Scene Magazine Means Pocket Money
When David Pedroza finally managed to squeeze out a self-financed CD after 12 years of striving on the local rock scene, he named it “Call Me Crazy.”
But Pedroza wasn’t that crazy. Leading such credible but perpetually scuffling bands as the Scarecrows and the Supernaturals hadn’t gotten him far, so around the time of his album’s 1995 release, he decided to fall back on the graphic-arts degree he had earned at Cal State Fullerton.
Pedroza’s interest in graphics began with drawing flyers for a band he had in high school. Now design work has led him back to rock, as publisher of Manic, a new, glossy, pocket-sized color photo magazine covering the skate culture that encompasses music, extreme sports and fashion.
“The scene is happening, and I wanted to get in on it,” Pedroza said. “It reminds me of the old punk days of the late ‘70s and early ‘80s. The skate thing, the music and the fashion thing is all gelling into one.”
Gerard LaBrie, a longtime fan of Pedroza’s music, acted as his guide to the skate scene. LaBrie owns a skate shop in Los Alamitos and doubles as the editor of Manic, which will appear every other month. Another familiar rock name on the masthead is production manager Frank Agnew, the former Adolescents guitarist who is Pedroza’s neighbor in Huntington Beach.
The first issue appeared last month with Ed Templeton, a professional skateboarder from Huntington Beach, on the cover and articles inside about an Adolescents reunion show, club promoter Gary Tesch and Love, a local fashion designer. The format echoes another Huntington Beach-based, micro-sized ‘zine, Electric Ink; Pedroza sees plenty of room for another stick-it-in-your-pocket publication covering the skate/rock scene with color photography and graphics.
The novice publisher’s introduction to the nerve-racking side of magazine journalism came when an ad fell through at deadline. To fill the space, he plugged in the nearest thing at hand--a copy of a Huntington Beach police log column that a friend had clipped from a newspaper and sent him as a joke because of its assortment of particularly offbeat infractions.
Like many other publications covering the local rock and youth culture scene, Manic is given away free in clubs, boutiques and the like; Pedroza says he sold enough ads to break even on the first issue.
“The magazine is just for fun, but I hope I can make money off it,” he said. For now, freelance assignments such as design work for a John Lennon video box set and Cabbage Patch Kids dolls packaging pay the bills.
His publishing venture has gotten him back into limited circulation as a rock musician: A staff band called the Snow Flakes (it began around Christmastime) has sprung from lunchtime jam sessions at the magazine. The only gigs so far have been at parties and a bowling alley. With Pedroza singing and playing guitar, Scarecrows alum Jeff Chandler on guitar and the husband-and-wife team of Frank and Libby Agnew on drums and bass, the Snow Flakes will play live Tuesday at 7 p.m. on KUCI (88.9 FM).
“The only reason we’re playing for KUCI is because a guy [from the station] called and asked,” Pedroza said. “I’ll play a party if someone asks. I’m pretty burned out” on anything that smacks of musical careerism. “But I still love music.”
