Timeline
Australia has had a long history of street press media, beginning in the 1980s. Most street press have been centred around music and gig guides, but subjects have also included movies, fashion, and food. Each major city in Australia had at least two music street press at some point, and they were at their most popular during the 1990s. [1] During the height of their popularity most were initially tabloid size, and printed on newsprint with glossy covers. Later titles shrunk to A4 size magazine.
One of Australia's earliest street press was TAGG – The Alternative Gig Guide , which ran between 1979 and 1981. It was originally published in Melbourne before a Sydney edition was launched in 1980.
In Melbourne during the 1980s, BeatMagazine and Inpress were both published weekly, with Beat first published in 1986 and Inpress following two years later. Beat was founded by Rob Furst and published by his company Furst Media, while Inpress was published by Street Press Australia. Both companies would go onto own and run multiple street press titles across Australia.
Forte was started in 1991 as a regional gig guide, similar to Beat. It was published in Geelong and distributed to Ballarat, Bendigo, Castlemaine, Geelong, Surfcoast and Warrnambool. [2] [3] In 2015 Furst Media became their publisher, starting with issue #619 on August 20. [4] Mixdown, a street press magazine focused on music creation and audio production, launched in 1993 and is printed by Furst Media as a national street press.
In 1989, 3D World began in Sydney, and ran until 2011. The magazine focused on dance music and club culture. Its main competitor was The Brag, published by Furst Media. [5] 3D World was purchased by Street Press Media in 2009, and they expanded to Melbourne and Brisbane in 2010 [6] before closing the print edition the following year. It was then revived in August 2011 as Three Magazine, an iPad-only magazine. [7] [8] It had been removed for the App store by 2014.
Sydney also had On The Street, which began in 1981 before its staff led a mass walkout and started a rival publication Drum Media in 1990. [9] [10] A similar story occurred when Sydney's Revolver closed in 2003, after six years of publication, and its staff created a new magazine Evolver. When Revolver's publisher threatened to sue due to the new magazine's similarities to theirs, Evolver was renamed The Brag. [11] This new title was briefly owned by Furst Media until 2016, and was published weekly until 2017 when it became fortnightly, then monthly, and in 2018 moved to quarterly. [12] [13] [14]
Also in NSW, Newcastle's Reverb ran from 2006 to 2012, and became an online only publication from 2013. [15] [16]
During the 1980s Time Off was published in Brisbane, after starting as a campus newspaper at the University of Queensland in 1976. It became a widely available bi-weekly title from March 14, 1980. [17] Rave Magazine was also published in Brisbane, starting in 1991 and ran for 1047 issues until 2012. [18]
Scene Magazine was started in 1993 in Brisbane, and focused on dance music to differentiate themselves from the more rock focused Rave and Time Off. They would later rename themselves as scenestr and become national in the 2000s. [19]
Rip It Up was published weekly in Adelaide, beginning in 1989 before it went digital in 2014 and ceased publication in 2016. [20] Although not officially part of Street Press Australia, it was added to the network via an agency agreement in 2008. [7] Adelaide also had db which ran between 1990 and 2014, [21] and BSide Magazine which began publishing in 2015, but ceased publication in 2018. [22]
Perth's X-Press started in 1985 as a weekly title, later shifting to monthly in 2014, [23] and the city also had their own edition of Drum Media starting in 2006.
BMA Magazine began publishing in Canberra in 1992, and is still publishing in 2022 as a fortnightly title. [24] Drum Media was also distributed in Canberra from Sydney. [25]
Starting in 1996, Pulse NT was published in Darwin and called themselves, "The Northern Territory's first street mag: local, national, international music and reviews." [26] It was published monthly by Pulse Street Press. [27] [26]
In 2006 the owners of Inpress formed Street Press Australia and took over The Drum Media and Time Off, before merging them all together in 2013 as The Music . [28] Alongside the new name came a smaller A4 size and a less frequent publication as The Music went monthly, shifting their focus away from being a weekly local gig guide. In 2018 Street Press Australia ceased to exist, and their assets were taken over by Handshake Media who continued to publish The Music on Australia's east cost. [19]
Furst Media's titles such as Beat and The Brag had been the major competitor with Street Press Australia in their cities, but never expanded further or merged their titles nationally. Instead they joined Beat, The Brag, Rave, dB, and X-Press under the banner of the National Street Press in 2009, but the companies remained separate. [29]
Perth's X-Press was merged with The Music in 2015, but continued to be printed under its own name. [30] X-Press was later put up for sale in April 2016. [31]
In 2017 The Brag was acquired by Seventh Street Media, and they ran The Brag alongside music websites Tone Deaf, The Industry Observer, and Rolling Stone Australia . [32] [33]
Scene Magazine, which had started in Adelaide in 1993 created a Melbourne edition in 2003. They downsized from their tabloid style magazine to A4 glossy in 2004 and later rebranded to scenestr in 2014, also changing from weekly to a monthly schedule. [34] [35] In 2015 they launched in Adelaide, [36] Sydney in 2016, [37] Perth in 2017, [38] and relaunched in Melbourne in 2018. [39] In 2021 they claimed to be the only national street press group. [19]
Other publications included Australian Musician , [40] and Music Feeds. [41]
The number of copies each street press distributed was audited by the Audited Media Association of Australia (AMAA) through their CAB brand which verifies and provides distribution data to media companies. [42] Street press magazines would report their weekly distribution numbers as CAB audited, and would occasionally call each other out over displaying their numbers incorrectly. [43] [6] By 2020 no titles reported CAB audited data anymore, and instead displayed rounded numbers on their websites or inside each magazine, if at all.
