First Custom Rodder, now Rod & Custom?

I receive these about a day apart only to read each is losing it's editor. What gives with PRIMEDIA? Why don't they shake it up a bit and gamble losing all their readership in one month. Sheesh! Thanks for everything Riz & RF.

 

Anybody know where Riz is going? He was pretty cool with the Budget Beater series on that RPU. Maybe Boyd hired him to replace Blue Bear!!!

 

i really like the way custom rodder is set up. Rob the editor has really made that an enjoyable magazine. Not to mention his 53 chev is really cool. That sucks he leaving.

 

Aust went to R&C it should be alright.
Although I'll really miss the Riz.

 

No RF at Custom Rodder?
No subscription,then....

 

Any word on why he is leaving or is that on the down low? Ive been in California for 12 days and havent a clue what is going on in the world.

 

Riz posted a resignatation thread on here some time ago...I can't find it however...but he left the mag on his own terms...perhaps someone else can find that thread...

It's my understanding that RF is going to "Classic Truks" or some truk mag that Primedia owns...

The new editor of Custom Rodder, Damon Lee, comes from a long line of kustom lovers...his father was a free-lancer for CR for many years and KNOWS kustoms...I'm sure Damon does too.

R-

 

I curios to know who are the new editor of Custom Rodder? (It will take a few more weeks until it reaches Sweden)
Think if it ever could be turned back to the great custom magazine it used to be! Not the trendy new century street machine magazine it is nowadays...
Yes, back in the early 90´s it did contain a few ugly cars, I’ll the first one to admit that, but the major content was traditional custom cars that never will get out of style. (Compare the later issues with the fall 1993 issue for instance to get what I mean. And just think of all the Harry Bradley drawings back then, they are one of my best sources of inspiration).

 

Damon Lee, that can be good for CR!
( That was a fast answer, typed as I wrote my question...)

 

[ QUOTE ]
Damon Lee comes from a long line of kustom lovers...his father was a free-lancer for CR for many years and KNOWS kustoms...I'm sure Damon does too.

[/ QUOTE ]

You just don't get it, do you? Regardless of what a "REAL" custom/kustom may be, it ain't Custom Rodder. You could put Ganahl as editor and it still wouldn't be a custom magazine. Maybe the title is too misleading, but irregardless, don't get your hopes up about it going back to the "way it was", even though it "never was"!
Damon's a friend of mine and a good guy, but don't bust his balls when you see the same CR format...

 

Damon is a great guy. His dad still does free-lance work and his still in the Lincoln, NE area. Damon shot my Malibu several years ago when he was with Super Chevy. He is one of those guys that gets it. He should be a good addition.

 

[ QUOTE ]
You just don't get it, do you? Regardless of what a "REAL" custom/kustom may be, it ain't Custom Rodder. ...but irregardless, don't get your hopes up about it going back to the "way it was", even though it "never was"!
Damon's a friend of mine and a good guy, but don't bust his balls when you see the same CR format...

[/ QUOTE ]

Hmmmmm, you're right, RF...none of us "get it", especially when we are outside and looking in...I also worked for Primedia in their B2B mags here in Denver...and I still wonder what's up Primedia's ass...if ANYONE doesn't "get it" IT IS PRIMEDIA!!!


Hope springs eternal, RF...guess we'll have to wait and see just what exactly happens to CR...

R-

 

Hasn't Damon Lee has been working for R&C as a photographer/feature editor? He's the one that did the photo shoot of Roadstar's VooDoo Child while at the Nats in August. Great guy, very nice, very personable.

 

"Dude", it doesn't have anything to do with Primedia...well, not entirely. And it doesn't make any difference that you worked for this corporation in some facet. You still think that through CR, I was trying to force a new definition of "customs" down your throat. Wrong. I know what a custom/kustom is, always have, always will. The "individual" who re-launched CR in the early '90s also knows what a real custom is--that was not intent to create a "custom" magazine, but a "custom rod" magazine. Again, maybe it shoud have had a different title. You don't have to agree with it--often times I didn't agree with it. Weesner did his best to interject as much tradition as possible, but he fought tooth and nail to include it. Obviously, that did not work.

