Relix
| Editor | Dean Budnick and Mike Greenhaus |
|---|---|
| Categories | music magazine |
| Frequency | 8 per year |
| First issue | September 1974 |
| Company | Relix Media Group |
| Country | United States |
| Based in | New York City |
| Language | English |
| Website | www |
| ISSN | 0146-3489 |
Relix magazine was launched in 1974 as a handmade newsletter devoted to connecting people who recorded Grateful Dead concerts. It rapidly expanded into a music magazine covering a wide amount of artists. It is the second-longest continuously published music magazine in the United States after Rolling Stone. The magazine is published eight times a year. In 2009, the magazine had a circulation of 102,000.
Les Kippel was the founder of the First Free Underground Grateful Dead Tape Exchange in 1971 that recorded and traded live Grateful Dead concert tapes for free. As the popularity of trading live concerts on tape increased, a practice the Grateful Dead allowed and ultimately encouraged, Kippel realized that he needed to get a more streamlined method of getting tapers together to trade. He started a newsletter to help his fellow tape-traders connect rather than all of them having to go through him. He and friend Jim McGurn came up with the name Dead Relix because each Dead tape, for them, was a relic. Jerry Moore became the editor-in-chief of Dead Relix, a relatively small magazine dedicated to taping and tape collecting the Grateful and bands of a similar ilk. The first issue was released in September 1974 with an initial print run of 200. Kippel allowed a friend, who taught printing in a high school printing shop to 'use' Dead Relix to teach printing to the students.
The first issue featured a black and white drawing of a large skull in the center with a horned, winged creature below it and marijuana leaves sprouting around it. On the upper left it says: "Dedicated to the memory of the world's sneakiest tape collector-Tricky Dicky." The issue cost $1.25. With only 50 initial subscribers, Kippel printed 200 copies. However, once word spread of the magazine, subscriptions rose quickly. The first issue was released shortly after the Grateful Dead announced a hiatus. The timing was auspicious as Dead Relix now became the only way for Deadheads, who frequently only saw each other on tour with the band, to stay in touch and up-to-date with band and its members' happenings. The group's hiatus also created the opportunity for Dead Relix to broaden its coverage as it came to include other Dead-esque bands on the San Francisco scene like New Riders of the Purple Sage, Commander Cody and Hot Tuna.
At the end of 1978, Relix underwent a major transition that propelled it from more of a newsletter to a true magazine. The change started with a new editor. Jerry Moore left the magazine and Jeff Tamarkin replaced him. Tamarkin had bigger plans for Relix. He felt it needed to branch out and he wanted to broaden the coverage to include more different types of music—punk, metal, new wave, even pop. Kippel gave him free rein to expand as he wanted. Dead was dropped from the title and the subject matter changed dramatically. The result was a greater readership and many angry Deadheads. Kippel attempted to appease the worries of Relix's longtime supporters in a letter from the publisher in the Jan/Feb 1979 issue. He wrote:
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