Maybe its the summer hols......maybe its the ecomomic downturn but for the last few issues the magazine is definately gone off the boil and for all the reasons you mentioned above.

However there was such a high quality threshold in the first instance that I'm biding my time for the "Big Return to Form" because its still the first magazine on my list every month.

But I don't disagree with one thing you said.

There are some good points there Martin. I imagine this is a deliberate strategy or maybe Ellen and Hepworth have just got short attention spans. I'm surprised, given the presence of contributors like Andy Gill and Paul DuNoyer, that more in depth articles are not included in Word's format. I actually find the blog is sometimes more interesting.

Speaking of Mojo, this months issue, just released here in Canada is a bit of a return to form. Good article on the first part of the White Album, nice retrospective on "Murmur" and a decent article on Marianne Faithful. Fairly pointless cover version CD though.

Been a reader since issue 1 and a subscriber since not long after and read Word pretty much because of the lack of ponderous in depth pieces to get my teeth into - haven't even glanced at the Lennon article to be honest.
I want it to entertain and inform me but not take it all far too seriously like certain other magazines. For anything more in depth I'll read a book.

I rather enjoyed Kate's Kevin Ayers feature. It may not have been an in-depth piece covering his musical output over the decades but it did give a fascinating insight into his current, shall we say, situation.

And the recent John Martyn piece was a blinder.

And normally its pretty good. I like a couple of articles that are long and chewy - ideally not q and a types either. To me, I like the personality of the writer to come through which it never really does unless its a decent size piece. But I like the 2 page interviews as well - they are great to dip into (and I have a habit of reading while brushing my teeth and the shorter articles are great for this).

Not that sure the mag has gone of the boil - this month was fine but I found the Lennon piece not worthy of the cover. Unlike the Lemmy and John Martyn pieces which I thought were great. Perhaps it was because the actual piece was really a Philip Norman interview.

I still read everything in it so I'm happy.

although a durutti column review would be nice. they have v long articles in uncut which is fine but what if you are not interested in their 5 rotating featured artists.

I like a mix of long and short articles too. I thought the piece on star specialisms was excellent. Some intriguing snapshots. My point is that the long articles are, er, too short. There seems to be an innate editorial reluctance to allow writers room to roam, almost as if the mag. doesn't want to come across as too learned. I think the magazine suffers as a consequence.

Any comments due from the esteemed staff at Word on this?
Or are they too busy preparing an eight page feature on The Miracle Legion?

.......I said in another post that I put it down to post-hols malaise, but the Lennon cover and non-article - WHAT exactly is so earth shattering about the book other than the fact that JL was a pretty screwed up individual - suggest a sagging of energy. A mate of mine has gone back to Uncut, saying "there isn't enough about music in Word" which is a bit much but what he means is the jokey stuff - best of/worst of etc is taking over from the music. I wouldn't go that far but I know what he means. Oh, and I missed Shelby Lynne because there is no news section (go on, tell me it was mentioned somewhere - I missed it though!). My Uncut mate went to the gig - saw it in Uncut.......

Not considering abandoning ship yet but one more Beatle cover and the subscription gets it.

It promised a lot on the cover "the most explosive rock story of the year" but I read it twice and still couldnt find the explosion. I guess it was Norman suggesting Lennon fancied both his own mother & Paul McCartney, but 1) that's Norman's opinion not a fact and 2) we've all done that haven't we? Made the Daily Mail though! Also didnt think it was a very good picture of Lennon. Certainly not a front cover picture.

The rest of the mag is pretty darn good though. Lots of different interesting stuff. Loved the Boycs article (but felt 2 pages quite sufficient; a perfect miniature)and the Ayers piece (would have liked more of this - though having heard him on Stuart Macconie podcast I think Kate did well to get a couple of coherent pages out of him).

As for a long term (or even medium term) decline I dont see it. I thought Word was on a roll until The Dead Rock Star cover of August 2008, which did seem a contrived article designed to justify a (albeit very nice) picture of a Beatle on the cover. The rest of that magazine was good as was the Lemmy edition.

So no! I will defend Word stoutly (two Beatles covers excepted). I do agree that maybe one further longer piece would be welcome in each edition. I also miss little Jude Rogers - both her articles and her podcast manner. Please ask her to pop her head round the door more often, with her lovely Welsh voice.

