From its humble beginnings as a newsprint counterculture magazine in Montreal to its current glossy reign as the literary equivalent of crack for urban scenesters, Vice magazine has come a long way. The Vice Guide to Sex, Drugs and Rock and Roll is a compendium of some of the magazine’s best articles on the aforementioned topics, as well as several others.
For the uninitiated, this book provides a perfect overview of what the magazine has stood for over the years, which can be basically summed up as everything your older brother or sister was supposed to tell you about (drugs, which bands to listen to, how to dress) and a few things they wouldn’t dare to (see the Vice guides to oral and anal sex).
As the only Canadian magazine ever to succeed internationally, Vice has survived several shady business deals as well as the heavy, heavy drug habits of founders Suroosh Alvi, Gavin McInnes and Shane Smith, all of which are detailed in the book’s frank introduction.
Perhaps more impressively, Vice has survived its own success in the fickle world of hipsters. Besides a few questionable editorial slants (a never-ending stream of articles on the ultra-pretentious electroclash scene and a championing of cocaine that has gone well beyond irony), Vice continues to snag readers because it gets to subjects first. The magazine’s contributors are a constantly evolving array of underground all-stars, from gay pornographer Bruce LaBruce to photographers-of-the-moment Terry Richardson and Ryan McGinley, cementing its reputation as the magazine for the young and jaded.
But Vice’s main charm is its irreverence, represented in the book by articles such as “My Mom Shot Me,” “The Vice Guide to Shagging Muslims,” and “A Guy Who Was on Acid For a Whole Year,” to name a few.
The book also features a collection of some of the magazine’s best “Do’s and Don’ts,” a look at fashion on the street that is by far Vice’s most popular section every month. Jocks, hippies, black metal fans and, of course, Quebeckers all get harsh write-ups, while four year-old Japanese kids with mohawks, mods and even the Humpty Dumpty chips mascot receive the approval of the Vice high commission of fashion.
As a follower of the magazine for several years, it’s good to see the magazine summed up so succinctly, and chuckle at articles that are still funny even after a dozen readings. Though the magazine itself seems to have hit a wall lately, its legacy has been preserved with this book.
