Next Magazine (Santa Monica)
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Next Magazine was an internationally distributed music trade publication reaching key decision makers at record labels, radio stations, retail, and artist management. Next’s reputation was that of a trusted, and expertly researched, business reference and resource in an industry beset with lowest common denominator trade publications. Next was neither a tip sheet, nor a compendium of chart statistics; it changed the face of music trade publications with its hybrid content, compelling design and focus on quality (from the paper it was printed on to its editorial standards and photography).
Next’s editorial mix was known for its range of subject matter and the depth of its features. It was the first music trade magazine to objectively address payola, its ramifications and possible enforcement actions by the FCC. It was also the first magazine to dedicate regular coverage to the convergence of technology and music, anticipating the sea changes that this disruptive force would have on the music industry’s business and marketing models. Next was also the first trade magazine to feature separate regular columns featuring new releases from the UK and Australia. Many of these leading edge content and design elements are now incorporated in many trade and newsstand magazines.
Next also released two promotional CD compilations that were mailed monthly with the magazine. The Next At Radio CD contained a mix of the newest music being released to radio and was geared toward providing programmers with a useful tool and context in which to hear the latest music.
The Next At Retail CD was mailed to music retailers across the country with only new releases included it was geared toward providing a fresh, vibrant mix of music for in-store play use.
Next also produced two weekly four-color newsletters: Next At Retail which addressed pressing new stories and new music release dates between magazines allowing for a weekly touch point to retailers and buyers and Next Flash, a weekly four-color newsletter covering unsigned bands and the A&R community. nextflash was acquired from Julie Gordon in a buyout and the name changed from Gordon’s Flash.
Nextweekly was a weekly multi-page fax to radio stations aggregating and reviewing that week’s new music releases and disseminating any pertinent industry news and gossip.
n. design was Next’s in-house ad agency and was responsible for a number of music and film CD/DVD packaging and designs, including “The Crow II” soundtrack.
Next also provided a number of direct mail services which were utilized by major labels, independent labels and international artists seeking to leverage Next’s relationships with radio and retail.
Next magazine’s cutting edge design and imaging was created by Grammy nominated creative visionaries Todd Gallopo and Tim Steadman. Their vision was extended and built upon by art director and creative director Chris Jones.
In May 1998, Next's Wilshire Blvd. offices were exclusively the focus of a four-page feature in Interior Design magazine. Next's offices occupied half of the top floor of a Santa Monica landmark art deco building. The firm of Frank + Frisch created a flowing space of custom architectural design elemets and one-of-a-kind furniture, transforming what was formerly raw space into a dynamic creative environment. Next's offices were designed to provide every office with an ocean facing view.
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[edit] Some Next Firsts
- First music trade magazine to feature independent retail store profiles
- First music trade magazine to focus on an entire broadcast market including the impact of local competition, and not just a single station’s personalities and legacy
- First music trade magazine to create detailed radio monitors including ids, drops, commercials, and jock rap
- First music trade magazine to address politics and its increasing role in pop culture and broadcasting
- First music trade magazine to cover the extensive role China plays in copyright and intellectual property theft
- First music trade magazine to include lifestyle editorial in every issue, Next regularly featured book reviews and city travel coverage
[edit] Founders
Next magazine and its associated properties were founded by Bryan Boyd and John Van Citters
This team also created VIRTUALLYALTERNATIVE which, along with The Album Network, Network 40 and Urban Network, was later acquired by Clear Channel Communications in a cash deal valued at over $75 million.
[edit] Notable Covers
- Screaming Trees
- Soundgarden
- Tori Amos
- Stone Temple Pilots
- Iggy Pop
- Alice In Chains
- Sebadoh
- Social Distortion
- Midnight Oil
[edit] Notable Features
- Breaking Records part I and II
- Ghost in the Machine: The political gains of MTV’s Choose or Loose
- The People’s Republic of Piracy
- The Road Less Traveled: High Profile Entrants in to the World Of Independent Labels
- Fables of the Deconstruction: An Overview of FCC Regulatory Proposals
- The Web As It Should Be: A Satirical Look at Music Online
- This Home Page Brought To You By The Letter W: The Basics of Building Your Own Website
- Turning Dookie Into Dollars: The Increasing Importance of Lifestyle Marketing
- Creative Value: Walt Disney’s Bran Ferren Discusses the Merging of Art and Technology
- Billion Dollar Broadcasting: Westinghouse’s Purchase of Infinity Broadcasting
- Behind the Curtain: Inside the World of Artist Bookings on Talk TV
- Tales From the Script: A Look at Rejected Music Video Treatments
- Internal Affairs: Breaking Records Through Perseverance and In-House Politicking
- Summer Games: Promotion Plans of Alternative Stations Around the Country
- Broadcast Revisionism: The Political Expediency of Telecommunications Reform
- How to Succeed in the Music Business Without Really Trying
- Payola
- Cue the Right Thing: The Increasingly Important Marriage of Music and Movies
- Real Audio: Real Time Music and Radio on the Internet
- Hollywood H-Fi: The Musical Pursuits of Johnny Depp, Keanu Reeves, et al
- Broadcast Subsidies: Creating Secondary Revenue Streams Through Digital Datacasting
- You Have the Right Not to Remain Silent: Krist Novoselic and Richard White Flex Music’s Political Muscle
- This Note’s For You: The Rise of Alternative Music on Madison Avenue
- Unchained Melodies: The Impact of Radio Specialty Shows
- Northern Exposure: The Bad Reputation and Resurgence of Canadian Music
- The Price Is Right: Breaking Down the Cost of CDs
- Creating Solutions: Varying approaches of Film and Music Marketing
- Declining Tolerance?: The Reality of Being Gay in the Music Business
- Life and Death: The Aftermath of Band Break-Ups
- Wireless Dreams: The Revolution in True Computer Portability
[edit] Notable Artist Interviews
- Iggy Pop “You young punk! Goddammit straighten up! And gimme those drugs! I’ll take ‘em myself!”