And further customer feedback (although I dont pay for podcasts of course so not strictly a customer in this respect) I really like the Backstage podcasts - interesting people and David Hepworth does his grown up voice for a change.

And another thing.....! The best podcasts have to have Mark Ellen and David Hepworth in them, together.

I thought Kate Mossman's piece on Kevin Ayers was one of the best pieces in this month's issue; it really captured the essence of Ayers and his surroundings. Great writing, felt like I was sitting next to him with a glass of red, whilst sucking on the last drags of a damp roll up.
I know what you mean re the Lennon piece, not sure if it was worthy of the cover, although Lennon's polar neck blended beautifully with the red Word logo. Although one cannot fault Lennon's genius, the more I read about him one cannot help but think he wasn't a particularly nice person at the best of times.
Kind of Beatled Up at the moment, a feature on The Ramones and indeed a cover story on them would be lovely.

...and more than a little puzzled at the repeated quibbling around here. I thought Kate Mossman did pretty well to spin two-and-a-half pages out of her visit to Kevin Ayers, whose best years - and sadly not only as an artist - would appear to be behind him.

Personally, if I see any Mojo-style multi-page retrospectives around these parts then I'm quite likely to be having it away on my toes. Don't know where yet, but it's more likely to be the relaunched Readers Digest than the NME.

.. to me it just felt like an outline sketch. Ditto the Killing Joke article. It was all wrapped up rather too hastily for my taste.

Does anyone know if Mr Hibbert is writing anywhere these days? I used to love those 'Who the hell does ... think he is?' bits in Q, and also remember him writing really funny stuff in the Observer and Mail on Sunday. Time for a comeback in The Word?

I have of late found that features, though good, leave me feeling a little bit like, oh, is that it? And as for the more light weight elements, inspired and entertaining as they can be - do they always all have to be there each month even when inspiration is a bit short? Could drop the odd one now and again until better ideas come so as to allow interesting, serious pieces/interviews to fully develop. Hate to be negative, mag is still a source of great pleasure - but since you mention it...

The Eagles podcast was excellent - outstanding interview, knowing to keep comments to a minimum and let a fine interviewee speak, I could have taken more but was very satisfied with what I got. Exactly the kind of thing I would like in the magazine - and I'm not even much of an Eagles fan.

as part of my endless house move, and came across an old issue of Rolling Stone. A really old issue of Rolling Stone, like twenty-odd years old. So I had a quick flick, as you do. It had a long piece in it about the intertwined lives, joint coming of age, respective comeuppance and shared demons of Jerry Lee Lewis and his cousin Jimmy Swaggart. It was ostensibly about rock 'n' roll and religion, yes, but it was really about a lot more than that. I read the whole thing standing up in the hall, next to the box.

Later I flicked through this month's Word, which I'd been saving for a non-box-opening window in my schedule, and learned that John once had the hots for Paul, maybe.

What I'm trying to say here is. . . never mind, I'm sure you know perfectly well what I'm trying to say here.

It's word magazine..shut up!
(Thank you Macca)

I have read the magazine from day one, but now I find some of it tiresome. Maybe I'm getting old, but I really can't be bothered with rubbish like the Redneck Register and Here's Looking Like You. 99% True has run its time and I'm sure the back page could be put to better use.

Last month there was a piece on how Pierce Brosnan had killed his career by appearing in Mama Mia. At the very same time Brosnan's agent was probably taking calls and adding another 0 to Brosnan's fee, on the strength of Mama Mia. Word has never exactly had its finger on the pulse of modern culture, but it used to be able to find it once in a while.

I was at first put off by the Lennon cover, but eventualy succumbed and bought this months issue for the David Simon feature. The Lennon article was not remotely "explosive", it was just an extended book review. I can cope with that as I wouldn't actually want Word to do a big Lennon feature. McCartney maybe, if it focussed on his new stuff, but not Lennon. They should have presented it as a review as it would have appeared as less of a yawn.

