Feature

1996

Best Haiku as Written by Mayor Martin Chavez:
Heathen monuments, by god
Let's pave them over

—Rick Mott, 1996

• We launch our first website: desert.net/alibi. The paper also sweats out its first Summer Guide, still appearing inside hot metal distribution boxes every May. Angie Drobnic Holan is a senior staff writer; she’ll go on to win a Pulitzer Prize in 2009 as part of the team behind Politifact.com. The paper has a thriving news section and promises an election issue: “Weekly Alibi will present the 1996 general election in a manner only Albuquerque’s alternative press is capable of.” We throw a KISS tribute show at the Dingo Bar.

Best Live Theater/Performance Troupe: Albuquerque Civic Light Opera Association

Best Tattoo Parlor: Hardware, Inc.

Best New Restaurant: Ragin’ Shrimp, Shogun Sushi

Best Statewide Political Embarrassment: Gov. Gary Johnson

Best Place For An Illicit Tryst: The palatial De Anza Motor Lodge

• The soundtrack to Trainspotting is released stateside. The mix of techno and primal punk is so good, we still break it out occasionally.

• Clinton gets re-elected president, while Russia chooses Boris Yeltsin as commander-in-chief.

• The Unabomber (Harvard grad and recluse Theodore John Kaczynski) is arrested, ending a 20-year string of mail-bombings. His hoodied visage sparks thousands of lazy Halloween costumes.

• Wildfires, drought and two months of endless wind are reported in the state.

• Fargo by the Coen brothers hits theaters.

• Stereolab plays the Dingo. DJ Spooky opens.