So what? Why now?Those words were some of the first bestowed upon me when I started working at the Alibi as an intern three years ago. Then News Editor Tim McGivern sat me down on the gnarled couch in his (now my) office, turned down the Tom Waits bellowing from his computer and explained that every story worth telling answers those two basic questions: Why does it matter, and why does it matter right now? I’ve tried to apply that lesson to every story I’ve written since and, in that tradition, I’ll try to do it for this one as well.The “why now?” is easy. Oct. 9 marks the Alibi ’s 15 th anniversary. Over the last several days, our editorial staff (including Steven Robert Allen, Laura Marrich, Devin D. O’Leary, Marisa Demarco and Amy Dalness) has thumbed through nearly every page printed in those 15 years and, let me tell you, that body of work feels impressive.The “so what?” isn’t as easy to define. What has the Alibi accomplished over the last decade and a half? Why do we, the writers and artists and salespeople and administrators, pour ourselves into pushing it out every week? Why do you read it? Why does it matter? After days of blackening our fingers with newsprint and flipping through articles filled with not just our own but the city’s history, I like to think in the last 15 years the Alibi has accomplished a lot. We’ve launched ourselves into the community with the hope of entertaining and educating, connecting our readers with the creativity, diversity and passion at the gut of this city. We exhaust ourselves for it every week because we love it—the work, the product, what the “alternative” in our name stands for, which isn’t so much progressive politics as it is a symbol of our desire to tell stories other media won’t report, in a way they won’t report them. You read it, we hope, because you enjoy it. And for that last sentence alone, it matters very much indeed.This reflection has become an emotional endeavor as well. As we celebrate this remarkable anniversary we are also about to lose our editor-in-chief, Steven Robert Allen, who has guided the paper to where it is today. It is poetic irony that this issue is his last, and next week he will leave us for a new job as the executive director of Common Cause New Mexico. Steve possesses all the qualities we could hope for in an editor and a friend, and I know I can speak for all members of the paper when I say he will be missed (even though he’ll only be two blocks away). Steve’s departure is another score on the Alibi ’s history, and our page-flipping sessions have reminded me just how rich that history is. We’ve tried to gather some of our favorite, or at least most memorable, parts of it for your perusal, from a 12-page biweekly started by two fresh-out-of-college kids to the award-winning weekly it has become. We hope you enjoy the journey as much as we have.Here’s to the next 15 years.
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1992
• On Feb. 1, George H.W. Bush and Boris Yeltsin get drunk together and formally declare the end of the Cold War.• NuCity publishes its first issue on Oct. 9, a sassy 12-page, black-and-white biweekly with big dreams. A tiny notice on the bottom of page 5 declares: “ NuCity needs salespersons. No sales experience necessary, but you must have worked or lived in the real world; must be willing to do a job well—no slackers or corner cutters, we’re full already. … Of course we need other staff, but until there are salespeople there ain’t no dough.”• That first issue includes a coupon for huevos rancheros at Frontier for only $2.54—with free coffee or hot tea.• Johnny Carson hosts “The Tonight Show” for the last time.• The world’s first text-based Web browser is introduced to the public.Feature
1993
• Toni Morrison wins the Nobel Prize for Literature.• In February, NuCity increases its page count to 16. • Martin Chavez begins his first term as mayor of Albuquerque.• NuCity hosts its first haiku contest.• The FBI and ATF raid the Branch Davidian compound in Waco, Texas. Following a seige that lasts almost two months, 79 members of the cult die in a fire.• A 13-year-old boy accuses Michael Jackson of fondling him.Feature
1994
• NAFTA goes into effect.• In January, NuCity goes weekly.• The Church of England ordains its first female priests.• The City of Albuquerque implements a massive water conservation plan.• Albuquerque Tribune reporter Eileen Welsome wins a Pulitzer Prize for “The Plutonium Experiment,” which documented Americans unknowingly being used in government radiation experiments.• In April, Nirvana lead singer Kurt Cobain blows his brains out with a shotgun.• In May, O.J. Simpson is arrested for killing his wife.Feature
1995