The Wire article felt far more prominent in the issue and I would have been happy with more of that though. It would be nicer to have had that on the cover too, though thats not really all that important so I suppose it's whichever sells better (though I find it hard to beleive many people will only buy a music monthly if there's a "60s icon" on the cover). The recent issue does feel a bit fluffy compared to previous ones, it's probably all the summer festivals and holidays. It would have made more sense to me to make the festivals review a bit bigger.

Agree with many of the comments here. When the mag is good it's a joy to read but there's a little too much padding in there for me. It used to stand out from all the other music mags but its now increasingly resembling Uncut and Mojo (Two George Harrison covers in the same month! Did he even get that treatment when he was alive?). The death knell will be a 'Making of Dark Side of the Moon' feature so please stay away from that one. Be braver - longer articles on stuff you love and more features on books or sports. And no more dead rock stars please. If you can't find a living one to put on the cover go with someone from another field.

Although I do agree with you in almost everything discussed only 20 or so bloggers are expressing this opinion. So draw your own conclusions.

If The Word had 20 readers or the thread had more contributors what we are saying might be relevant but unfortunately commercial reality is rather different.

But Please Mr Word Don't Turn Into Q.

I imagine if you’re a Kevin Ayers enthusiast you might want a 16 page interview covering every aspect of his career in depth. But there aren’t that many Kevin Ayers fans. In the context of a magazine like The Word Kevin Ayers isn’t worth more than a couple of pages. And the Durutti Column not worth more than a couple of hundred words.
Space is at a premium. On the expensively printed and distributed pages that is. But not online. I seem to remember The Word bunging a few “extra bits from the interview that we couldn’t fit in” onto the website in the past. Why not do that as a matter of course? Longer, more “in-depth” interviws/reviews online, shorter more browser-friendly pieces in the magazine. A lot of journalists have to work this way - different lengths for different slots - in print, radio and TV. It’s not impossible.
The internet brings whole new dimensions to journalism, perhaps the most useful of which is space.
As far as quality goes I think The Word most comes a-cropper when it has to conjure up a “cover story”. I don’t think the beat that Word covers really lends itself to “cover stories” (though “rock mavericks” - Lemmy, John Martyn - is a pretty rich seam to mine). I’m one of the biggest Beatles bores on earth, but two covers in three months based on flim-flam? Behave.

Actually I thought the Lennon article and Norman interview were good and - as our beloved leaders (Hep and El) have pointed out before - Beatles on the cover means you sell more. Otherwise I agree with pretty much all above. I get bored enough to routinely skip the pages that just list best this or worst that or greatest whatevers.I wouldn't be scared off by more literature reviews ad articles, which were occasional but seem to have disappeared completely. How much does word mag sell, presumably wider than us hardcore website contributors, so there's a more casual audience to capture? I imagine it's all a tricky balance to strike. While we're doing a user generated survey I'd add that I enjoy the opinion columns by Hep, Collins and guests and also the reviews section especially. As has been said the features do often feel a little thin, perhaps they reckon that not enough of us will put in the time to read a really developed piece or profile. The ten minute interview formats are good but I don't just want to read those.

I agree with much of what's been said already. You can tell a lot about a magazine from the structure. As a trainee journalist I learnt a rule of thumb about how you divide up the editorial pages to make for a satisfying read: the front third should be shorter, newsy pieces, the middle third is the 'features well' and then you end up with the final third consisting of reviews or something similar. A 33/33/33 split, in other words.

The Word has always followed this structure, but recently the front section seems to have grown to take over an ever larger proportion of the mag. I haven't got a copy to hand to check, but I'd say it's approaching a 50/20/30 split these days. For me, that's the problem in a nutshell: there are too many 'up front' stories that aren't quite meaty enough to be features, and then when you get to the features, they're not all that meaty either.

Finally, can I echo the others who've asked for more on books? If the blogs are anything to go by, there's plenty of appetite for it. And TV as well...

Deffo more book reviews Heppo please!!

Give Andy Gill and DuNoyer some longer pieces to write.

I would love a track by track review of "feature" albums.

Still love y'all though!!

... didn't David H do a good job on the film reviews this month? Lovely writing.

Btw, I don't have a problem with the cover stories lately, apart from one:

"Who's The Best Dead Rock Star?" is really more suited to a blog discussion rather than a [lead] article in the magazine.

