EDIT, JUNE 30th: Coilhouse #05 is on sale now!

Behold: the cover of Issue 05 is revealed. It’s been tough keeping this one under wraps, but you’ll still have to wait a couple more days to see what’s inside. For now, we’ll just say that the cover image embodies the international flavor of this issue: it features Kenyan model Ajuma Nasenyana, channeling Jamaican-American superwoman Grace Jones in a monumental image by Iranian-born, Paris-based photographer Ali Mahdavi. You can see a larger version of the cover here.

Reflecting the issue’s theme – which can be summed up by 05’s rallying spine line of “Let All the Children Boogie” – the cover features blingtastic, discodelic, holographic gold foil. But that’s not the only special print flourish employed in issue. In addition to the gold foil, Issue 05 also features a large, beautiful, double-sided poster with custom artwork created exclusively for Coilhouse by a distinguished artist. Which artist? You’ll have to wait ’til Wednesday to find out.

In just two days, the contents of this issue will be revealed. If you want to be notified the very minute that this issue goes on sale, join our Mailing List. Check back soon!

HAPPY MERDAY! Your co-editors wish you blankets of autumn leaves, wreaths of kitten-bound turtles, a harem of lamé-wearing Italian 80s TV pop stars, a barrel of the finest mocha with a side of bum-biscuits, dusted with poop jokes and polished with mermaid tears, delivered by a stampede of naked hobbits on WETA legs. Every day, we marvel at your ability to juggle music recording, editorship, cross-hemisphere time travel, and simply being there for your friends in times of need. You leave a path of growing dendrites wherever you go, inspiring all who surround you to do their best. Like watching a magician who outdoes herself with each new act, we shiver with ANTICI… (master-master-master)… PATION of The Parlour Trick album that you’re probably working on as we type these words, and everything else that you’ll accomplish in the year to come.

Birthday card by Paul Komoda, who’s pig-sitting Mer’s beloved Ingmar Superstar while she’s in New Zealand.

Most of you are familiar with the work of Coilhouse contributor Joshua Ellis. Perhaps you read his excellent article “Dark Miracle: Trinity, The Manhattan Project And The Birth Of The Atomic Age” in Issue 02, or “Children by the Millions Wait for Alex Chilton” in Issue 04. He’s also been published in Mondo 2000, Make, and countless other fine publications. Additionally, he’s a musician and a web designer.

Josh has just launched a new project called Dbasr – a free, open-source content management system for musicians and other rich media artists. Dbasr aims to do for musicians what WordPress did for writers and artists – create a decentralized, customizable platform with an emphasis on flexible design options and usability.

Josh is uniquely qualified to undertake this sort of project owing to his experience as creative lead and co-founder of the now-defunct Mperia, a BitPass-founded, DRM-free online music store launched in the early 00s. Josh has described it as “a sort of radical iTunes where any artist could create a profile, upload their music, choose a price for each song and album, and sell it using BitPass’s payment system.” For complex reasons beyond the developers’ control, Mperia folded after four years. Since that time, Josh has been keeping an eye on more recent online stores and promo websites. He’s been doing his homework on interface and user experience, and has some excellent points concerning the various options musicians and fans currently have for presenting or perusing music online:

MySpace is ugly and clumsy, and music is shoehorned in as an afterthought to what the site was designed for […] Facebook is even worse. Music is just not what these sites are meant for. There are music-specific social-type network sites for bands, such as ReverbNation and Bandcamp. These are great tools for what they do, but I think they miss the point. Musicians — really any kind of artist — need their own unique presence online. Their web presence needs to match up with their individual aesthetic, and they need to be able to interact with their fans and publish work in ways that they and their fans choose.

Agreed.  A truly elegant, intuitive, multifunctional interface for presenting or buying independent music on the web has yet to surface. Click here to read what Josh has to say about his concept. Could DBASR could be be the site we’ve all been waiting for?