- Iggy Pop :How much restraint is good? The answer? Well I can’t say, cause I’m a gentleman.”
- Nick Cave “I don’t see my job as an artist to make music that congratulates or applauds humanity.”
- Nick Cave “I think that Lollapalooza, in a way, destroyed something integral about our band.”
- Screaming Trees, Mark Lanegan “Everything I ever did, I did until it damn near killed me. And then I’d have a long, hard fucking fight to save myself from it.”
- Screaming Trees, Mark Lanegan “I do believe that I have a God, but it’s only my God, and luckily my God thinks I’m pretty damn funny, thinks I’m a good songwriter, so we have a pretty good relationship.”
- Screaming Trees, Mark Lanegan “In London they like to call me a ‘low-down evil drunkard,’ I think that’s the last thing I heard about me.”
- Finn Brothers, Tim Finn “I know the whole world fell in love with the Beatles, but for us it was an obsessive love. We would have stalked them if we could have.”
- Smashing Punpkins, Billy Corgan “People say, ‘Oh, if only you weren’t so tortured, but I really believe that I’ll make my greatest record when I’m happy.”
- Smashing Punpkins, Billy Corgan “If we’d broken up after Siamese Dream, we would have walked away goin',’‘Man, we never quite did it..."
- Alice In Chains, Jerry Cantrell “Layne sang really well for a corpse on this record. He was just smoking.”
- David Bowie “I think there are many negatives to this pathetic idea of a computer utopia, which I will not buy into in any way.”
- U2, Bono “It used to be said that a lot of English rock n’ roll bands went to art school and we went to Brian Eno.”
- Tim Booth ”Songs are really important. They’re the background noises that affect how we behave. And yet they’re pumped out all the time without any thought at all.”
- Muzzle, Ryan Maxwell “None of us have great degrees or are going on to some big job. It’s either this, or work in a coffeehouse.”
- Stone Temple Pilots, Robert DeLeo “I would be wrong to criticize Scott personally…but things have been quite frustrating…”
- Stone Temple Pilots, Scott Weiland “There is no such thing – no matter what your dealer may purr in your ear – as “recreational substance abuse.”
- Green Day, Billy Joe Armstrong “In a sense we became what we hated.”
- Green Day, Billy Joe Armstrong “When you sell eight million records you’re going to come across some weirdoes.”
- Cast, Skin (on trying to kill his father) “I wanted to kill him, so I waited at the top of the street with a big concrete block. I was there for about six-hours in the rain, but he never walked past.”
- Tori Amos “You wake up one morning and are making gingerbread muffins for breakfast and you are dropping razor blades into them just to see how he reacts.”
- Tori Amos “Until now I haven’t allowed myself to explore the part of me that could be so vicious and decadent.”
- Oasis, Noel Gallagher “The fact of the matter is, we’re The Beatles and the Stones, and they’re the fucking Monkees.”
- Therapy? , Andy Cairns “All the unemployed terrorists are beating up drug dealers or dealing drugs themselves.”
- Therapy? , Andy Cairns “We’re definantely not going to end up as one of those bleeding heart bands doing a lot for charity.”
- Social Distortion, Mike Ness “When I was 17, if you wanted to walk down the street with a leather jacket, jeans, black shoes, white socks, maybe a buzz cut you were pretty much deciding that you might just go get in a fight.”
- Social Distortion , Mike Ness “I put the heroin and the alcohol down almost 11 years ago. I don’t lie and steal and do that stuff anymore, but I still see things differently than other people.”
- Public Enemy, Chuck D. “People been saying to me, ‘You fell out of the limelight.’ But you can’t be in the limelight all the time. What the fuck do I look like Colin Powell?”
- Midnight Oil, Peter Garrett “If the band is hitting the stage in such a way that they want to spill blood on it, then you’ve usually got a performance that’s worth being a part of.”
- Midnight Oil, Peter Garrett “If I was an American I’d be pretty depressed.”
- Lemonheads, Evan Dando “I read the most ludicrous shit about me and Courtney.”
- Lemonheads, Evan Dando “Ever since I was about four, I started to figure out that I just couldn’t cope. I can get through, you know, but it almost kills me, just tryin’ to stay out of people’s way.”
- Kula Shaker, Crispian Mills “It’s very difficult to rebel now that drugs aren’t outrageous and sex isn’t outrageous and everything’s old hat and boring.”
[edit] Industry Quotes
- “The thing that impresses me is that you really focus on alternative music. Your music reviews and the stuff you put on your samplers shows that you are really out there hunting for new music.” Nic Harcourt , former MD WDST Woodstock, current PD KCRW/Santa Monica
- “Better than rolling stone or the New York Times, I read it every time I get it.” Oedipus, PD WBCN/Boston
- “It’s the Conde Nast of trade magazines” John Lenac OM WRLG/Nashville
- “I love the magazine and set it aside so I can read it and really focus on it. Like the child of divorce, I give it quality time.” Cruze PD KTBZ/Houston
- “One of the few magazines I take home and read cover to cover” Kate Ronald, buyer Best Buy Home Office