You're wasting your breath with this issue...actually, it's a broken record. Complaints that CR is not the "traditional custom" mag it used to be fall on deaf ears. You want tradition, read TRJ, Hop Up, etc.

 

O/T and I realize this is casual conversation RF but...

Irregardless is a word that many mistakenly believe to be correct usage in formal style, when in fact it is used chiefly in nonstandard speech or casual writing. Coined in the United States in the early 20th century, it has met with a blizzard of condemnation for being an improper yoking of irrespective and regardless and for the logical absurdity of combining the negative ir- prefix and -less suffix in a single term. Although one might reasonably argue that it is no different from words with redundant affixes like debone and unravel, it has been considered a blunder for decades and will probably continue to be so.

40Stude, you usually jump all over this stuff, are you sick?

I need more to do.

 

The last issue of rod and custom I got had an editorial statement by Riz that he was leaving, It sounded like it was his decision and he no longer wanted to deal with corporate crap. After reading I came to the conclusion he may be doing some thing on his own. Any way I wish him luck.

 

[ QUOTE ]
Irregardless is a word that many mistakenly believe to be correct usage in formal style

[/ QUOTE ]

I know...I like the way it sounds. If you "really" read CR (or SR/CT/PHR etc) in the past, I always try and sneak a made-up or modified word in here and there...

 

[ QUOTE ]
[ QUOTE ]
Damon Lee comes from a long line of kustom lovers...his father was a free-lancer for CR for many years and KNOWS kustoms...I'm sure Damon does too.

[/ QUOTE ]

You just don't get it, do you? Regardless of what a "REAL" custom/kustom may be, it ain't Custom Rodder. You could put Ganahl as editor and it still wouldn't be a custom magazine. Maybe the title is too misleading, but irregardless, don't get your hopes up about it going back to the "way it was", even though it "never was"!
Damon's a friend of mine and a good guy, but don't bust his balls when you see the same CR format...

[/ QUOTE ]

I agree with Rob. I dont "know" him on a personal level other than a few meetings at Roundup and emails, but Rob is a "k""c"ustom car fanatic just as much as the next guy, if not more! Its kinda like a radio station. 9times out of 10 a DJ doesnt want to play the same song every 20 minutes, they want to play their friends music, and underground band...whatever. Point is, no matter how much Rob lives for this "kulture" its not his decision. It is all a chain of command.

 

[ QUOTE ]
40Stude, you usually jump all over this stuff, are you sick?

[/ QUOTE ]

Nawww. I'm not sick...and I didn't miss it. It's just that his use of regardless and irregardless in the same thread just didn't seem to have the importance of what I had to say to RF.

And yes, RF...most of us out here knew what Weesner was trying to do...and truth be known, I hate the term "custom ROD!", but you said it yourself: "he fought tooth and nail" to include kustoms in the mag...it's my humble opinion that Primedia suits do not know the first thing about what constitutes a 'true' kustom and they never will...they aren't car guys...and the only thing they worry about is their bottom line...fighting "tooth and nail" to put out a mag most everyone liked, seems to me, should be reasonably important to an editor.

Now then RF, a very personal question for you: WHY, after being editor of CR for such a short time, have you been given a new position?

R-

 

Why not?

 

at least we don't have to worry about offending the all-knowing Rob Fortier anymore when we bitch about custom rodder. or more appropiatly, maybe rob won't take the criticisims of the magazine, not him, personally.

i got a stack of custom rodders going back all the way, there were customs in it! how'd they get in there? it was never ABOUT customs!

