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Print Guitar Mags, which ones?

Orange Jackson

By Orange Jackson
in Electric Guitars

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Eddie Newbie

Eddie

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I'm going to put my remaining Guitar One magazines on eBay. I don't know if they still publish it, but I loved it. I recently met Wolf Marshall, who started the magazine, and thanked him for it :)

 

After reading Guitar Player, Guitar For the Practicing Musician, and Guitar World, Guitar School and Guitar One became my favorite magazines. I also liked Total Guitar and had a nice collection, but the UK magazines (e.g., Guitarist, Guitar Techniques) are quite expensive IMO.

 

If Guitar One or Guitar School are still available -and have not declined like Guitar World- those would be my choice.

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3shiftgtr Newbie

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Guitar world has turned into a "lifestyle" magazine. When did having tattoos and nose rings become a lifestyle. It's a {censored}ing joke. They actually had an article called "Sympathy for the Devil: The Art of Playing the Devil's Music". Like it is a tutorial about playing music Satan likes. WTF? Like there'd be a sidebar called "Here's Satan's 3 hexatonic scales". The mag is a joke and Brad Tolinski (the editor) is a total sell out.

 

O.K., before anyone who is into the mag, metal and has a tatoo and a nose ring, chill. I'm referring to how ludicrous it is that it is supposed to be a GUITAR mag, and it has become a lifestyle mag.

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artiem Newbie

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It wouldn't hurt to have a guitar magazine show up every month, something with good tips, lessons, and an interview here and there.


Any magazines out there that are focused on the over 25 crowd that are worth while?

Premier Guitar is IMO the most intelligent US-based mag out there right now. Guitar Player is OK. Guitar World is the least useful, and should probably be retitled "Metal Guitar World" if you ask me. I currently get all three of them, and find that PG is the only one I really look forward to reading.

 

I miss Guitar One, that was a great publication.

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Will Chen Newbie

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Premier Guitar is IMO the most intelligent US-based mag out there right now. Guitar Player is OK. Guitar World is the least useful, and should probably be retitled "Metal Guitar World" if you ask me. I currently get all three of them, and find that PG is the only one I really look forward to reading.


I miss Guitar One, that was a great publication.

 

 

 

+1. I'm a Premier Guitar subscriber (even though you can e-subscribe and read all the content for free). I have been a long time Guitar Player subscriber but just haven't been able to connect with it in the past couple years so I ended my subscription.

 

However, I think Guitarist and it's spin off Guitar And Bass are the best guitar mags out there. While the American mags tend to focus on the world of guitars, the UK mags seem to treat it as more of a passion and are written less "proper" and more like everyday folks who love guitars covering the world world of guitars (little articles about shops, yoga for guitarists, historical articles, and giving fair coverage to the cheapies as well as the high end). I would subscribe if it wasn't so damned expensive to get them in America.

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Dr. P Newbie

Dr. P

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Guitarist
, from the UK.


http://www.guitarist.co.uk/


gui.jpg



I have tried every possible Guitar publication known to man, and I would definitely pick this one. Great interviews (over last year, have interviewed, J Marr, Jeff Beck, Gary Moore, B B King, the bloke from the Red Hot Chilli Peppers, Seasick Steve, Billy Bragg, Derek Trucks, Bonamassa, and a bunch of other people); they feature new and up and coming bands; they have the best gear reviews - in depth and with a cd/cd rom with sounds/examples; a funny letters page; Charles Shaar Murray and Tony Bacon doing columns (CSM sometimes mentions things that go on here on HCEG in his column); reviews of new albums. I think their slight weak point is in the techniques, but I also had Guitar Techniques for a year, which I found to be no better... in fact, I generally find the techniques from magazines not entirely useful.

They've also toured the Taylor factories, the Martin factories and did an interview with the big dick at Gibson (although he didn't come across as a dick of course). Disclaimer: I understand his second middle name is Richard.