• Tejano music icon Selena is gunned down in a Corpus Christi motel room by Yolanda Saldivar, the president of Selena’s fan club.• Timothy McVeigh and Terry Nichols kill 168 people with a bomb in the Alfred P. Murrah Federal Building of Oklahoma City.• It’s about damn time! NuCity runs its first Gay Pride issue.• NuCity runs an epic gonzo interview/narrative between Hunter S. Thompson and two staffers, compiled over six days of insanity. An excerpt:"3 a.m: We actually have no idea where the animal shelter is. Norma thinks: That son-of-a-bitch. That controlling bully. I hate him. He’s got us running scared in the middle of the night. He could have waited until morning. I’m being punished for some starving animal. We find the shelter, hidden away behind a maze of office complexes, and drag our sad, terrified hyena from the car and into an outdoor pen lined with hay.At least we have luck on our side."• Christopher Reeve, known for his role as Superman, receives a paralyzing spinal chord injury after being thrown from a horse.• Captain Opinion mysteriously appears in NuCity. • Chicago publication New City threatens to sue NuCity over its name. Instead of blowing a wad of money on litigation, the paper changes its name to the Weekly Alibi and throws a big, free party on Saturday, July 22, at El Rey Theater. 750 people attend. Six hundred "Why I Hate Chicago" postcards, addressed to the New City Chicago publisher, are mailed the following Monday. • Jerry Garcia dies.• The Weekly Alibi’ s first-ever Survival Guide initiates arriving UNM students into the mysteries of our beloved Burque.Feature
1996
• Bill Clinton is re-elected President of the United States. Russia gets Yeltsin.• Weekly Alibi launches its website, desert.net/alibi (now alibi.com).• Mathematician and professor Theodore Kaczynski (aka the Unabomber) is arrested, ending a mail-bombing campaign that lasted two decades. BluBlockers and hoodie sweatshirts become a favorite Halloween costume.• The Hutu-Tutsi conflict in Rwanda ignites. No one in the U.S. seems to notice, much less care.• Fat Chance closes. So does the Golden West. Live musicgoers of Albuquerque weep.• Indie movies reign supreme! Films that go on to achieve cult status include Trainspotting, Bottle Rocket, Fargo, Slingblade, Big Night, Swingers, The Birdcage, Leaving Las Vegas, The Craft and Joe’s Apartment. • The Alibi launches its first-ever Summer Guide. Sweaty New Mexicans rejoice.• Eric Robert Rudolph, an anti-abortion and anti-gay extremist, wounds 111 and kills 2 at the Centennial Olympic Park bombing in Atlanta.• On April 27, New Mexico becomes the 38 th state to have a lottery.Feature
1997
• The year of high-profile dying. Princess Diana is killed, apparently while fleeing paparazzi, in a Paris car accident; a nutjob murders Gianni Versace outside the designer’s Miami home; and Mother Theresa dies nine days after her 87 th birthday.• The Weekly Alibi sponsors its inaugural Readers’ Choice NuMusic Awards (like Best of Burque for music) and Weekly Alibi Music Awards (WAMmies). The ballot stuffing and live ceremony is held at The Zone, then recorded and rebroadcast on KUNM. Future Alibi publisher Carl Peterson wins the first-ever WAMmie as best local songwriter for his work with the Ant Farmers.• Scottish scientists clone a lamb. Reports of sheep-related bestiality in Scotland double. (Just kidding.) Meanwhile, Hong Kong is no longer a British colony: Its 6.4 million citizens are now under China’s jurisdiction.• Some albums 1997 Music Editor Michael Henningsen can’t live without: Yo La Tengo’s I Can Hear the Heart Beating as One , American Analog Set’s From Our Living Room to Yours , Smog’s Red Apple Falls. And something about Billy Joe Shaver.• Clinton signs the Telecommunications Act of 1996 and something called The V-Chip goes into TVs. Network and cable channels are required to label their programming with parental-guidance ratings for the first time, while the Internet porn trade flourishes.Feature
Cover by Stephen Ausherman
1998
• In January, Alibi staff writer Stephen Ausherman goes behind enemy lines to report the happenings in Iraq in a two-part feature titled, "A Journey Through Iraq"—three years before 9/11/01. • In February, Bill Gates gets a pie thrown in his face in Brussels, Belgium.• Marcy Britton files a lawsuit against Albuquerque Animal Services for cruel euthanasia and animal handling practices resulting in debate, controversy and change surrounding the animal shelters that continues today.• Elton John is knighted.• The legendary Dingo Bar closes.• Senior Display Account Executive Sarah Bonneau marries her boyfriend, Phillippe, in Venice, Italy, three years after meeting through an Alibi personals ad.• In September, Google is co-founded by Larry Page and Sergey Brin while they are students at Stanford University.• Gubernatorial Candidate Martin Chavez tells the Alibi during an interview that if he had to be an animal, he’d be a Golden Labrador. Congressional candidate Heather Wilson says she’d be a horse.• FDA approves Viagra, the male impotence drug.Feature
Cover by Jen Scott
1999
• President Clinton’s impeachment trial begins in January.• The Euro becomes the official currency of the European Community.• Secretary of Energy Bill Richardson falls off Al Gore‘s VP list.• In April, the Columbine High School massacre shocks the nation.• As advertised in the Weekly Alibi : "Y2K is coming! Great ready—get your needs filled. All foods in stock! No waiting! Preparedness seminars! Survival kits! MREs!"• Albuquerque Business Times publishes its last issue in June.• Star Wars: Episode One stuns the sci-fi world silent, but that doesn’t keep Film Editor Devin D. O’Leary from linking someone from the cast of every summer film release to the original Luke Skywalker, Mark Hamill.• Alibi readers vote XTC’s Apple Venus Volume 1 as their No. 1 album of the year.• The Alibi holds its first-ever Crawl.• Gov. Gary Johnson begins advocating for the legalization of drugs.Feature