Rob, you weren't listening when you were editor, and you still ain't listening. your readers are saying what they want to see in the magazines. you can listen, and make the magazine they want to buy, or keep wondering why people like us are letting our custom rodder subs expire. i don't "get" why are still making excuses for management.

custom rodder can be whatever the fuck primedia wants it to be, fine, fuckit. i'll keep spending my money on little books like Kustoms Illustrated. frankly, many of the cars are just as ugly as in CR, but i can feel the owners passion for their craft, i don't feel that when i see many of the newer style of custom rods. ten years ago CR and R&C was about all we had, not so anymore. hell, look at the surge in hot rod's circulation since the makeover, and guys here are lovin it, and not just the closeted mulletheads.

 

[ QUOTE ]
Why not?

[/ QUOTE ]

Ask a stupid question, get a stupid answer...indeed.

Thanx RF,

R-

 

PRIMEDIA, as long as I was involved with them, have never seemed to get it. While I was there, I saw a lot of wasted resource and money. When I got pulled off Super Chevy as the senior art director, it wasn't for design reasons. As a designer, what other reason should I have got yanked? Then I'm put on an airplane magazine? What gives, any artist on staff could have directed that? I still contest, I have more cycle and car knowledge then any designer on staff. Then, with Hot Rod Bikes about to need an art director at the time, I'm let go altogether. I was so surprised. I logged over 50,000 miles on cycles in three years while at PRIMEDIA. Art directed over 50 issues. Why would PRIMEDIA let go onoe of the "true" enthusiest they have in the art department? Yeah, PRIMEDIA doesn't get it.
As far as the editors changing slots or leaving altogether, I hope it was on their own terms. If it wasn't, hang in there guys, it's not always smart what happens to us in life. The upside for me is I doubled my income in less than two months after leaving. I hope the same can happen for you. MOre money for the kustom stuff!
I may not be at a company doing cool magazines, but I'm still building my bitchin' ride and logging on the motorcycle miles. I'm still me in the end.

 

Dang, I gotta chime in on this one.

I have subscribed to CR for several years, but when this sub runs out, I'm done. That's because I really don't see the content as interesting TO ME anymore. However, I think the book has the clearest direction it has ever had, and it seems that it is showing up as a "real" magazine more and more lately. (No longer just an "experiment" or "market test" to see if it was worth producing... as it was during the Weesner years and when RF took the wheel.)


So even tho I don't care for the content anymore, I think RF has really done CR well. (The DJ analogy was very appropriate here.) I wish the best for him whatever title he ends up at, as well as for Damon as the new driver for CR.

And I'll still keep an eye out on the newsstands to see if I start digging CR again...

 

Maybe, some us should just wait and see what is actually going to happen insted of trying to anticipate and second guess as to what direction, if any, the mag will go. I know for a fact.........hell nevermind, I know nothing at all.

Mike

 

[ QUOTE ]
O/T and I realize this is casual conversation RF but...

Irregardless is a word that many mistakenly believe to be correct usage in formal style, when in fact it is used chiefly in nonstandard speech or casual writing. Coined in the United States in the early 20th century, it has met with a blizzard of condemnation for being an improper yoking of irrespective and regardless and for the logical absurdity of combining the negative ir- prefix and -less suffix in a single term. Although one might reasonably argue that it is no different from words with redundant affixes like debone and unravel, it has been considered a blunder for decades and will probably continue to be so.

40Stude, you usually jump all over this stuff, are you sick?

I need more to do.

[/ QUOTE ]

Thats too funny, I nocticed that also. You get that word alot here in Utah. Irrregardless..ha,ha

 

Hi Mike....

 

Yeah, Hi Mike!

 

Hey Mikey

 

Alls I know is that I enjoyed RF's article on adding a Roth-style shifter, a photo of McPhail in shorts, concept artist choices,and similar material.
Leave us not forget his VIVID and ACCURATE description of "morning after" STRIPPER PANTIES.....
I think 40/A is a riot.
Hi Hooligan!