heavymetalmagazinefanpage.com updated!

I was very happy to see that heavymetalmagazinefanpage.com was recently updated.  It's been several years.  It's not very different, but Lostboy updated the Magazine List somewhat, and produced an updated copy of the checklist (in Downloads).  There's also updates to the History page, and I thought the updates were concise and informative.  I was flattered that this tiny blog was mentioned.

I've often credited Lostboy with helping me back into my Heavy Metal Magazine fanboyhood, and I'll continue to do that.  Back around 2005, heavymetalmagazinefanpage.com was The Best independent HM resource out on the still rather new internet, and I still feel that way, even more now that the mag's come to its ignominious end.  I'm very grateful for finding Lostboy's fan page and for the effort put into it, and how it's been there all this time.  Thanks for keeping it up.

fred

Peter Kleinman

Peter Kleinman came up with the now-iconic Heavy Metal logo, back at the beginning, while he was employed by National Lampoon. The very first issue, Number 1, April 1977:

(Image lifted from heavymetalmagazinefanpage.com, cuz it's The Best)

(Also from heavymetalmagazinefanpage.com, more detail on Mr Kleinman and his time with Heavy Metal Magazine)

During the last few years, Mr Kleinman had been credited on the masthead for the logo, and I thought was nice to have his name in the credits again, mostly absent since the magazine's earliest years.  He was even credited with Logo Enhancement in issue #320 and issue #318, which made me wonder if he was actually involved in those end days.

I was curious about Mr Kleinman, and a bit of internet searching was rewarding.  First I came across an interesting blog entry by Todd Klein, another famous comics guy I wasn't familiar with, discussing and speculating about the Heavy Metal logo.  The blog entry contains a reminiscence from his friend John Workman, also Heavy Metal Magazine's Art Director in early years (1978-1984), which was fun.  

Even more fun on this blog entry, was a reply in the comments by Mr Kleinman himself, six years later.  I'll take the liberty to copy/paste the text of his reply below:

Peter Kleinman here. yes I designed the Heavy Metal logo. The story above is close to the truth. I don’t remember Len grabbing it off my drafting table. I was assigned to be the creative director of the new Heavy Metal magazine while also doing my fulltime job as Creative Director of the National Lampoon. I set the type in the heaviest font I could find. ….. Coated the back of The repro with 1 coat rubber cement, sliced the characters apart with my trusty exacto, and fashioned a pretty cool little visual pun. Then I traced over the design and comped it up to see how it would work over various illustrations, and how it would look with cover lines, dates, UPC codes, etc. I presented the pencil sketch, which I still have, to the editorial board and the publishers. They loved it. ……. to date I have yet to receive one penny in royalties though it has been used on countless covers, tee shirts, web pages, posters, movies, etc. It is one of the most recognizable icons of the fantasy universe….. And it took me about ten minutes to create. I also designed the Animal House logo and the ad campaign, for which I was paid 350$ for by Universal Studios……. ahhhhhh, the good old days. its been 40 years since i was hired by Doug Kenney and Michael Gross to take on the best job in the world with the smartest, funniest, most incredible people ever assembled. I’m still at it and I love going to work every day. Creating great communication is still the same challenge…. except for the fact that its all electronic and we get more done with less. I wouldnt change a thing, wouldn’t do one thing differently….. All is as it was meant to be…… And as they say, now, you know the rest of the story. – Thanks to all – Peter

I thought it was really cool for Peter Kleinman to comment on someone's blog like that, with some first-hand narrative about how the logo for my favorite magazine came about.  And that I found it almost 10 years later, still out there on the internet.

Even cooler, Mr Kleinman has a website, which even has a page for Heavy Metal.  And a few other things like National Lampoon covers (I recall the Fat Elvis cover, and there's even the March 1977 cover announcing a sampler of the "forthcoming illustrated fantasy magazine, Heavy Metal") and some other cartoons.  

But the coolest yet, is when I whimsically wrote in on the contact form, to say I was a HM fan and thanks for the cool logo.  And he actually wrote back!  We sent a few emails back and forth.  He was happy enough with how I built the PHFMEH from the Summer 1987 issue, that he sent me an image of a connect-the-dots Picasso he did for Esquire magazine in 1974:

Wow.  I accepted the challenge so enthusiastically, that I actually procured a copy of the July 1974 Esquire magazine, to get the intended resolution, greatly improving my chances of completing my quest:

 

Someday, I may actually do it.  And if so, it will show up here.

