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Sunday, November 17, 2002
Rolling Stone scoops NYT Magazine, with NYT running a piece on Conor Oberst at least two weeks after RS. This is a big victory for the new group in charge over at RS, and their past few issues are additional testament to that.
A major trend that has popped up from their two most recent issues: the cover is a poor advertisement for the actual issue. The Christina Aguilera-naked cover seemed in line with all the other sexy(sexless?) coverage that surrounds music at this point in time, but the piece on her was decidedly unflattering and honest; the issue also included the piece on Oberst(something that the old RS would never have run, btw) and a very intriguing interview with Michael Moore.
The Simpons issue that just came out is pretty dry on all of the little things that supposedly make the new RS jazzy: the multiple-points-of-entry facts & tidbits on the story offered very little, but the actual story offered some fascinating information, such as how Matt Groening had pitched & had rejected a series focusing on Homer's teen years. The cover story is also surrounded by interesting stories on the video-games label Rockstar and some interesting eulogizing of Jam Master Jay, among other things.
Surprisingly, what the new RS has done is make a better magazine not by taking advantage of all the flashiness of the men's-mag genre, but by doing better reporting on the music business, with pieces that offer new information and frame that information in an interesting way.
Steven I. Weiss 1:55:00 PM
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