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Do you read metal magazines? If so what are they like in your country?

In the UK we have four readily available magazines:

Kerrang - nobody in their right mind would take this seriously. Even back in the day their coverage was shocking. How can you respect any magazine that gives "Show No Mercy" a 3/5 score!!!! Nowadays it is even worse as it is just for Emo kids and they wank at the altar of Dave Grohl, My Chemical Romance etc.

Metal Hammer - Back in the late 80's I think they just took articles from the German Metal Hammer and translated them into English. In the 90's they worshipped at the feet of Grunge and bands like L7, faith No More etc. They gave Solitude Aeturnus "Beyond the Crimson Horizon" 0/5 and said if you listen to this you obviously have "no friends". Famously declared all guitar solos to be crap in 1998 at the height of the nu-metal craze. Try to get some credibility back in the last few years by interviewing Manowar etc. but they are not fooling anyone.

Terrorizer - this used to be okay. When it started it was kind of like a continuation of Metal Forces (best UK metal mag of all time imo) with good demo reviews and features on bands not seen elsewhere. Nowadays they have Arch Enemy and Lacuna Coil on the cover art least twice a year. Their album reviews are very predicatable. I knew that as soon as Nile bought out their last album it would be album of the month and hey presto it was. They have a team of writers who like to think they are cutting edge by including Rap albums in best of the year lists and artists like Beastie Boys & N.W.A. in their greatest albums of the 1980's feature.

Zero Tolerance - bi-monthly A5 sized job that is not that bad and at least make an effort with a good mix of bands. They don't appear to be forced by the labels to put artists on the cover or we give no advertising yet.

There are a couple of other magazines as well "Fireworks" and "Powerplay" but these cater for more melodic rock/melodic metal and AOR whcih is nice if you like that kind of thing.

What is it like in other countries? Is it the same with Rock Hard, German Metal Hammer? Burrn?

In Lithuania as far as I know right now we have just one printed Magazine,but its focused more on Black/Death metal direction.

http://www.forgotten-path.lt/

Back in 90s we had some excellent Magazines as Ledo Takas,Ad Arma or Peccatus Altar,Wounded or Edge Of Time(very good Heavy/Prog/Power/Thrash zine) ,Death Industry.

msp, you missed out Classic Rock magazine, which has a far wider scope than you'd probably think.
The writers of the mag also include names from "Sounds" & the early "Kerrang!" era, before the magazine became a joke.
A varied and well-written read, give it a try if you haven't before, i think you might enjoy it.

Most mainstream Metal magazines aren't worth anything to me. I like reading fanzines like Forgotten Scroll and Snakepit. You guys have probably already seen this but I will post about it for those who might not have. The new issue of Snakepit(#16) is out. I am looking forward to reading it. Here is a bit about it I copied from another message board:

While webzines have almost exterminated what was known as fanzines back when Metal was damn strong and full of feeling, there’s still a few survivors that refuse to join the easy way, Snakepit magazine being one of those. Time for a new Metal strike with issue 16 having just been unleashed by the dogs of war! This new issue features as usual possibly the most in depth interviews you will ever read in the Metal scene with past Metallic heroes such as AFTERMATH, AGGRESSION (Canada), ANGUS, APOCALYPSE (U.K.), ARCHENEMY (The one and ONLY ARCHENEMY from L.A.!), CHEMIKILL, CYNIC, DEATH FORCE, DEATH STRIKE, DEVASTATION (IL), EXHORDER, FIRESTORM, HELL, JJ’S POWERHOUSE, LABEL SPECIAL (RAVE ON RECORDS!!), MASTER, SARDO, SCEPTRE, SINDROME, TRANSGRESSOR, VERMIN but also actual Metal heroes such as AGENT STEEL (possibly the most in depth feature ever done on them with original drummer Chuck Proffus!), CRUCIFIED MORTALS, FIRELAND, GAUNTLET, INFERNAL MAJESTY, HIBRIA, RAZOR (bassist Mike Campagnolo explains his return and more!), SEPTER, THRUSTOR and the legendary WITCHFINDER GENERAL!!! Over 106 pages filled with nothing but molten Metal, done by fans for fans!!!! And if it’s not enough to fulfil your appetite, there’s also a DEATH DEALER 2 song live 7” included available exclusively with this new issue. This Canadian Power Metal act were a leading band back in the mid ‘80s and were part of that new Metallic wave that invaded the world (EXCITER, ANVIL, RAPID TEARS, CULPRIT, JAG PANZER, WITCHKILLER, METALICA being some other names) but due to certain circumstances they never managed to achieve the success they deserved after the recording of two albums. Discover them again with those two exclusive live tracks recorded when the band was at its peak back in 1984!
The price is $8 each retail and $6 each wholesale with minimum of 10 copies.