If you’ve enjoyed Josh’s work for Coilhouse, we’d like to invite to pitch in and help him devote himself to this project as if it were a full-time job. There are three ways that you can help – by donating to get the project going, contributing your coding skills, or simply spreading the word.

Questions? Opinions? Share them in comments.

As we type this, Issue 05 of Coilhouse Magazine is being printed. We can’t wait to be reveal the contents of this issue to you. So many months of hard work went into this issue, and when you see the results, we think you’ll agree that it was worth the wait. It’s our biggest release to date, and there’ll be a lot of news to share. Just a few more weeks, comrades.

When Issue 04 went on sale, we had no idea that it would sell out within 21 days. We got many comments from people saying, “damn, I didn’t even know that this issue is out, and now it’s gone!” We announced the issue on our blog and on Twitter, but we realize that not everybody checks in regularly, which is why, unfortunately, some of you missed out. In an effort to get word about Issue 05 out well in advance, we’d like to invite you to join our mailing list. Those who join will be notified in advance of Issue 05’s on-sale date in our shop. We may occasionally email you with other announcements, such as new merch releases, Coilhouse events, and other news. It goes without saying that we will never share your email or send you spam.

As with past issues, there will be no reprints. Once they’re gone, they’re gone. Believe us, this is one issue you don’t want to miss out on. So sign up now.

One of Courtney’s type treatments in Issue 05

EDIT: The position has been filled. Please welcome Emily Harris to the Coilhouse design team. Check our her blog, Design Gossip. Thank you to all who applied!

For the past two issues, we had an incredible design intern named Molly Hawthorn helping us in the last stages of magazine production. But Molly is graduating from MICA this weekend (congrats, Molly!), and unable to help out this time around.  So… any graphic design students reading this have a few hours to spare this weekend? We need help wrapping up Issue 05 on the 15th and the 16th. The entire issue has been laid out, and we just need to put the finishing touches on it. We need someone who knows Adobe InDesign on an intermediate-to-expert level to work side-by-side with our Creative Director, Courtney Riot, to iron out all remaining issues. The help we need has to do mostly with adjusting text for readability: kerning, tracking, alignment, and other such stuff. Not the most fun or creative task, but still a valuable learning experience for how a magazine comes together and goes to print.

Perks: you get to see Issue 05 before anybody else does! You’ll be credited as a Graphic Designer on Issue 05’s masthead, you will of course get a free copy of Issue 05, and we can pay $200 for the extra help this weekend. Interested parties, please email us with your available hours for this weekend. Any attachments or links to documents displaying your layout and InDesign skills would be most welcome.

Thank you so much!

We know, we know. So many self-referencing posts in one week. We promise to make up for it with lots of juicy blog posts in the weeks to come. For now, three quick notes:

• There are only 2 hoodies left, both in Size L. Seems that this was a popular item. Duly noted, and we’ll try to make more.
• There are only 27 sets of the deluxe Issue 04-themed porcelain candy dishes left. Please note that this limited edition will never be recreated – once these are gone, they’re gone. We may do other pieces of a Coilhouse tea set in the future, but these plates will be gone forever.
• The deadline for reserving your ad in Coilhouse Issue 05 is at midnight tonight. Click here for our media kit, as well as some exciting notes about Issue 05’s distribution. To reserve a spot, please contact Sam.

And finally, a note from Gretta, our lovely Mistress of Shipping: “As always upon an initial release of Coilhouse goodies, due to heavy order volume, it may take up to 3 business days to be shipped. If you absolutely must have it shipped within 24 hours of placing an order, please make a note with your order or email [email protected] with the subject “RUSH ORDER” and your name and transaction id number in the body. This is no guarantee it will get to there any faster due to I have no power of the post office’s speed of labor, but I will brings yours to them sooner. Once again, kindly make sure the shipping address is correct and up to date. Thanks!”

We’re proud to present the latest round of Coilhouse Merch, available to purchase immediately in our online shop.

