We cover music and culture as it is, and as it aspires to be. We cover black music with the kind of obsessive accuracy that could only come from respect and love.
I’VE HAD A FEW ORIGINAL MOMENTS OF MY OWN.
Just a few. My original VIBE cover story was the third issue. My mother drove me to Wesley Snipes’ Venice Beach, Calif., home for what was supposed to be a 30-minute interview. I ended up staying for four or seven hours, alternating Snapple with red wine.
He was gracious to my mom and my sister and to my mom’s dog Conrad (RIP). My original hip hop cover story was for the San Francisco Bay Guardian—I wrote about M.C. Ant, K-Cloud and The Crew, and among others, Digital Underground. It’s how I came to know young Tupac Shakur, an original’s original.
My original hip hop almost-fistfight was with Foxy Brown at a restaurant in Manhattan. It was 1998, I was 32, and I hadn’t had a fight since sixth grade. Though it was a tongue-kiss of a cover feature (Fox was the ultimate), she didn’t like what I said about her ponytail. It’s a long story, but we managed to not come to blows.
The lessons from that violent era in hip hop stay with me like a tattoo.
My original music editor was Sacha Jenkins of ego trip fame. My original fashion editor was Emil Wilbekin (now a former editor-in-chief of VIBE and current editor-in-chief of Giant).
My original managing editor was Jesse Washington (now entertainment editor for the Associated Press). My original moment with Quincy Jones was at NYC’s Nobu with him, a youthful woman he was dating, Keith Clinkscales (former CEO of VIBE, now SVP, Content Development and Enterprises at ESPN), and author James McBride. John F. Kennedy Jr. got up from the table he was sharing with his wife, Carolyn Bessette Kennedy, to tell the founder of VIBE of his parents’ admiration for Quincy’s music. JFK Jr. was gracious, even nervous.
He thought Keith, James, and I were Quincy’s grown children, and in a way, we are. I was originally going to be a teacher or a librarian. I was originally going to have kids and a vegetable garden. I was originally going to live in Oakland for my whole life and have the good friends I always had. I was originally never going to go to Europe or the Caribbean or South America.
I was originally supposed to live in New York City for five years, get some bylines, and go home where it was safe. I was originally supposed to never meet my husband, Elliott (then a freelancer, now former editor-in-chief of XXL), who wrote this month’s cover story, “The Audacity Of Hov” (page 125).
When I originally came on staff at VIBE as music editor, we were all told that the magazine had three issues to make money or it was going under. But, no: Alan Light, Rob Kenner, George Pitts, Ben Mapp, the Clink, Len Burnett, John Rollins, Lisa West, Joan Morgan, and Karla Radford (to name a few) and I—we flipped it. That’s probably why now, when everyone moans about magazines dying, my staff and I don’t sweat.
And it’s not just because we have the new and improved VIBE.com, it’s because VIBE has always been the best, while at the same time balancing on the precipice between “urban” and pop, multicultural and black, gonzo and emo, beautiful and purposefully menacing. We’re always looking over our shoulder, trying not to get bitten, forever staring off into the distance, trying to see what’s next.
It’s exhausting, but maybe that’s what makes VIBE grand—a lil’ paranoia, after all, never hurt anyone. And we end up doing something here that doesn’t get done elsewhere.
We cover music and culture as it is, and as it aspires to be. We cover black music with the kind of obsessive accuracy (see “From Jay To Z,” by Music Editor Sean Fennessey, page129) that could only come from respect and love. It is amazing that VIBE is here 15 years later—we take nothing for granted. Amazing that we have readers (close to one million, legal, not “passed along”) who get us, and celebrities, who, even when they are angry with us, still respect us. Amazing because the magazine is so important, and so necessary, and comes from such a good place (Quincy’s imagination, our souls) that in this crazy world, it almost should have disappeared in a cloud of pixie dust when it was still being pitched as a hot idea.
But yet here you are. Your 15th Anniversary Issue. It’s an original. I want to shout out my whole staff, and really the whole current staff of VIBE—exec (Angela Z!), marketing, accounting, and publishing (Hey, Edgar!).
Everyone has gone above and beyond. Oh, we have sniped at each other and rolled eyes and called in sick for no reason and stayed past midnight and took work home (I see you, Murph) and watched Jay-Z watch Tiger Woods win the Open at the cover shoot and hunted down Jesse Jackson Sr. for input and located writers and illustrators from VIBE’s past and drank Coronas in the office because our beloved Erika Ramirez is moving back to Cali. We were weirdly quiet at the Notorious shoot and giddy at the Glam Squad shoot.
We kept our fingers crossed that Jay would let Elliott on his G5. We took VIBE stationery to every event to get handwritten birthday wishes for Shirea’s “Inbox” (page 42). We found original video vixen Darlene Ortiz. We e-mailed Ralph Lauren and Karl Kani.
We did not originally think this issue was going to be as great as it is. We did not know until the very end that Eminem was coming in the book, that Ice Cube’s shots were so incredible, that DJ Clark Kent would assist Fenn with Jay’s songography, that Janelle, Celia, and Memsor would become such a killah team, that Ben and Chris would make “28 Days” (page 71) make sense, that the Research and Copy departments (Watford = dedicated) would rise as usual to the occasion, that Photo (Thanks, Robyn!) and Art (Hey, Mark!) would attack these pages with originality and elegance. And on top of it all, we planned a redesign (Carla, how did we manage?).
Wait until you see the next issue; it’s going to be totally different—a new, original VIBE, a magazine for the next 15 years. Perhaps you knew we were going to make this great. Perhaps we felt your support. For that, and for riding with VIBE for 15, we thank you.
As ever,
Danyel Smith
Editor-In-Chief
Comments
1.
jybrd3091 says:
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Is it out yet???
August 7, 2008 at 2:11 pm