PAPERBACK JUKEBOX and TONIC.
I was the Co-Founder, Art Director, Writer, Photographer, and Production Manager…and payroll check writer…and story developer…and distributor…and business strategist…and film developer…and fire puter-outer of these two arts and culture magazines in Portland, Oregon.
PAPERBACK JUKEBOX, 1991–1994
In summer of 1991 I co-founded Paperback Jukebox a Portland music, arts and culture rag. In the beginning I did everything but was primarily the production manager. But then our first art director started hearing voices coming out of the speakers of my co-founder’s stereo. It was actually very concerning, we got him immediate help, and the next thing I heard he was being deported back to Japan. Shortly afterwords his replacement split town without warning in the middle of production. So I became the art director and my design career was launched in earnest. In addition to the art duties I also wrote. My main gig was a music column reviewing 7” vinyl. My policy was that I would review every promo sent to me—talk about some unwieldy articles. The paper began rough, punk, raw, and naive, but we managed to build a worthy, influential publication.
TONIC, 1994-1995
Six of the core members of Paperback Jukebox, including myself, wanted to go in a new direction. So in the spring of 1994 we started a new publication. Our aims were to never sleep again and to provide an irreverent alternative to the long established Portland paper, Willamette Week. We published twice a month for a year and a half and made great inroads towards our goals. The last few months of publication were showing exceptional promise: national advertising was way up and discussions were in place to partially merge with The Onion. But our startup cash was dwindling and I was often working 72 hours straight to complete layout and design. My constitution collapsed, so we pulled the plug. Ironically Willamette Week ended up hiring most of our founders and staff. I wanted out of publishing and went on to work for Nike. This is not hyperbole: I am convinced that if we could have held out six more months that Tonic would exist in some form today. We had excellent talent and drive and the money was coming. I am immensely proud of what we built.