• Unisex hoodies. These feature our battle-cry of “INFORM INSPIRE INFECT”, emblazoned in black on a black, incredibly soft, long-sleeved hooded top. $34.99.
• Tank dresses. Super-soft, relaxed-fit summer dresses featuring our postergirl, the Stratosphere Messenger. An over-sized screen print on heather gray. $34.99.
• Miniature Porcelain Plates Set. A set of three creme-tone 3″ porcelain coupe plates featuring the Issue 04 section dividers, drawn by Zoetica. The plates come encased in a semi-gloss black box stamped with an elegant tarnished-silver I/I/I inscription designed by Courtney Riot. Hang them on your wall, use them as candy dishes, or to store your keepsakes – the choice is yours, comrade! $44.99.
• Issue 01. We are selling 25 copies of the coveted, limited-edition Neogender version of Issue 01, for a discounted price (they were originally $15). If you haven’t been reading Coilhouse long enough to remember why we did two different versions of Issue 01, there’s a NSFW explanation here. These copies are returns – meaning they got shipped to the wrong address (this happened a lot less after we put up a little warning in PayPal). They might have small defects from being in transit, so they’re not in mint condition – hence the lower price. $12.99. This issue is now completely SOLD OUT. Thank you!
  
• Last but not least, there are only 65 copies of Issue 03 left. Issue 03 took longer to sell out than our other issues because we had a larger quantity of it in stock, but it’s almost gone. Which is awesome, because we need to make room for Issue 05.

Many, many more detailed product images, after the cut.

Intrepid early adopters of the Small Business ad format, Issue 03.

The final call for placing an ad in Issue 05 is here. The deadline is this Friday. For those just tuning in, it’s possible for small businesses to advertise in Coilhouse for as low as $99 per issue. Please see our Advertising FAQ for more details. For the media kit, which outlines our circulation, distribution, demographics, rates and other stats, click here. We’ve said it before, and we’ll say it again ’til we’re blue in the face: we’d much rather survive with the help of small independent businesses than large corporate sponsors.

Issue 05 is probably the best issue to start advertising in: we’ll be in three times as many Barnes & Noble stores as we were before, the magazines are going to appear in B&N’s most prominent display cases where everyone can see them, and we got picked up by the revered alt distributor Last Gasp. More details on this expansion available here.

If you’re interested in grabbing a spot in this upcoming issue, please get in touch with us by this Friday, May 7th. After Friday, we cannot accept any more ads. You don’t have to have the artwork ready by this Friday, but if you want to reserve a spot in this issue, getting in touch with us by the end of this week is crucial. For those who have already placed an ad, you’ll be receiving your proofs shortly. For those who bought a 4-issue package starting with Issue 03, we’ll be reaching out to you shortly as well.

One more thing: we’ll be doing a huge “Support Our Advertisers” blog post in conjunction with Issue 05’s release, similar to this post that we did when Issue 01 came out.

Click here to get in touch with our brilliant Ad Manager, Samantha, to reserve your spot in Issue 05!

Achtung! Tomorrow, we will be updating the Coilhouse shop with several new merch items, some of which we’ve been working on since January. In addition to a new, snug unisex hoodie and a relaxed-fit eco-heather summer dress, we’re also issuing our first “luxury” item: a boxed set of three small porcelain plates, encased in a silver-stamped black box bearing a custom Coilhouse inscription.

In addition to the new round of merch, we will be offering a very small number of copies of an out-of-print issue of Coilhouse at a reduced price. Which issue? Check back tomorrow to find out!

This is a super-limited merch run. There are 50 hoodies, 50 dresses, 50 boxes of plates (3 plates in each box), and 25 copies of the mystery issue. Because of the small quantities, we anticipate that this round of merch will sell out fast. Stay tuned for the full reveal.

Download the media kit here!