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BG76 Newbie

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Back in the day when people actually played guitar instead of looking for teh Gibsun killa for $200.00 the guitar mags were great.

 

Guitar Player was probably the best with the Chet Atkins, Rik Emmit and Tommy Tedesco Studio Log (my fav) colums.

 

Guitar for the Practicing Musician was cool for complete tabs.

 

I would buy some back issues on ebay. These days, the mags are just ads and gear reviews, which are also ads.

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Saturn Newbie

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I wish Guitar For the Practicing Musician was still availible. That was a great magazine. I had a subscription for years and kept every copy until my brother gave them away when I was moving thinking they were trash.

I pick up Guitar Player occasionally when I see it at Borders or GC. I have been thinking about getting a subscription.

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Will Chen Newbie

Will Chen

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Yup, a few years ago they wanted me to purchase $3000.00 in advertising to get a review of a set of my pickups.



One one hand that is extremely disappointing to hear. However, thinking about it having a product appear in a publication is advertising to a huge niche audience. Running FrugalGuitarist.com largely out of pocket is difficult and borderline insane the more I think about it. But $3000! That completely excludes all the little guys out there and it becomes much more obvious why the more affordable brands don't get any coverage in the big US magazines. :cry:

I've always wondered how Premier Guitar was able to offer all their content online for free, well there you have it...

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Dr. P Newbie

Dr. P

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Back in the day when people actually played guitar instead of looking for teh Gibsun killa for $200.00 the guitar mags were great.


Guitar Player was probably the best with the Chet Atkins, Rik Emmit and Tommy Tedesco Studio Log (my fav) colums.


Guitar for the Practicing Musician was cool for complete tabs.


I would buy some back issues on ebay. These days, the mags are just ads and gear reviews, which are also ads.



I recently found four bound volumes of three years of 'Guitar' magazine - UK based, for the years 1978, 79 and 80, on a market stall. It was really refreshing: - no reviews of new gear, long, in depth interviews with guitarists on tour, techniques in ALL genres of guitar playing, including classical... but STILL the same lusting after the Gibson Les Paul... :lol:

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Special J Newbie

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In my experience, Premier Guitar's reviews are paid for. As in you have to pay to get your product reviewed.

The UK mags are the best.

 

 

This is not all that surprising to me. Nothing really gets lower than a 4 out of 5 rating. But I don't think you can trust gear reviews in any publication. At least they can give you a basic ideas of the features of a new product though.

 

I like Premier Guitar because it has content that I'm interested in, and the content to advertisement ratio is fairly good. I get the electronic subscription, but occasionally pick up a print copy as well.

 

I used to like Vintage Guitar, but I don't really pick it up anymore. Too much advertising, not enough sexy old guitar pics.

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artiem Newbie

artiem

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One one hand that is extremely disappointing to hear. However, thinking about it having a product appear in a publication is advertising to a huge niche audience. Running FrugalGuitarist.com largely out of pocket is difficult and borderline insane the more I think about it. But $3000! That completely excludes all the little guys out there and it becomes much more obvious why the more affordable brands don't get any coverage in the big US magazines.

Is there such a thing any more as a truly objective magazine review? Even if the magazine didn't ask for an upfront commitment or placement payment, they would be quite hesitant to ding a product of one of their regular advertisers. Any magazine that relies on ad revenue is implicitly compromising their objectivity, which pretty much leaves Consumer Reports the only objective source. I think we all know the limitation of that approach.

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BG76 Newbie

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Even if you don't like Ed Roman, his rant on magazines is spot on.

 

http://www.edroman.com/rants/magazines.htm

 

There was a time that GP did record reviews, artist profiles and lessons. There was a gear spotlight and there were ads but you didn't see reviews in the articles.

 

The exceptions would be when they did cover stories on something like guitar synths and they would tell you the pros and cons of various models.

 

Today, people spend more money on guitars then they do on lessons and playing.

 

Look at the number of questions asked about new pickups compared to the questions about new techniques.

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