well, I enjoy it and I hope you continue to do something similar.

― walterkranz, Tuesday, 27 February 2007 03:05 (nineteen years ago)

― the table is the table, Tuesday, 27 February 2007 03:33 (nineteen years ago)

I am now superbummed.

― Andi Mags, Tuesday, 27 February 2007 07:30 (nineteen years ago)

It was always a great day when I found an issue of this laying on the floor of Freakbeat in the Valley, 'cause I would take it to a Coffee Bean and kill a peaceful hour or 2. And I loved the design! Probably my favorite looking music magazine around, in fact!
Anyway, thanks for all the good reads!

― Ben Boyerrr, Tuesday, 27 February 2007 11:54 (nineteen years ago)

Thanks for all the kind words. In a bizarre twist, I still have access to
myspace.com/arthurmag
so i will update that site with news about what all the Arthur contributors are up to, etc etc
In the meantime -- let's all welcome back LA RECORD!!!!!

― jaybabcock, Wednesday, 28 February 2007 03:28 (nineteen years ago)

fwiw -- The Magpie blog will return to its original home at jaybabcock.com starting Monday, if not earlier.

― jaybabcock, Thursday, 1 March 2007 04:01 (nineteen years ago)

three weeks pass...

*whistles idly*

― Shakey Mo Collier, Wednesday, 28 March 2007 23:13 (nineteen years ago)

http://farm.tucows.com/2005/02/please_stand_by.jpg

― walterkranz, Wednesday, 28 March 2007 23:20 (nineteen years ago)

Arthur Magazine Joanna Newsom Cleavage! TV On The Radio View similar active items
Sell one like this
1 $3.00 $7.00

― danbunny, Thursday, 29 March 2007 04:21 (nineteen years ago)

Skipping 353 messages at this point... Click here if you want to load them all.

My copy came in the mail today. I haven't cracked it open yet, but the cover looks fantastic.

― Mike Dixn, Tuesday, 18 December 2012 01:12 (thirteen years ago)

resurrected arthur is a thing of beauty!

― tylerw, Friday, 28 December 2012 15:39 (thirteen years ago)

Just got my copy yesterday

― Elvis Telecom, Friday, 28 December 2012 19:56 (thirteen years ago)

one month passes...

New issue is at the printer. 8 more color pages, more music coverage in this issue than last one.

http://arthurmagdotcom.files.wordpress.com/2013/02/a34coversml.jpg

After 20-plus years navigating strange, inspiring trips across myriad underground psychedelic terrains with a host of fellow free folk, righteous musician/head MATT VALENTINE (MV&EE, Tower Recordings, etc) finally spills all possible beans in an unprecedented, career-summarizing, ridiculously footnoted epic interview by BYRON COLEY. Plus: Deep archival photo finds from the MV vaults, a sidebar wander through some important MV listening experiences with your guide Dan Ireton, and a gorgeous cover painting by ARIK ROPER of MV & EE at peace in the cosmic wild. Delicious!

Also in this issue:

Psychedelic scholars Christian Ratsch and Claudia Muller-Ebeling lay down a rap about this planet’s AROMATIC APHRODISIACS, with art by Kira Mardikes…

Gabe Soria chats with author AUSTIN GROSSMAN (Soon I Will Be Invincible) about the basic weirdness of playing (and making) VIDEO GAMES, with art by Ron Rege, Jr….

LA Record’s Chris Ziegler encounters young Southern California psych-rock band FEEDING PEOPLE, with photography by Ward Robinson…

All-new full-color comics by Lale Westvind, Will Sweeney, Vanessa Davis and Jonny Negron…

A lengthy interview with the remarkable ecstatic cartographer DAVID CHAIM SMITH by Jay Babcock, with massive reproductions of his out-of-time artwork…

Stewart Voegtlin on what (or: who) made MELVINS’ 1992 beercrusher “Lysol” the most unlikely religious record ever built, with art by Stewart’s Chips N Beer mag compatriot Beaver…

Columns by the ever-provocative “Weedeater” Nance Klehm and The Center for Tactical Magic…

Byron Coley and Thurston Moore’s essential underground review column, Bull Tongue, now expanded to two giant pages…

― jaywbabcock, Saturday, 23 February 2013 18:05 (thirteen years ago)

eleven months pass...

http://adhoc.fm/post/arthur-magazine-calling-it-quits-again/

― curmudgeon, Tuesday, 18 February 2014 14:37 (twelve years ago)

online mail-order Arthur Store will be open until March 2, 2014. At that point, all unsold backstock will be chucked on the compost heap or into the recycle bin.