After weeks of streamlining, updating, researching and grooming, our media kit is finally done. We’re so proud of it, comrades! It might seem a little strange to get the warm fuzzies over something intended for cold, hard commerce, but we feel that this is a respectful and elegant representation of Coilhouse and its readers. We’re excited. Especially when we think back to 2007 and realize just how far this good ship has traveled. For those interested in learning more about advertising in Issue 05, as well as in future issues, the 2010 Coilhouse Media Kit is available for download here. In addition to that reveal, we have three more bits of very interesting information to share:

1. Our biggest news is that we’re dropping the magazine’s price to $12.99 in stores. We’re doing this to give back to all the readers who’ve supported us through the years, and for everyone who wishes the magazine was slightly more affordable. The quality of the magazine (number of pages, paper stock) will remain the same. In fact, the overall quality of Issue #05 is going up, as we’ll be trying out a dazzling special effect on the cover, and including a large fold-out poster inside. For the time being, the mag will remain at $15 in our online shop and will include a special surprise (to be divulged at a later date), for those readers who buy directly from us. We’re committed to making the magazine more affordable both in stores and on the web, but we need to take it one step at a time. This is the first step.
2. We’re more than tripling our distribution in Barnes & Noble stores across the country. It will be in more stores than ever before! A list of locations will be posted. In addition, Issue 05 has been accepted into the Barnes & Noble Endcap Display Case – you know, the one that you see when you first walk into the magazine aisle, under the heading “Featured Titles” or “Just Arrived.” Issue 05 will be there for four whole weeks. This is a huge win for us, as we hope that we’ll be able to introduce more readers to Coilhouse than ever. Especially with such an intense cover, which we can’t wait to reveal to you. Eeee! We’re sitting on our hands to keep from spilling the beans. Soon. SOON.
3. Issue 05 will be appear in more independently-owned shops than ever before. We just got picked for distribution by Last Gasp, a respected distributor of all things alt, who recently celebrated their 40th birthday. They’re amazing. In addition to its history of publishing underground comix, Last Gasp is known for distributing items such as the RE/Search books, the Gothic & Lolita Bible, Hi-Fructose, Fantagraphics titles, and a lot of other more obscure counter-culture stuff. They can get us into a lot of cool mom and pop shops that other distributors don’t have access to.

Issue 05 will have more reach than any issue we’ve ever done, and it’s our most ambitious, colorful output to date. It’s so hard to keep the content of this issue under our hats! We’re sitting on our hands again. But there’s some beautiful stuff. You already know about the Neil Gaiman & Amanda Palmer piece, and some of you may have heard online whispers of Chet Zar and Zoë Keating and Gibbous Fashions and Crabapple illustrations… babies, that’s barely the tip of the iceberg. Just you wait.

For small businesses looking to advertise in Coilhouse, this is the issue. We considered putting that sentence in flashing, grunting, neon porno marquee lights for emphasis, but we are classy ladies. (Besides, we couldn’t figure out the HTML coding.) If you’ve been on the fence about taking out an ad, please note that this is probably the best issue to start. With the lower cover price, more people who haven’t heard of the magazine will be inclined to buy it. Combine that with special display promotion at Barnes & Noble, and it’s a guarantee that more folks will be picking up and leafing though it than our previous issues, which were often relegated to the back shelves of periodical purgatory.

We’d much, much, muchly much rather survive with the help of small independent businesses than large corporate sponsors. We cannot overstate that. Which is why we’ve kept the Small-Business Ad Format rates the same as they were before. It’s still possible to advertise in Coilhouse for as low as $99 per issue. We’ve hired a kick-ass Ad Manager, longtime Coilhouse reader Samantha Chin-Wolner, to help small businesses get their ads squared away. Sam will assist you with every step of the process, and she’s a total sweetheart.

For those interested, please contact Samantha for details.

For everyone else, thank you, as always, for your support and kinship on this journey. We remain gratefully and giddily yours. Up, up and away we go!

A sneak peek at some original artwork by Greg Broadmore, created expressly for Coilhouse #05.