on 12/5/02 10:23 AM, Franz Fuchs at f.fuchs@gmx.net wrote:
From William Crump
There is no difference between Rolling Stone and People. How many years since it's actually been a music magazine?
That's an interesting question. What were the RS' best years? Is there an (online-)history or article about the magazine's different phases?
Rolling Stone was never entirely innocent of sucking up to the stars. I've never seen an online history, but I will say this -- up through about '82 or '83, you could really count on RS to cover MUSIC, even if the cover was some smarmy Fleetwood Mac or Eagles type. Artiles about The Contortions, Joe King Carrasco, Lene Lovich etc were always in there somewhere. Let us not forget Greil Marcus' huge article WAKE UP!, where he predicted the key to rock's future was Gang Of Four, the Raincoats, and Essential Logic. A masterpiece of wishful thinking. Turned out the future of RS-styled rock lay more in Pat Benatar. I think things started getting shaky when it RS started making pronouncements that LONDON CALLING was a masterpiece that would impact all rock records in its wake etc. They seemed to believe this because they were the biggest magazine and they had the most power of any rock publication. For my $, CREEM was way better. RS is still owned by Straight Arrow Press. Wouldn't it be funny to see a list of their financial holdings and also who are the principal shareholders in Straight Arrow? It might clear up a few questions.