Issue 74 of No Depression magazine (March/April 2008) |
|
| Categories | Music magazines |
|---|---|
| Frequency | bi-monthly |
| First issue | September 1995 |
| Final issue | June 2008 |
| Country | United States |
| Language | English |
| Website | nodepression.com |
No Depression was a bi-monthly magazine that covered a broad range of roots music, including alternative country and Americana.
Contents |
No Depression was launched in September 1995 (as a quarterly) by co-editors/co-founders Grant Alden and Peter Blackstock. The magazine was named for the Carter Family song "No Depression in Heaven", the 1990 album No Depression by the band Uncle Tupelo, and an early AOL online discussion group on alternative country called The No Depression Folder. Kyla Fairchild, who handled distribution and then advertising in the first couple of years, became a co-publisher with Alden and Blackstock in 1998. Over the course of thirteen years, No Depression gradually grew into one of the nation's most prominent and broad-ranging bimonthly music publications until it ceased print operations in June 2008. Along the way, No Depression received Utne Reader Independent Press Awards for Arts & Literature coverage, and was cited as one of the nation's Top 20 magazines of any kind in 2004 by the Chicago Tribune.
Other ventures during the company's print history included a No Depression Tour (featuring Whiskeytown, the Old 97's, Hazeldine, and the Picketts) in 1997; two best-of anthologies published by Dowling Press (1998) and University of Texas Press (2005); and the No Depression Radio Show, which aired on dozens of stations across the country in 2002 and 2003.
The publishers announced in February 2008 that the May–June 2008 issue would be its last.[1] Buddy Miller was featured on the cover of the final issue, with No Depression declaring him Artist of the Decade.
No Depression launched a community website (NoDepression.com) on the Ning platform in February 2009. The site is a growing community of bloggers, videographers, photographers, artists, labels, DJs, venues, and fans around the world. Site content comes from throughout the community which attracts more than 110,000 visits (85,000 unique) per month. An online archive of No Depression's 75 print issues can be found at Archive.NoDepression.com.
Co-editors Alden and Blackstock published three No Depression "bookazines" with University of Texas Press; the debut edition was released fall 2008, the second edition March 2009, and the last September 2009.
No Depression co-founders Alden and Blackstock sold their ownership stakes to Fairchild in 2008 and 2010, respectively. Fairchild is the sole owner of the NoDepression.com community website.
The first annual No Depression music festival took place at Marymoore Park, just outside Seattle on July 11, 2009 and featured Gillian Welch, Iron and Wine, Patterson Hood and the Screwtopians, Jesse Sykes, Justin Townes Earle, Jessica Lea Mayfield, Zee Avi, and Seattle roots music all-stars.