OK peeps... In a change to the normal swing of things, I decided it was time for me to actually do something for the site. Unfortunately, Sumo has
inadvertently interviewed every emcee ever, so while we wait for a new generation of emcees to be born and grow
old enough for Sumo to quiz them... Here's an interview with George Mahood, editor of the fine periodical Big
Daddy...
Could you introduce yourself? What is your
specific job within the magazine?
My name’s George, and roughly speaking,
my job is editor / page layouts / mail order stock buyer
/ whatever else needs doing. Though I stay well clear of
the money side due to my poor vinyl-related financial
track record.
How did the magazine actually come around
starting up?
I wanted to do something constructive after
nearly getting killed in a car crash around ‘95. So
I put the idea together, and did some groundwork and
research while I was studying in the US during 1996. I’ve
always read the music press since I was a kid, and I’ve
always thought it was inadequate, so it was a natural
thing to want to do.
Where
did you get the idea for the name 'Big Daddy'?
From
our favourite wrestler of all time, of course: Shirley "Big
Daddy" Crabtree. Cry-Baby Cooper and Giant Haystacks were also
hardcore fighters, but their names just didn't sound as good.
What was the main goal when the magazine was
in the development stages?
To create a hip hop mag that wasn’t too
bothered about trends or industry concerns, and make it
something that covered hip hop culture in the broadest
possible sense of the term.
Was finance a
problem at the beginning?
Not really, because the first person who saw
the plans myself and Shok 1 were working on was
enthusiastic and decided to put their money in the pot.
Though no-one getting paid for the first year and a half
and I was on brass tacks, so that was quite a major
problem… we definitely paid our dues!
 |
| George
cunningly disguised as 'Joke Bloke' from the Daily Star |
Are you happy
with the position that Big Daddy is in now?
Definitely, though it’d be nice to get
into the newsagents and corner shops eventually.
Roughly what
circulation does the magazine have?
21,000 copies worldwide.
Do you sell a
lot of copies outside of Britain?
Actually it’s strange, because nearly
half of copies sell outside of the UK. There isn’t a
similar mag elsewhere really, so people love all the
information and interviews in Big Daddy.
How did you go about
deciding which articles and columns would feature in the magazine?
I knew
roughly what I wanted, so it was just a matter of finding the right
people to do it. Since the start, some great writers like Soulman,
Snowboy, Egon (Stones Throw) and the P Brothers have got involved. As
it goes on, hopefully I’ll pick up some more people of that calibre.
There’s some interesting celebrity contributors in the pipeline, but
I don’t want to jinx anything by spilling the beans just yet!
How did some of the more
unorthodox articles get into the magazine (such as the darts news
column)?
Well we
are all big darts fans so we decided we needed to have a darts column.
I was pleased with the way our darts correspondent “The Hound”
handled his coverage of The Lakeside last year especially. We
definitely hope to feature more pub sports in the future! If nothing
else, it baffles Americans which we find entertaining in a pathetic
way. Plus, you need some things like that to break up all the serious
interviews.
Was the decision to cover
a much wider range of music an effort to sell to a wider audience or
was there another reason for that?
At the
start I wasn’t really thinking about shifting units, it was more an
attempt to link different types of music. There’s a lot of people
who enjoy listening to a combination of hip-hop, reggae, funk and
whatever else, and then there are also some purists who only like one
thing. But regardless, there are a lot of similarities between those
different things. Now Jazz / Latin is getting some light through a new
section that Snowboy is doing. If we can get more pages, I’d like to
start featuring other types of music too. All the scenes are
relatively small in themselves, so it’s strength in numbers. Plus
they’re all relevant to hip-hop in one way or another.
To you try to cover all
the elements of hip-hop in equal proportion?
As much
as possible, though it can be hard because for example there’s only
so much you can say about performance DJs, especially at the moment
where there seems to be a certain lack of ideas in the turntablist
circuit. Plus I’m not too concerned with that whole “4 Elements”
thing; it’s all a bit false and up-its-own-arse if you ask me. I
think talking about producers like David Axelrod or certain jazz
artists is just as relevant, if not more relevant to hip-hop than
going on about the latest DJ battle.
Who is Big Daddy’s
target audience, and who do you find is it’s actual audience?
The
audience is record buyers, music fans, b-boys, collectors,
trainspotters, freaks, and anyone else with an interest in the type of
stuff we cover. We have never done a readership survey, marketing, or
anything like that before, though we’re just about to so we’ll
find out soon.
How would you say Big Daddy
differs from other hip-hop magazines around?
Most
mags only cover rap, and the odd DJ if you’re lucky. It’s an
industry at the end of the day, and while Big Daddy is a part of it
now, I try not to let it succumb to the pressures that make certain
other mags so weak and “industry-linked” - to put it politely.
Do you think that Big
Daddy makes an effective ‘learning tool’ as well as an
entertaining read? I ask
this because the magazine has taught me so much about digging since I
started reading it.
Yeah,
that’s the idea! Hopefully there’s a fair bit of information in
each issue that will expand people’s knowledge and horizons.
Do you
not think that the
large amounts of information in the magazine could be seen as daunting
by the average reader though? Are
you worried about alienating potential audiences?
It is
definitely daunting at times, and we are trying to make it a little
more presentable. But if people want to get the magazine equivalent of
watching Jerry Springer, there’s a lot of titles out there they can
buy to fulfill that need… Big Daddy is a niche magazine, so we will
probably never achieve massive mainstream success on the level of
something like The Face or Loaded. In any case, I think that if we
tried too hard to appeal to the masses, we would lose a lot of the
reasons why people enjoy it.
How do you continue to get
so many high profile people involved and/or interviewed in the
magazine? Is there some
kind of secret involved?
Erm, no,
not at all! Even from before the first issue came out, I found that a
lot of fairly well known people were willing to give a bit of their
time. I guess if nothing else, it’s a way of getting some publicity,
and people can see that we’re not going to try and misrepresent
them.
When you look back at all
the interviews you’ve done, are you surprised how many musical and
hip hop legends you’ve covered in only 7 issues?
I think
we could be doing a lot better than we are really. I’m surprised how
crap and shallow most other music magazines are, because what we do is
not that hard at all, it’s just a matter of putting a little work
in. Most editors and journalists must just sit there and wait for PR
people to ring up and tell them what music to write about. I can’t
understand how little effort and thought goes into the average
magazine in WH Smiths, all those people must just be on the take from
the big record companies. Shit is foul!!
© Ya' boy DJ Precision for ukhh.com 2001
