Creem, Crawdaddy, Circus & Trouser Press - the golden age of Rock mags

I know! I loved reading about Todd there. When I saw their Top 20, I had no idea that a lot of these albums weren't actually blowing up the charts. But my goal was always to get every album on that Top 20.

 

Creem had a centerfold of Todd as the Venus di Milo including rainbow-dyed pubes.

Maybe it was down to the fact that Todd was willing to dress like a proper rock star.

 

Yep....I remember that!

 

Bam magazine.

jerol

 

NME (New Musical Express) over in this part of the world. Some great writing from the likes of Nick Kent, Charles Shaar Murray, Roy Carr and my own personal favourite, Max Bell. I still have issues from 1972 to 1993.

 

They really liked him. Cover story mid 1975 for the Initiation album.
They really pushed Jim Dandy and Black Oak Arkansas for some reason too...I really don't remember them being that big.

 

How is Todd Rundgren not in the Rock and Roll Hall of Fame?

There is a documentary coming out on Creem - I pitched in on Kickstarter and just got my brand new "Boy Howdy!" Tshirt!

 

A friend would "mimiograph" copies of Mojo Navigator for me. That, along with Crawdaddy (with Paul Williams) and Rolling Stone was my 60's R'n'R indoctrination. Rolling Stone was the survivor. Remember Patti Smith and Lenny Kaye doing record reviews there.
R'n'R music reviewing was still in its infancy and whatever info you could get was treasured. In New York, there was also various amounts of music coverage and ads in Village Voice and, later in, the Soho Weekly News. Sometimes the East Village Other and New Yorker mixed it in with various other lots.
By the 70's Crawdaddy's quality faded (IMO). Later, Trouser Press, Punk and New York Rocker were enjoyable reads.
By far, my favorite magazine in late 70's thru 80's was Musician (sometimes subtitled Player and Listener). They had the best interviews and broadened the Rock scope.
As for (across the pond) the UK, NME was "it" for me back then.

 

Yeah, they were an amazing magazine! Their 1985 interview with Kate Bush by Peter Swales was one of the most through and deepest ever conducted with her.

The only explanation I can come up with is that Todd said something really sarcastic to Jann Wenner.

Every time the subject comes up, I argue that he should be in there as a producer, at the very least. Bat Out of Hell sold 30+ million copies, Todd produced it, arranged it, played guitar and was most of the backing vocals.

Everyone who wonders what the deal with Todd is, should watch this six minute introduction.

 

Used to collect em all. I did the 'mosaic/chop em up' thing also! Used to also collect Downbeat, Jazz Journal, Rolling Stone (back when it was a b&w newspaper), Jazztimes (back when it was in newspaper format). Won't get into all the audiophile mags I used to collect!

 

I used to regularly buy Trouser Press and Circus. For some bizarre reason, Circus was only sold locally in a McMahan's furniture store.

 

I have that issue. Look at listing of Top 20! It's looks like a Greatest Hits for a decade but No, they were all current at the time. The true Golden Age for Hard Rock. So glad I lived it in real time.

Also in the 80's I loved Ira Robbin's "Trouser Press". Such a classic!

Rick A.

 

Bought them all (actually mostly Creem and Circus) along with Rolling Stone, Billboard, and even Variety once in a while. I think Variety had a Top 50 music chart in some issues.
How things have changed. Now so much is online. I miss standing at the newstand and picking up a magazine. My first stop was always Billboard and the Hot 100.

 

When I was about 11 or 12 which was in '78-79, my cousin moved to Hawaii and I inherited a huge stack of Creem back issues from her.

To this day I still think of that as one of the best music-related things that ever happened to me. I must have read each of those magazines a dozen times at least. I couldn't get enough.

Crawdaddy I never saw but I would get Hit Parader and Circus, and later on Kerrang! and Rip and things like that. Creem was always the best though, and definitely the funniest, although Kerrang! could be pretty funny.

 

Rolling Stone, Creem and Circus, the unholy three for me.

 

I never bought Creem or Circus regularly but would pick up remaindered copies at a used book store that sold newstand returns (illegally).
I subscribed to Trouser Press and then started buying New York Rocker, Slash, Bomp, Kicks and many other fanzines.
Discovered many great bands from the TP singles review section.

 

I still have a couple of copies.

 

I still have a nice stack of Creem and Crawdaddys from the early to mid 70s in good shape. Love the articles by L. Bangs about Lou Reed. Priceless.

 

I used to buy:

Hit Parader (off and on) from May 1968 until the mid-'70s, when it went heavy metal;

Circus and Circus Raves for about three years, from 1974 to 1977;

Creem from around 1975 (I think) until it stopped publication around 1988 (and again briefly when it restarted);

Rock Scene for a short period in the '70s. As one poster mentioned, it was very good for info about the burgeoning New York punk scene (at Max's Kansas City and CBGB's), but it also had a fair bit about European progressive rock! Talk abut incongruous ...

I never bought Crawdaddy; wasn't it more about jazz?

I don't think I ever bought an issue of Trouser Press, however I have two different versions of the Trouser Press Record Guide.

The Circus and Circus Raves and the Rock Scene are long gone but I still have the Hit Paraders and the Creem. Heee!

 

Does anyone subscribe to www.rocksbackpages.com

I know they have a lot of articles from these mags there, but I'm curious if they also have the pics that went with the articles....or if it's mostly just text only. It's pretty pricey for a subscription.

 

No, it was very rock oriented. They had some amazing writers.

 

Most of the Rock Scene issues are online thanks to this fantastic archive.

RockScenester.com »

 

SPIN was solid when Bob Guccione, Jr. was at the helm and before Rob Sheffield started contributing

 

Some of these mags had lines that I recall years later. Like an interview with a Gordon Stephenson of Lydia Lunch's early band "Teenage Jesus and The Jerks" - "...Jesus was unavailable, Stevenson's a Jerk."

 

And a few years later, they'd be all over Starz and Angel. As a kid, I thought these were bands who were legitimately on the way up. Looking back, Circus was the only place I remember reading about them...