― curmudgeon, Tuesday, 18 February 2014 14:50 (twelve years ago)

Shakey Mo's decided not to store this junk any longer basically.

― One bad call from barely losing to (Alex in SF), Tuesday, 18 February 2014 15:00 (twelve years ago)

That's a real shame.

― you are clinically deaf and should sell you iPod (stevie), Tuesday, 18 February 2014 15:04 (twelve years ago)

Shakey Mo's decided not to store this junk any longer basically.

now now. (ftr all Arthur material was moved long ago to a super-secret airtight underground bunker way out in the middle of the desert in Joshua Tree)

but yeah buy up that shit! posterity demands it

― How dare you tarnish the reputation of Turturro's yodel (Shakey Mo Collier), Tuesday, 18 February 2014 17:41 (twelve years ago)

bummed, i was really enjoying the new arthurs, but i definitely understand that it was a labor of love for all involved.

― tylerw, Tuesday, 18 February 2014 17:47 (twelve years ago)

just bought some stuff, I really needed that cassette comp with the Michael Hurley tune so thanks for the bump even if it's bad news

― sleeve, Tuesday, 18 February 2014 17:59 (twelve years ago)

Thanks Tyler, yeah the energy for doing this proj has diminished for so many reasons — at least it wasn't financial this time! — but we'll see what happens in the future. Sleeve, thanks friend, your stuff is already in the mail.

― jaywbabcock, Tuesday, 18 February 2014 23:45 (twelve years ago)

http://adhoc.fm/post/arthur-magazine-calling-it-quits-again/

the fact that adhoc lives while arthur dies is completely fucked

― *plop* son (Whiney G. Weingarten), Tuesday, 18 February 2014 23:47 (twelve years ago)

Whiney - I would hesitate to draw any conclusions. Arthur's existence has always been precarious and contingent on so many things..

― jaywbabcock, Wednesday, 19 February 2014 00:25 (twelve years ago)

Jay am I correct that you are sold out of all the "new" issues other than the Hurley one? I would have sprung for those as well but didn't see them.

― sleeve, Wednesday, 19 February 2014 01:22 (twelve years ago)

Sleeve - Yeah 33 (Rick Veitch/Jack Rose/etc issue) and 34 (Matt Valentine/David Chaim Smith/Feeding People/etc) are gone now. Sorry bout that...

― jaywbabcock, Wednesday, 19 February 2014 01:46 (twelve years ago)

Sleeve & others - I came across a few more copies of some issues that I thought were all gone, including the Brightblack/Godsmack/Derrick Jensen issue, and the Devendra/Joanna Newsom/Cocorosie issue...so those are all now available in the Store, til close date, which is this coming Sunday. But no 33 or 34, sorry.

― jaywbabcock, Monday, 24 February 2014 20:29 (twelve years ago)

Spoke too soon. Just found 7 more copies of 34 (MV issue).

― jaywbabcock, Monday, 24 February 2014 20:56 (twelve years ago)

LOL well OK then, guess I'd better head back to yer website

by the way I already got that package, thanks! loving the CD comp...

― sleeve, Monday, 24 February 2014 21:07 (twelve years ago)

The fact that Rolling Stone lives while Arthur dies is even more fucked.

― Position Position, Monday, 24 February 2014 22:08 (twelve years ago)

Farewell, Arthur.

― alpine static, Monday, 3 March 2014 08:07 (twelve years ago)

eleven years pass...

Arthur Magazine archive finally complete

This took forever, but I am very glad to be able to write this morning that the entire run of Arthur magazine (2002-2008, 2012-13), which I co-founded and edited, is finally available online as single issue PDFs.

https://arthurmag.com/read-the-magazine-in-pdf-format/

― Kim Kimberly, Thursday, 3 July 2025 21:13 (eleven months ago)

Pretty great!

― Ned Raggett, Thursday, 3 July 2025 21:29 (eleven months ago)

Yay! No 3d glasses though

― sarahell, Friday, 4 July 2025 03:03 (eleven months ago)

oh great, I think I learned about both ayahuasca and Pandit Pran Nath from a single (free!) ish of this.

― doe on a hill (Deflatormouse), Friday, 4 July 2025 03:36 (eleven months ago)

You must be logged in to post. Please either login here, or if you are not registered, you may register here.