But, hey, keep up the good work.

most of us (dare I say including the writers?) are bored of rock star interviews. However much I have loved John Martyn, Leonard Cohen, Radiohead etc, I really don't think I need or want to read another interview or article about them. We are in a state of saturation with this kind of stuff, and the only interesting reads are about the genuinely under written about artists (like Ayers maybe). The current issue's standout was The Wire piece, which would have made a good cover. But I guess the Word has identity problems if it is trying to sell itself as a music mag. Personally I would worry less about that and just try and concentrate on good journalism, the subjects of which can be anything its readership can take, which is a pretty wide brief. People seem to want more book related stuff, why not, some of the best interviews have been with writers, whether books, comedy, tv or film. Perhaps they have more interesting observations which haven't been repeated ad nauseam elsewhere. If you look at David Hepworth or Andrew Collin's blogs, they talk about whatever they find interesting - books, tv, films, photographs, ideas, culture etc. The Word sort of goes there, but I reckon it could go further. The best thing about reading Word or other mags is being introduced to new things, and being stimulated to think about something. On the music front, Word did a good job of introducing Tinariwen and Toumani Diabete to its readers - they could do a bit more of this. So - more new music and musicians, and lots more general culture - as long as it's interesting that's fine. The rock stuff has run its course, surely?

I've asked Word about this before (it was snipped out of my one published letter a few years ago) but it wasn't addressed? I've tried googling TH a few times recently but met with very little success. I do remember him posting a review for Word in the early days but nothing since. He seemed to vanish after his spell writing the diary section for the Observer.

Is his brother Jimmy Hibbert of Bob the Builder fame?

Turns out I'd got Kevin Ayres and Kevin Coyne confused.
Still, never mind eh. Kate Mossman's writing was good enough to keep me entertained even though I have no interest in the subject. I don't think I've ever heard anything of his, and I'm not tempted to seek anything out, but the piece was a well written portrait of an alcoholic in the sun. Otherwise, there seems to be a lot of filler in the mag. More lists than the last issue of Q that I read. Generally shorter articles too. Hep on The Wire was pretty good, but please, even you guys must now acknowledge there is nothing new to say about The Beatles. At least not until you can secure an interview with Mark Chapman. Now, there's a cover star for you...

It means a great deal to me read all these affectionate posts about Tom Hibbert. We were inseparable friends after meeting in May 1980 in the offices of New Music News, an underground rock weekly published by Felix Dennis to fill the vacuum of the IPC strike (NME and Melody Maker had been suspended). I'd noticed a perilously thin individual sitting in the corner in a cloud of smoke operating a manual typewriter and, looking over his shoulder,  discovered he was inventing post to the NMN letters column from imaginary correspondents. When I asked why, he rolled his eyes - duh! - and said "because we haven't got any readers!". I suggested that I edit the letters for him and put comments after each one, and we thought it might be a wheeze to stop a passer-by on Oxford Street and ask them to sit in the photo booth by Tottenham Court Road tube station and for me to then edit the letters in the fictional voice of the person in the photo. We kept this up 'til the magazine folded 12 weeks later, alternating each week - me writing the letters, Hibbert as the imagined guest editor with this week's picture, and vice versa. I moved to Smash Hits at this point, hired by David Hepworth and when I moved off to start Q with Dave in '85, I was looking for someone to take on my role as the Black Type (an imaginary character who edited the - very real - Smash Hits letters column). There was clearly only one man for the job: Hibbs - who took this piece of psychedelic whimsy to extraordinary heights of mystery and imagination. I still have a framed photograph of him and Margaret Thatcher when he interviewed her for Smash Hits at Downing Street in the late '80s, a catastrophically misjudged plank in her re-election campaign. When we launched Q we offered him a regular slot called "Who The Hell", an invention of Dave's, which cemented his reputation, and he later wrote the Pendennis column for The Observer. Tom was very ill in 1997 and has since considered himself retired from showbiz. He lives quietly in Henley-On-Thames. We were at the Big Star concert in Shepherd's Bush in August. 

... Mr Ellen for putting the time in to explain this. Curiosity satisfied.

to Mr Hibbert. His interview with Morrissey in Smash Hits is my favourite ever interview. And Who The Hell was the best bit in Q when Q really was the best mag in the world.

And a blog post from Mr Ellen to boot.