By now those of you who have stopped by in the past few weeks may have noticed a new addition to this site. Those of you who have not stopped by for a good while might wish to start stopping by more often now days.
With this news item begins the new direction in the Sonic Ruin world. It’s being broken down into three different areas to best promote the bands featured within Sonic.

Website
The website will from now on feature all of the reviews. No reviews will see light of day in the print form on Sonic Ruin. Even if I decide to ramble on for days and days about an album it will end up here on the site. So if all you want to do is read album reviews, the website is the place for you to hang out at.

Fanzine
This is where I will begin to really attack what issue 3 was meant to be. Every issue of Sonic Ruin that sees print will be a tribute to the artist featured in its pages. Consider them mini-biographies, mini-books if you will. I am attempting issue 4 to be a tribute to Rene Berg.

Podcast
Ah…the new addition to the family! THIS is the area you bands might be most interested in! THIS is where you will hopefully get the best of everything! The whole intent of the podcast, The Sonic Underground, is going to be to expose you bands! The whole purpose will be interviews. I’m looking to give the bands about 15 minutes to just shoot the shit and let everybody know who the hell you are. In the past I was very specific about who got in to be interviewed, choosing only bands I was familiar with. Not anymore. Now all you need to do is fit the criteria of what Sonic is about. I’ll be chasing many of you down, but if you think you fit the style (that means look at the other bands interviewed, reviewed, covered, etc. and see if you fit), drop me a line. Overseas bands and out of the US bands might need to spring for the call, as if I get too many of you there will be no way I can afford it, at least at first. Down the road…we will see. Every band interviewed will also have their tunes played.
This weeks podcast features interviews with Valentine Failures, the whole blasted band, and Danyell from Chop Suicide. Both interviews went fairly well, but I am surprised at how much work they are going to be and how troublesome they can be. You will notice the volume on the Valentine interview is pretty loud, so turn your speakers down before that one begins. Plus both interviews crackle and get too loud at times, though I did lower the volume on the Danyell interview to make the noise less painful. I did do a good amount of editing and cleaning up of the sound before posting them to the show, but I just could not take out all of the noise.
So that is where I am at as of now with this. Let’s see what kind of doors we can kick down together!

Thanks again to all of the usual folks, Staci and Michael. Also thanks go out to the guys in Valentine Failures (Justin, Dillon, Bombs, Wayne 15) and to Danyell.

Rock on kids,
Carl

Ah, and so we begin. Reviews, reviews, and more reviews are what you can be expecting around these parts over the next few weeks. I’ve got a ton of these things clogging up my rooms, and it’s about time I give the bands and labels what I owe them. Now, not always will these be super-long, super well thought out reviews. These puppies will be changing in their styles and I will be reviewing them as I feel fit. Some of them I will be sitting down with and listening to very intently, many times over. Others, as you will see with the review found in these parts with the Harlots of Babylon, will be rattled off as I listen to them. Seriously, that was the best way I could find to do that review. It also seemed to fit best with their style.

If you are in a band (or with a label) and you sent something along at any point and have not heard back from me yet about it, please be patient, it will be up here soon. Everything that has been sent my way is finding it’s way to the reviews here. Seriously, I work for an engineering firm and my desk here is cluttered with CD’s, NOT engineering plans.

You will also see a few changes in the writers. Yes, I’ve taken on a couple other people to try and keep things interesting and moving around here.

Michael Toland used to run High Bias and is a fine writer. He had planned to stop writing, but as time away passed, he realized he missed it. We shared emails for sometime there, but he finally asked if I would mind if he wrote a few things for Sonic, just to get his feet wet again. I’m not an idiot, so I said “yes”. I expect you’ll like his writing, he does know his shit.

Ken Zalewski is a buddy of mine. I sent him the disc he reviews here knowing he is a fan of Thin Lizzy. Not sure if I can get Ken to write more…but we will see. He has a great taste in tunes and also knows his shit. The only thing I could ask for more out of Ken is for him to get his sense of humor into these reviews, but I need to find something really bad to send him for that to come rolling out.

Yes, there will be other people wandering along reviewing stuff. The writers on the website will change quite often I presume, with only a few choosing to stick around for the duration of life here. The print ‘zine though will remain 100% me.

So that is it for this update. Hopefully it all comes through just fine.
Again, thanks to Staci for his work on the site.

Rock on kids,
Carl I.

Welcome to a new chapter for Sonic Ruin, the ever evolving magazine!

First let me explain what is going on here. No, the print version of Sonic is not going anywhere. I enjoy the idea of holding an actual print ‘zine too much to jump ship so soon. But being a person who has a family and not a whole lot of time or money and is running a ‘zine by himself poses a few problems.

The main problem I face: bands want reviews done, and they want them ASAP. This is understandable as the bands and labels send me material at their expense. They would like a review and would rather not have to wait the 4 – 6 months it will take me to get a review into print. By that time many labels have moved on to promoting other CD’s, and many bands have moved on to working on their next batch of songs.

I also kept running into CD’s being sent that were not exactly what I wanted Sonic to cover. Many times these CD’s were close, but not quite there. I’m limited to space in Sonic as I do 32 pages, 3 of them spoken for by the cover, inside table of contents, and the back page ad. So a whole bunch of CD’s get left out and I don’t like having to do that. Many of these bands might be of interest to you the readers still. So even if I just do a sentence or two, in my opinion that is still worth it to the band, label, and you.

So my idea for Sonic is this: the website here will house the reviews. The magazine doesn’t sell blockbuster numbers, but I think the website will be getting a decent number of hits, if I judge by the My Space site and the blog there. This will benefit the bands and labels a whole lot. No CD will be passed over. Everything sent will get a mention from here on out.

By doing that one move that means that the reviews will not be in the ‘zine anymore. But by doing that it will free up more space for me to be able to turn Sonic into what I really want it to being. This will allow more room for interviews and band coverage.

The print ‘zines will also be partially available online. This is to try and hook people into thinking about getting the print someday by letting you see what I am trying here. I want it to be different than other print ‘zines and webzines. I’m trying a whole new creature, one that utilizes both the web and the power of print.

So, from here on out drop me into your bookmarks if you would like, and check back often. I plan to have updates happening quite often between here, print, and even a bit over at the My Space site.

HUGE, massive thanks go out to Staci T. who is the wonderful webdesigner and man behind Slugernaut Designs (and guitarist/vocalist from Chop Suicide). Just drop by some of the links on the links page to see just what the gentleman is capable of, and give him a call if you should find yourself in need.

A big thanks to Mark Bell and his Swordfish Graphics again for issue 3’s cover. Look for more from Mark in the future. Also, whereas Mark did the computer work to make the logo work (and Staci continued on with it for the site here), Marcus Calzada did the original design. Thanks Raggz.

O.K., let’s see what happens next…

Carl I.

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