Greenroom Magazine
The Minneapolis-based print publication connects music content with health, wellness and social issues
Yet another reminder that print isn’t dead: Minneapolis’ recently launched Greenroom Magazine. Given the Twin Cities’ long history of underground hip-hop, electronic and house music, Greenroom is shedding light on both the history of the local scene and also the current bigger picture with interviews from the likes of Chance The Rapper and Stones Throw Records’ critically acclaimed Homeboy Sandman. “I see Minneapolis as a melting pot of interests and ideals; rappers challenging me to practice yoga, graffiti writers teaching me to grow my own vegetables, choreographers schooling me on the ins and outs of the Prison-Industrial Complex,” explains Editor-in-Chief Jake Heinitz. “Real people caring about real things, rather than allowing themselves to be restricted by genre or title.”
Rather than competing with digital media’s immediacy, Heinitz aims for more of a lasting product that delves into different intersections in music, whether it’s health and wellness, entrepreneurship or social issues. For example, New York-based Styles P of THE LOX and Ruff Ryders discusses the merits of a juice diet—trading shots of Patron for shots of wheatgrass—as well as the issue of desserts in inner cities.
The cover story features 2013 standout and Chicago-native Chance The Rapper as a before and after: When he was an unknown outside the Windy City and as the rising star he has become today. The piece touches on South Chicago’s unprecedented gun violence and gang activity with analysis on the creative divergence Chance’s local contemporary peers like Chief Keef. “If [Chief] Keef is portrayed as everything wrong the city’s treatment of its youth, Chance [The Rapper] is everything that’s right,” writes contributor Alexander Fruchter. This is one instance of Greenroom’s more depth-focused style that makes the publication worth a look and suggests its potential.
Issue one of Greenroom is available now from retailers across the US and in Australia. Quarterly subscriptions are available online starting for $30.
Photos by Hans Aschim