| Title | 2009 Distributed (CAB Audit) | 2009 Outlets | 2020 Distributed | 2020 Outlets | References |
|---|---|---|---|---|---|
| Inpress | 33,348 | 1000 | [25] | ||
| The Drum Media (Sydney) | 34,312 | 850 | [25] | ||
| The Drum Media (Perth) | 25,318 | 900 | [25] | ||
| Time Off | 22,218 | 800 | [25] | ||
| Rip It Up | 12,000 | 800 | [25] | ||
| Beat | 34,000+ | 1800 | n/a | 32,000+ | [44] [45] |
| The Brag | 30,000+ | n/a | n/a | n/a | [46] |
| Mixdown* | 25,000 | 1500+ | 32,000+ | 1750+ | [47] [48] |
| Scene / Scenestr* | n/a | 1,100+ | 60,000 | [49] [50] | |
| The Music* | n/a | n/a |
In 2020, during Australia's lockdown period, due to COVID-19, most street presses quietly stopped printing and moved completely online.
In Melbourne, Beat had moved to a fortnightly schedule in 2019. [51] Following issue #1695's publication on March 11, 2020 Beat paused their print edition until in May 2022 editor when Lucas Radbourne announced the print issue had returned, and was available freely again as a monthly magazine. [52]
In Sydney, The Brag also ceased publication in March 2020. [53] But while most street press did so without a formal announcement, The Brag released a statement in February of their coming closure. [14]
March 2020 was also the date of The Music’s most recent issue, and in October 2021, Handshake Media (previously Street Press Australia) announced they had sold The Music to SGC Media, owners of online music titles Purple Sneakers and Country Town. [54] Time Off was separately sold to Sean Sennett, who had run the magazine through the 1990s, with plans to relaunch the magazine in 2022.
scenestr reported in October 2021 they were the "largest – and only remaining – street press group in Australia", and had returned to printing copies of their magazine in mid-2020 in five states and territories "where COVID and prevailing conditions have permitted". [19] They continue to be published in 2022. [55]
Mixdown has continued to be printed bi-monthly by Furst Media and made available nationally. They published their 318th issue in December 2021. [56]
Elsewhere, BMA is still being published fortnightly in Canberra and is the longest consecutively running street press which is still in print in Australia.
The Australian Women's Weekly, sometimes known as simply The Weekly, is an Australian monthly women's magazine published by Mercury Capital in Sydney and founded in 1933. For many years it was the number one magazine in Australia before being outsold by the Australian edition of Better Homes and Gardens in 2014. As of February 2019, The Weekly has overtaken Better Homes and Gardens again, coming out on top as Australia's most read magazine. The magazine invested in the 2020 film I Am Woman about Helen Reddy, singer, feminist icon and activist. Editor-in-chief Nicole Byers told Film Ink "Helen’s story of adversity and triumph is nothing short of inspirational. The Weekly has been telling stories of iconic Australian women for more than 80 years and we're delighted to be supporting the film production".
TV Week is a weekly Australian magazine that provides television program listings information and highlights, as well as television-related news.
Inpress was a free weekly tabloid-sized music magazine that was published in Melbourne, and was released in the Geelong and Mornington Peninsula areas of Victoria, Australia. The magazine was published by Street Press Australia on a weekly basis every Wednesday.
