With the first 101 issues of Rip It Up going online this week at Papers Past – about 3000 pages in all – where to start? Two dedicated readers and contributors share their favourite moments from the magazine’s early years. In 1980 Simon Grigg founded the influential indie record label Propeller, which launched Blam Blam … Read more
The first 101 issues of Rip It Up have been added to the free online archive Papers Past. Gareth Shute tracked down some of the people behind this legendary publication to get a sense of how it started and why it was so essential to the local music scene. Rip It Up magazine was a … Read more
Fair to describe Buster Stiggs as a legend. He was in New Zealand’s first punk band, Suburban Reptiles, and then joined his old schoolmate Phil Judd in The Swingers, who created maybe the greatest song in NZ rock history – ‘Counting The Beat’. He recently penned the first part of a memoir in the autumn … Read more
A mysterious TradeMe listing offering a GOLD MINE of a magazine for potential investors piques Steve Newall’s interest – but why won’t they tell us its name? A mysterious listing on Trade Me teases an “Iconic Magazine for Sale”. Beside it, an image alluringly screams GOLD MINE. Oddly, there’s no mention in the listing of what it’s actually … Read more
Leonie Hayden was editor of Rip It Up until its sale to Grant Hislop in 2013. She writes about the experience of watching a publication she once loved disappear from view – until it published an already-infamous review of the film Dope. Rip It Up has long been redundant as a pop cultural touchstone. Many will argue that has … Read more