After the holidays, I reached out to Mr Kleinman, to perhaps continue our conversation, but no word.  Oh well, I enjoyed a friendly interaction with someone from Heavy Metal Magazine's very beginning.  It was a rare treat, so thanks.  He certainly owes me nothing more.

Well, that was fun, and I'll look forward to more fun working on the connect-the-dot puzzle, and posting it when I get there.  I've got a few more bits of things to write about too, so see ya next time.

DON'T BUY FROM THE HEAVY METAL ROBOT KIDS!

DON'T BUY FROM THE HEAVY METAL ROBOT KIDS!  The Robot is lying to you!

Almost a year after Heavy Metal Magazine collapsed, the HM websites are still up, though with no activity or updates of any kind I can see.

However, it turns out that the HM shop site is still "operating", zombie-like, enough to make people think they are still selling and shipping merchandise.  They are not.  Heavy Metal Magazine is dead.  I actually tried to place an order, and got to a credit card entry page.  No, I did not complete the order, I didn't want to join the unfortunates who got screwed by HM, ordering and paying for items that never shipped, which was a widespread problem well before the Heavy Metal ship sank.

It's appalling.  I even got a "you left items in your cart" email from the robot.  It's disgusting and funny that the email indicated a physical address, which appears to be in Long Island NY, and seems to be an auto repair shop.  It's another sad commentary on the clowns and jokers that ran Heavy Metal to its demise.  Medney and Erwin?  Yeah, fuck those guys.

I suppose eventually the site will die, if no one pays to keep it up.  Just as well, considering the mag's ignominious end.  But until then,

DON'T BUY FROM THE HEAVY METAL ROBOT KIDS!

Tripwire 30

I went and ordered a copy of the Tripwire 30th Anniversary book, since it was published by Heavy Metal, and I found it for $12 on ebay (vs the $40 original price, which it's still being sold for) including shipping.  HM advertised it in the mag right up to the final issue #320.

I'm not familiar with Tripwire, apparently it's a long-standing comic magazine from UK, and I'm not a comic book guy, but I decided to get it to see if there was anything about why Heavy Metal published it.  No one reason was indicated, and besides a couple words in the Editor's introduction and the publishing notes, there's a several page article about Heavy Metal Magazine at 45, which is about the most HM made of a 45th anniversary.

(I'm stumped by the last image, apparently a woman's portrait.  I know I've seen it, I thought it was in a gallery in a mag issue.  I recall thinking it was very different in style from the rest of the images.  I couldn't find it.  I paged through the last fifty issues, twice, and tried some internet searching.  I didn't see it.  If anyone has a clue I'd love to hear it.)

The article is unfortunate.  The handful of images are nice enough, mostly covers.  The text starts with some good early history, including more detail with names about how National Lampoon brought in stuff from Metal Hurlant to start Heavy Metal Magazine.  But then there's a very brief description of ownership transitions, so brief as to be misleading.  Some talk about their big plans.  There are a few paragraphs about the 1981 Heavy Metal movie, and the Magazine's influence on some creators.  It ends with a dumb quote from Mr Coriale, including an amusingly censored "- Buckle the f--k up, Heavy Metal has arrived."

Reading this article, and considering the recent past as I flipped through pages looking for that portrait, made me think of how much has happened with my favorite mag over the years, and how poorly this article reflects what happened.

The best I can figure, this was an opportunity for Tripwire to get their book published, and an opportunity for Heavy Metal to promote their future plans.  We all know how that turned out.  Heavy Metal Magazine didn't last a year after this came out.  (Medney and Erwin?  Yeah, fuck those guys.)

The rest of the book is outside my range.  There are a couple familiar names, Moebius, Corben, some Morrison and Bisley, but lots of superheroes on which I am clueless.  More power to them to enjoy their long history.

The worst part of it, is the egregious HM logo treatment, on the spine and the barcode on the back:

Never have I seen anyone try to separate the Heavy from the Metal with the HM logo, and for good reason I think.  It detracts terribly from the logo's visual impact, and it's an unfortunate commentary on the magazine falling apart immediately following this publication.  I'd bet Peter Kleinman had nothing to do with this.

So I'm glad enough I got this, for its small bits of Heavy Metal-ness, how it fills in some gaps, and adds gaps of its own, to Heavy Metal Magazine's history, and that I could share it like this.  