In 1975, Brisbane's first FM radio station began broadcasting from a studio at the University of Queensland Student Union. 4ZZ became a catalyst for the development of original music in the city. Bands such as The Saints, The Go-Betweens, gerrymander and the boundaries, The Riptides and The Laughing Clowns established an ecosystem for alternative music that continues to flourish.
The Reykjavík Grapevine is an English language Icelandic magazine and online newspaper based in the Icelandic capital of Reykjavík. Its target audience primarily consists of foreigners, immigrants, international students, young Icelanders, and tourists. The magazine is currently a year-round publication, fortnightly from May to October, and monthly from November to April.
The Music is an online Australian music magazine. It previously existed as a street press devoted to long-form music journalism and commentary, music news, and artist interviews. In its printed form, it was based in Sydney, NSW and distributed throughout Sydney, Wollongong, Newcastle and Canberra, and surrounding areas. The magazine changed its name to The Music in 2013, following the merge with two other magazines, Brisbane's Time Off and Melbourne's Inpress, owned by Street Press Australia. In 2020 the print edition was paused.
Nicholas Caruana, also known as Nicky Bomba, is an Australian musician and singer-songwriter. He is the leader of the ARIA Award-winning Melbourne Ska Orchestra, frontman of his band, Bomba, as well as the former drummer and percussionist of John Butler Trio. He has performed in other acts and as a solo artist. His youngest sister, Danielle Caruana,, is married to his former bandmate, John Butler. His older brother, Michael Caruana, is a member of Bomba and of Mama Kin's backing band.
Blunt Magazine is an online music magazine based in Australia. Previously based in print, the magazine is now predominantly online, with occasional physical releases. With historical covers featuring A Day to Remember, Bring Me the Horizon, Paramore, Green Day and Parkway Drive, the magazine is recognised as a significant publication in the international music industry.
Time Off was a free weekly tabloid-sized music magazine that was originally distributed in Brisbane, Queensland, Australia. The magazine began on campus in 1976 at the University of Queensland as an initiative of co-editors Rob Cameron and Bruce Dickson, and was originally printed on A4 glossy stock. While then circulated free on campus, it was simultaneously released for limited edition purchase through South-East Queensland newsagents. Commenting on its status as a pioneering cultural production of its type for Australia, Phillip Adams at the time described it as "a remarkable achievement".
Rolling Stone Australia is the Australian edition of the United States' Rolling Stone magazine devoted to music, politics, and popular culture, published monthly. The Australian version of Rolling Stone was initially published in 1970 as a supplement in Revolution magazine published by Monash University student Phillip Frazer. It was launched as a fully fledged magazine in 1972 by Frazer and was the longest-surviving international edition of Rolling Stone until its last issue appeared in January 2018.
Jess McAvoy is a Brooklyn-based performing artist, songwriter and musician who was born in Perth, Western Australia. Their career spans over two decades and thirteen self-funded and self-produced studio recordings. McAvoy has toured extensively across Australia, Europe, Canada and the United States. They currently reside in Brooklyn, New York.
L'Officiel, full name L'Officiel de la couture et de la mode de Paris, is a French monthly fashion magazine. It has been published in Paris since 1921 and targets upper-income, educated women aged from 25 to 49. A men's edition called L'Officiel Hommes is also published, as are many foreign editions of the magazine. In 2022, it was acquired by AMTD a Hong Kong based company.
Stuart "Stu" Harvey is a Melbourne, Australia based radio announcer.
QNews is an Australian online news outlet based in Brisbane, Queensland catering to the lesbian, gay, bisexual, transgender, intersex and queer communities in Australia. The first issue was published in December 2000.
Rock Australia Magazine or RAM was a fortnightly national Australian music newspaper, which was published from 1975 to 1989. It was designed for people with a serious interest in rock and pop, and was considered the journal of record for the Australian music scene, along the way producing some of the country’s best writers on music and popular culture.
TAGG – The Alternative Gig Guide or TAGG was a free fortnightly Australian music street press published from 1979 to 1981 in Melbourne. It was published by Toorak Times, an independent newspaper started in 1972, and later expanded to Sydney.
Music magazines have been published in Australia since the 1950s. They peaked in popularity during the 1970s and '80s, but currently, there are still several national titles, including local editions of Rolling Stone and the classical music-focused Limelight, among others.
Beat is a free monthly tabloid-sized music magazine published and distributed in Melbourne, Australia. It was Melbourne's longest running street press, and one of the earliest street press after TAGG. Beat paused its print edition between March 2020-May 2022.
Tijuana Cartel are an electronic music group from Gold Coast, Australia. They have described their sound as electronic music with a world music element.