''Rip It Up'' was a bi-monthly

New Zealand New Zealand () is an island country in the southwestern Pacific Ocean. It consists of two main landmasses—the North Island () and the South Island ()—and List of islands of New Zealand, over 600 smaller islands. It is the List of isla ...

music magazine A music magazine is a magazine dedicated to music and culture in music cognition, music culture. Such magazines typically include music news, interviews, photo shoots, essays, record reviews, concert reviews and occasionally have a covermount with ...

that was published from 1977 to 2015.

History and profile

Started in June 1977 as a free monthly giveaway, it grew rapidly, with its monthly print run reaching 30,000 copies by the mid-1980s. p. 205 The new magazine arrived at an opportune moment, with the musical revolutions of

punk rock Punk rock (also known as simply punk) is a rock music genre that emerged in the mid-1970s. Rooted in 1950s rock and roll and 1960s garage rock, punk bands rejected the corporate nature of mainstream 1970s rock music. They typically produced sh ...

and new wave arriving in New Zealand in the first few years of its existence - two genres which the new magazine was to champion, alongside local music trends such as the

Dunedin sound The Dunedin sound was a musical and cultural movement in Dunedin, Otago, New Zealand, in the early 1980s. It helped found indie rock as a genre. The scene is associated with Flying Nun Records, an independent label. Bands associated with th ...

. For many years it was unequalled as a New Zealand source of information on rock music. The magazine's back-catalogue also provides an unrivalled reference for information about the history of New Zealand's rock music. The brainchild of Murray Cammick and Alistair Dougal, ''Rip It Up'' was circulated free via record shops for fourteen years as a music rag produced on a meagre budget. In 1991 the physical quality of the publication improved, making the transition from newsprint to a gloss medium, a direct result of the NZ$2 charge.

Editors

Murray Cammick was the first editor of the magazine and ran it virtually single-handedly for several years. Other editors have included David Long, now a sports journalist at Fairfax Media, Scott Kara, who later worked for the ''

New Zealand Herald ''The New Zealand Herald'' is a daily newspaper published in Auckland, New Zealand, owned by New Zealand Media and Entertainment, and considered a newspaper of record for New Zealand. It has the largest newspaper circulation in New Zealand ...

'', Martyn "Bomber" Bradbury (radio and television host), who left ''Rip it Up'' in 2005, and Phil Bell (AKA DJ Sir-Vere), who left in August 2011 to become the programme director for popular urban radio station Mai FM. ''Rip It Up'' ceased publication in 2015. The archives and the name are owned by Simon Grigg. In 2019, digitized issues of ''Rip It Up'' from 1977 to 1985 were made available through the

National Library of New Zealand The National Library of New Zealand () is charged with the obligation to "enrich the cultural and economic life of New Zealand and its interchanges with other nations" (National Library of New Zealand (Te Puna Mātauranga) Act 2003). Under the ...

's Papers Past website. Issues from 1986 to 1998 were added to Papers Past in 2023.

References

External links

Rip It Up
- official website - @ Archive.org
AudioCulture
- history
Digitised issues from 1977–1998
available at

Papers Past The National Library of New Zealand () is charged with the obligation to "enrich the cultural and economic life of New Zealand and its interchanges with other nations" (National Library of New Zealand (Te Puna Mātauranga) Act 2003). Under the ...

1977 establishments in New Zealand 2015 disestablishments in New Zealand Bi-monthly magazines Defunct magazines published in New Zealand Free magazines Magazines established in 1977 Magazines disestablished in 2015 Mass media in Auckland Monthly magazines published in New Zealand Defunct music magazines {{music-mag-stub