The End Again

RM Rhodes has completed his years-long project of daily chronological posting of select pages of Heavy Metal Magazine.  It's been thoughtful and even personal.  Congratulations are due for outlasting Heavy Metal Magazine and making it through the mag's entire run.  I first noticed it from a post on HM's now-moribund website in 2016.  I've enjoyed seeing this over the years, and now I'll start going back through archives over time to see what I missed.

It's a valuable resource and a very useful perspective that reflects much of where Heavy Metal magazine came from, and what it's meant to him.  Seeing his viewpoints and opinions, often different from mine, broadened my views as well.  I certainly recommend it to any and all fans of Heavy Metal Magazine.

He mentions his book again, and I hope he succeeds getting it published.  I would most definitely get a copy.  He's written a number of articles about Heavy Metal Magazine that have amused and informed me, and I'd expect a book to be even better.

So again, thanks for the efforts and the results.

Dust in the Wind

Huh.  I search around for HM clues every so often, I rarely find anything. 

But I came across a podcast interview with Tommy Coriale, touting Heavy Metal branded cannabis, that was dated just this past August.  About a month past the July announcement of the magazine's demise.  My suspicion is that the interview was recorded before the final implosion, and put up regardless of its reality.  

It's mostly Mr Coriale chattering about how awesome HM weed products are, prefaced with some blather about Heavy Metal's "brand".  He's not entirely wrong all the time, but it's tiresome to hear lazy opinions about my favorite magazine.  Like fabricating a correlation between early Heavy Metal Magazine and heavy metal music.  It's just not correct.  Music was often featured, but it was mostly "rock" at the time (or "rok" if you were Lou Stathis, and by the time he showed up in the early 80s, it was mostly punk and new-wave on the scene anyway).  Or like saying that the 1981 Heavy Metal movie was the first feature animated adult movie (Fritz the Cat would like to have a word).

There was some talk about QR linked art on the HM weed packaging, that probably works as well as the Heavy Metal AR app that was featured in HM #289 does (or did).  Much like the talk of new movies and digital products and other crap that didn't materialize while the jokers and clowns sunk the ship, it's so much dust in the wind.  My feeling is that, if there's anything left of HM, it's Mr Coriale pretending he owns the brand and can sell weed with it, if even that.

For me, I'm mostly just paging through old mags for connections and ideas for a new post or two, I've got a couple in mind, and trying to keep my eyes open from beneath the rock I live under for any hints of my departed favorite magazine, and thinking about updating my little blog.

More Corben

I came across some cool old Corben comics, a couple more Rip in Time issues, #s 4 and 5 from 1987, and an issue of Slow Death #4, which, being from 1972, counts as from the Underground comic era in my mind (my issue is a post-1976 reprint):

Getting two more Rip in Time issues makes me want to get the one I don't have, #3, someday, to have all 5.  They're really pretty good, showcasing the departed Mr Corben in a middle part (late 80s) part of his career.

The Slow Death is incredible.  I really dig the cover, and I'd bet the "aliens discovering remains of the long-gone human occupation of Earth" trope was much more fresh over 50 years ago.  It's not just Corben, it's got Irons and  Jaxon and Metzger and Sheridan, and sex and weed too.  Amazing to consider the times this was from and how things are now.  A couple pages of the Corben story "The Awakening":

(There was also a reprinting of The Awakening in the Rip in Time #4, though the print quality was lesser than in the Slow Death #4)

Even more amazing to me, is a poem at the back, contributed by soldiers serving in Vietnam.  

Truly horrifying, the truths told here, as I recall what it was like for me and the world around me back then (I would turn 14 in 1972, the Vietnam war was ever-present in the media and the politics, not just the underground comics, and the tide had shifted over the previous few years to growing anti-war sentiment across the societal landscape).  Life magazine had been running lists and photos of US war dead, and I recall the January 21 1972 issue, highlighting the single US casualty that week, and that my mom wept at the futile sorrow of it.  It would still be a couple years before the US exited Vietnam, and the damage to the US and Vietnam has been lasting.

Somehow I lived through those times.  I was too young for the draft, and too old for selective service by the time it was reinstated.  Another bit of my relatively good fortune.

Mr Corben was so prolific over his long but too short career, that I could spend the rest of my life seeking out his work.  But I won't.  Enough to enjoy coming across a few things in my wanderings, that I can loosely claim have some Heavy Metal Magazine connection, and enjoy realizing how fundamental Mr Corben was to my departed favorite mag.