http://www.nwnprod.com/catalog/

I have a fanzine, but sometimes is a pain in the ass so I understand why most of them are turned into webzines. For example, I'm still trying to gather enough material for the second issue, and I already have 7 interviews done, some of them are gettin kinda old and I can't get more to complete the 'zine. So is kind of frustrating sometimes, but there's nothing like having a printed zine you made on your own.
Here in Argentina metal magazines suck, since we have the translated versions of the magazines mentioned above, and some local ones that only emulate those, or they support the so called local scene, that actually is a fuckin' joke.

I don't read the big mags like Metal Hammer, the Dutch Aardschok, Rock Hard etc because they are full of complete utter shit. The current zines I really enjoy reading at the moment are Snakepit and Morbid Tales. I'm sure there are a lot more interesting ones but these are the ones I follow at the moment.

Fanzines are great. There are some really good ones about. The new Snakepit is very good.

Probably my favourite one of all time is Isten.

In Hellas there was this kick ass mag Steel Conjuring!

R.I.P.!Back in the 90ies it was the ultimate Heavy Metal bible of the obscure...........Really obscure stuff with a shitload of information about bands etc etc

Witchkiller wrote:In Hellas there was this kick ass mag Steel Conjuring!

Yeah, I have one copy of that - I think Cirith Ungol were on the cover and it was really good. I think I got it from Sonic Age mailorder

Witchkiller wrote:In Hellas there was this kick ass mag Steel Conjuring!

R.I.P.!Back in the 90ies it was the ultimate Heavy Metal bible of the obscure...........Really obscure stuff with a shitload of information about bands etc etc

Easily the best 'zine that Greece ever put out. Too bad my copies of the first 2 issues are totally fucked up.

From Old fanzines I enjoyed ISTEN,SLAYER,VOICES FROM THE DARK SIDE and PEARDROP(Fra) and MORTICIAN/NUMSKULL.Also as I remember there were very informative newsleter with tons of reviews comming out every month USR (Undergraund Scene Report) from Belgium.If someone can Offer scaned copies please PM.Really need this one.All possible issues.Thanks.

msp wrote: Yeah, I have one copy of that - I think Cirith Ungol were on the cover and it was really good. I think I got it from Sonic Age mailorder

Yep,there was an Ungol cover.That was on the third(and last) issue.It was this mag that made me look for a lot of cool bands and a great deal of them became a life time worship...........................

Here,some old Fanzines in PDF format.SOme in English,some in Lithuanian.Chek it out. English writen fanzines : DEATH INDUSTRY,WOUNDED,BITAL WOUND,CALMANT,maybe some more...

http://www.hell-music.lt/spaudatinkle/zinai/

lunaboy wrote:Back in 90s we had some excellent Magazines as Ledo Takas,Ad Arma or Peccatus Altar,Wounded or Edge Of Time(very good Heavy/Prog/Power/Thrash zine) ,Death Industry.

Edge of Time was one of the best zines I've ever read. I wish there was another zine like that around today.

msp wrote:
Terrorizer - this used to be okay. When it started it was kind of like a continuation of Metal Forces (best UK metal mag of all time imo) with good demo reviews and features on bands not seen elsewhere. Nowadays they have Arch Enemy and Lacuna Coil on the cover art least twice a year. Their album reviews are very predicatable. I knew that as soon as Nile bought out their last album it would be album of the month and hey presto it was. They have a team of writers who like to think they are cutting edge by including Rap albums in best of the year lists and artists like Beastie Boys & N.W.A. in their greatest albums of the 1980's feature.

You know this has changed, you should check us out now...