When I informed a friend last year that a Hard Rock Cafe was opening near Pike Place Market, he quipped “It’s 2010—shouldn’t they be closing Hard Rock Cafes by now?” It may seem counterintuitive to start a monthly magazine in today’s media climate, particularly when we already operate a daily music blog and devote a significant amount of our weekly paper to the topic. But we still believe there’s a place for a monthly magazine dedicated to the music being made in Seattle, perhaps now more than ever.

Reverb Monthly is our chance to take a step back and ask ourselves what all the blog posts, mp3s, announcements, and show reviews stack up to.

We’ll mine our daily coverage for columns, essays, and profiles that put the scene into perspective, providing both a snapshot of the Seattle sound (see the city’s most comprehensive collection of Seattle music reviews) and perspective (Eric Grandy’s “Circuit City”).

Each month, we’ll use a different theme (in this instance, Bumbershoot) as a starting point for our conversations about the audible and cultural implications of the sounds, institutions, and personalities of the local music scene.

In addition to being inserted into Seattle Weekly, Reverb Monthly is being distributed independently at more than 70 locations across the city. Look for us on the first Wednesday of every month.

Enjoy the issue. We’ll see you again on October 5.

Best,

Chris Kornelis

Editor, Reverb Monthly

Music Editor, Seattle Weekly