Bits

Just a handful of HM-related Bits I've come across in my wandering the desolate wasteland that was once my Heavy Metal Magazine fanboyhood.  It's a cryin' shame what they did to my favorite mag (Medney and Erwin?  Yeah, fuck those guys).  

The only news things I found were a report of old inventory being destroyed, rumor mongering about someone maybe buying HM, and the HM-branded weed seems to still be a thing.  Sigh.

Oddly, traffic on my miserable blog is high, but it's mostly some robot that says it's from Singapore hitting it about a hundred times a day or more, randomly.  Not a fan.

Ferran Xalabarder is still around.  I found him selling art as of this year via his Fbook:

https://fineartamerica.com/featured/the-pause-ferran-xalabarder.html

R.G. LLarena hasn't been a part of Heavy Metal for a couple years, but it appears he's still working.  He would actually comment on my blog a bit way back when.

I did also notice that besides being on Twtr, Philippe Druillet is on Iggrm and also has a website, which is in French but still really cool.  I figure to add to them the Links page on my little blog, along with a few others that are out there.

Anyway, here's hoping that, like me, anyone reading this has more to their lives than mourning the death of Heavy Metal Magazine, and perhaps some may enjoy my little stumbles across the wastes of the HeavyMetalpocalypse, searching for more traces of the mag's past existence.  Every now and then I'll come across another Bit, and I'll post about some of them.

HM Article

RM Rhodes of heavymetalmagazine.wordpress.com fame, wrote an article on "The Uncertain Death of Heavy Metal Magazine" on Comicsbeat.  I thought it was pretty good, it's pretty long and informative, there's some chronology, and some Opinions that I even agree with sometimes. 

He brings up a good point, that there's been nothing "official" from anyone actually in Heavy Metal Magazine about the mag's demise, just the announcement from Massive that's they won't publish Vol 2.  Besides the note about Mr Lees taking over in February (still up on HM's Igram), the only other thing I've seen was the bit about HM branded weed, which seems to still be on the market.  (Getting a HM lighter or "rolling tray" with HM on it would be pretty cool, but I'm not likely to get to MA anytime soon.)

It's fun to speculate that the lack of "official" information hints at a possible re-birth being negotiated, but more likely it's due to the thorough degradation of the magazine as an institution and people keeping quiet to avoid being caught up in any legal fallout, or to avoid any accountability for its demise, that there's nothing left to be re-born.  Again, fuck those guys.

But it's nice to read an article with some affection and some information on my departed favorite magazine, and RM Rhodes does it well.  He's written quite a bit about my favorite magazine, and if the book he's talked about ever materializes I'd like to get a copy.

Until then, I'll enjoy looking through old mags and remembering, and finding new connections and threads through them, and concocting new things to write about on my puny blog.  The blog's due for some updates too, updating links and info etc, I'll have to figure out what they will be.  

That's All Folks!

RIP Heavy Metal Magazine.

It only took about a week for me to notice, but it's out that Heavy Metal Magazine has been dropped by Massive (formerly Whatnot Publishing), who had been slated to publish the so-called Vol. 2.

It will not.  Heavy Metal Magazine is no more.

Bleeding Cool apparently broke the news, I saw something on Multiversity Comics, and there's some reddit on it.  (edit)  I finally found the Massive announcement.  There's more out there I'm sure.  I don't expect many eulogies, but there may be some, and those will usually be incomplete and inadequate, or sometimes so stupid that it should be criminal.  (An example I came across demonstrates the Artificial Stupidity reinforced by the modern media landscape, of dimwits parroting stupidities fed to them.  I knew this clown was one of them, when he complained about Taarna wearing clothes, but couldn't even spell the name right.)  I doubt I'll do a complete retrospective either, but I may have more thoughts to share someday.

Mostly I will be grateful for my many years of fanboyhood, and take comfort in my hundreds of magazines.  

I will also say "Thank You" to all those who worked to produce the mag over the decades, from the beginning to the end, and especially to Kevin Eastman for keeping it going well past its expiration date.

I'll also have a big fuck you to the clowns and jokers who were in charge the last few years.  It didn't have to end this way, but it did, and it's your fault.  May the poor slobs victimized by your hubris and incompetence find solace and comfort, somewhere.  May your names forever live in infamy in the sordid history of Heavy Metal Magazine.

While Heavy Metal Magazine may not be back, I will.