Daily Story: Category—Magazines

The Smile fishwrap

I got the idea for my magazine fishwrap after being in New York and getting interviews at People magazine and Entertainment Weekly. It’s too long to get into for this story, but I had gotten to know someone from doing my magazine POP in Peoria, who had a lot of clout at Time, Inc. and helped get me interviews at both magazines. Neither of the interviews went well and after a few weeks I got the disappointing news that I didn’t get either job. By this time I was getting some freelance writing assignments, so I was being published in New York, which gave me some confidence about my writing skills. I realized I had never really read a copy of Entertainment Weekly closely. In fact I had been so busy for the last three years before I moved to New York publishing my POP magazine, that I hadn’t really read a magazine in years. So I went to a newsstand and bought a copy of Entertainment Weekly, walked to Central Park and read the whole magazine cover to cover. When I was done, I was stunned. The writing was horrible, they tried to be funny and they weren’t and the whole staff just came off as a bunch of wanna be nerds. So I started reading other magazines and realized what a load of crap they were. Sure there were good things here and there, but the amount of celebrity ass-kissing and bold faced stupidity floored me. And then it really pissed me off that I couldn’t get a job with these assholes.

Fanzines were big back then and I decided to do one devoted to making fun of these asshole editors and writers. I thought of the name fishwrap, called my friend Clare who helped with the page layout and art direction of POP and asked if she like to do it with me and be the art director. She loved the idea and in the winter of 1994 we came out with the first issue. It was a sixteen page, black and white fanzine that I had printed up at a local copy shop. I printed a couple hundred up and then mailed them to people on the mastheads of magazines I skewered. The first piece of press we got was in Sassy magazine. We were the “Zine of the Month,” and I told the woman who wrote it, to put in it that if anyone wanted a sample issue, they could have on for a buck. Well shortly after it came out, hundreds of teenaged girls had sent me a buck and then the magazine took on a life of it’s own.

I got more press and it kind of fed upon itself. Though the years fishwrap got written up in Men’s Journal, USA Today, Chicago Tribune, Spin magazine, the NY Post, NY Daily News, NY Press and lots of fazines. While it was somewhat of a cult hit, it never did make money, because I could never sell ads and had no money to hire a salesperson. I was always hoping to get backing, but never could. Shortly after I started the magazine, I started working a full time night job and by 2001 I had been working nights and publishing fishwrap for over seven years and I was really burnt out. And I always say, by 2001, magazines and so many facets of the entertainment world had gotten so dumbed down that making fun of them was like making fun of a retarded person. It’s easy to do and you feel a little dirty after you do it. So I decided I had had enough and was going to move on. But I kind of wanted to end on a fun note. But wasn’t sure what to do.

One day I was listening to my bootleg copy of The Beach Boys, Smile (see yesterday’s music video) and was thinking about how cool it would’ve been for it to come out. Then it hit me, why not do a magazine version? I knew lots of artists and writers and photographers, it would be fun to have them write something about or based on a song from the Smile album. And before you knew it, that’s exactly what I was doing. And just like fishwrap, this thing took on a life of its own. I don’t even know how I met or got in touch with some of the artists and writers but one thing led to another and people were getting me email addresses to people who were connected to that album. One person I had gotten to know through the years was a writer and photographer named David Dalton. David wrote for Rolling Stone in the glory years of the late 60s and early 70s. I called him and he nonchalantly told me that not only would he contribute a piece about the first time he met Brian Wilson, he asked if I’d like some photos of Brian and the Beach Boys from that time that had never been published. Of course I waited about a half second and said yes!

There were two other guys who were really instrumental in this issue and they were Gary Pig Gold and Domenic Priore.Look! Listen! Vibrate! SMiLE! Gary had been in the only authorized Canadian Beach Boys band, Endless Summer and Domenic had written a book about Smile called, Both of them knew people who knew people and like I say, this project took on a life of its own.

Domenic had the email address of David Leaf, who was one of Brian Wilson’s advisors and managers. I sent him an email telling him about the project and asking if there’d be any way Brian Wilson would like to be involved or interviewed. I told him some of the people involved and he emailed me back and said it sounded like an interesting idea, but Brian didn’t like to talk about that time of his life. He wished me good luck and asked if I would be kind enough to mail him a copy after it was printed.

So everybody got into the spirit of things, some great articles were written, great art and photos were done (one piece was done by Frank Holmes the artist who did the original artwork on Smile) and it was the most fun and freewheeling fishwrap I ever did. It also sold the most (Tower records sold out of it) and to this day I’ll get a stray email asking if I have anymore copies. Someone even made a little website devoted to the magazine. It was kind of nuts.

After I got them from the printers I put five or six into an envelope and mailed them to David Leaf. And then about two weeks later I got a package in the mail and there was no letter just a copy of the magazine. At first I wondered if this was his way of saying he didn’t like what I produced. Then I looked closer and saw some writing on the cover. Looking closer I realized it was Brian Wilson’s autograph. I stood there fucking stunned. That meant Brian Wilson looked at my magazine production of his legendary album.

I immediately emailed David Leaf and thanked him. He email me back and said he thought I’d get a kick out of it. And he told me Brian got a kick out of it.

It reminded me how important it is not to do things solely for money. Through the years people would ask me how much money I had made off the magazine. When I would tell them I lost money doing it, they would look at me like I was nuts. I guess that’s why a lot of people never create anything. There’s no money in it a lot of times. Like Bob Dylan once said, “Money doesn’t talk, it curses.”

Here’s the cover that Brian Wilson autographed and part of the issue, I’ll post the rest tonight or tomorrow when I get time. Smile!

Comments

[Biff]

Very cool, Marty! Keep on writin'!