OFF THE RECORD

Rip It Up, Issue 48, 1 July 1981, Page 18

OFF THE RECORD

Francis Stark

After last month's tentative beginnings, we can really get down to it now.

I mentioned City Girl in Eassing last time, and now I ave a copy of New Zealand Girl and a pleasant change it is, too. Here at least is one young women's magazine which doesn't descend to the softcentre porn of ideal lover' scoresheets and marriage quizzes. Instead, it treats its readers like people who are still awake.

It spreads the subject matter around, too. There's plenty of stuff about local musicians and artists, the book reviews are sensible and don't sound like they come from the publishers' press releases, and the clothes and photography are often great (apart from a distressing habit of knocking the tops off the models' heads).

One thing, though. When will someone have the nerve to put out a magazine in this field without a horoscope? Moving right on up the market, we have the first issue of a new free publication,

simply called Paper. At first glance, this large-format glossy seems to be entirely taken up with advertisements, but a closer look reveals there is Art at work here.

Using a full-page ad format, and alternating with actual advertisements, various Auckland graphic artists and photographers have been given the chance to come up with the layout they've always said they could do. The result is unexpectedly intriguing. Not exactly a good read, and too chic for the coffee table, this would make a great first instalment in your high-tech magazine rack. Like last month, we'll finish with a rock and roll magazine, though this one is also at the slick end of things. Trouser Press is America's leading Anglophile rock monthly, and a very nice job it does, too. It cleans up all the stuff that the big American mags like Rolling Stone and Circus don't even realise is going on in the world, and has the space and facilities to do impressively complete backgrounders.

The latest issue will be the first on sale over New Zealand counters and it will be interesting to see how a public used to NME terrorist journalism will take to it. It has a couple of really worthwhile articles on Costello and Byrne and Eno

and a whole crop of fascinating pointless facts about US bands who wish they'd been born in Liverpool. Admittedly, it does get a bit suspect around the time when they give the Boomtown Rats a complimentary full-page album review. The magazine is a monthly and has a US cover price of $1.50. It looks like it will run about two months behind publication more recent than the British music press. Don't look to it for news or signs of the latest trends stick to RIU for that but it should provide a good solid read ... say, two bus rides and a bath's worth.