Cover by Scott Rickson
2000
• The world fails to come to an end courtesy of the Y2K bug. Some people have to reset the clocks on their computers. Others are stuck with a hundred cases of bottled water.• Among the Year 2000 psychic predictions in the Alibi : Bill Bradley will become president, Boris Yeltsin and Fidel Castro will die, Ted Turner and Jane Fonda will reconcile.• The RIAA sues Napster out of existence.• CBS’ hit summer series "Survivor" launches TV’s reality show trend.• The Mesa del Sol Amphitheater (soon renamed "Journal Pavilion") opens in Albuquerque.• Albuquerque indie rockers The Shins sign to Sup Pop Records.• The Albuquerque Dukes minor league baseball team, formed in 1915, is sold to an interest group in Oregon and renamed the Portland Beavers.• The National Hispanic Cultural Center opens in Albuquerque.• George W. Bush wins the presidential election (sort of), kicking off 36 days of vote recounts and court challenges.Feature
Cover by Ellen Forney
2001
• Pundits, bloggers, science-fiction authors and people hanging out in coffee shops ignite an argument over whether or not the "new millennium" started in 2000 or 2001. By February, nobody gives a damn.• The crumbling Albuquerque High is finally renovated into the Albuquerque Lofts.• Construction begins on Albuquerque’s multi-year Big-I reconstruction.• It’s the 75th anniversary of Route 66.• The events of Sept. 11 wipe all other stories out of the headlines.• On Oct. 7, the U.S. begins bombing Afghanistan, which harbored fugitive Al-Qaeda leader Osama bin Laden.Feature
Cover by M. Wartella
2002
• Bill Richardson announces his campaign for governor. He later wins the Democratic primary, beating out current Attorney General Gary King and former Land Commissioner Ray Powell. He is elected to office in November.• Defrocked priest John Geoghan is found guilty of child molestation, sparking national outrage.• The No Child Left Behind Act is passed.• The Enron scandal erupts.• “The X-Files” airs its last episode.• A controversial anti-abortion exhibit goes up on UNM campus for two long weeks.• Sachs offers free nipple piercings to patrons … as long they’re performed in the storefront window on Central.• The City Council unveils the Planned Growth Strategy.• The Alibi offices move from Nob Hill to Downtown.• Baca’s Restaurant, a Nob Hill landmark, is bulldozed.• Local journalist Alisa Valdes-Rodriguez holes up in a West Mesa coffee shop for a week and writes Dirty Girls Social Club, which she later auctions for a $500,000 advance.• Bow Wow Records closes.• On Oct. 9, the Alibi turns 10.• Albuquerque’s Youth in Transition office is burned down on Thanksgiving Day.Feature
Cover by Kathryn Rathke
2003
• In January, President Bush announces in State of the Union address that he is willing to attack Iraq without a U.N. mandate.• The space shuttle Columbia explodes.• In February, the city’s Ethics Board finds Mayor Martin Chavez guilty in the ABQPAC scandal.• Albuquerque expands the no-smoking ordinance to include restaurants.• On March 19, the U.S. and Britain launch war against Iraq. Peaceful war protesters on Central are attacked with tear gas, pepper spray and stun guns by local police and the SWAT team.• Arnold Schwarzenegger is elected governor of California.• PNM opens its Wind Energy Center.• Isotopes Stadium is unveiled.Feature
Cover by Sam Webber
2004
• The film industry in New Mexico begins to swell.• In January, Iraq weapons investigator David Kay resigns, saying there’s no evidence of weapons of mass destruction in Iraq.• In April, Abu Ghraib prison photos are released.• George W. Bush beats John Kerry in the presidential race.• Rapid Ride starts service.• A tsumani hits Asia, killing at least 225,000.Feature
Cover by Jeff Drew
2005
• The Alibi assumes guardianship of rocksquawk.com. • Hunter S. Thompson dies. His ashes are fired from a cannon. Alibi.com publishes a brilliant obit by one of Thompson’s former lovers, Norma Jean Thompson.• Mayor Martin Chavez throws a fit about all-ages shows held in venues that serve alcohol—not counting Isotopes Stadium and the Journal Pavilion, of course. • The National Poetry Slam championship comes to Albuquerque, and our guys win. • Katrina slams into the Gulf Coast. • State Treasurer Robert Vigil and Michael Montoya, a former state treasurer, are arrested and charged with extortion, money laundering and conspiracy.Feature
Cover by Wes Naman
2006
• Albuquerque hits the big 3-0-0.• VA nurse Laura Berg is investigated for sedition after writing a letter to the Alibi . • "¡Ask a Mexican!" debuts to a flood of letters and phone calls from readers who adore/despise the foul-mouthed, fearless column.• The FDA approves a vaccine against an STD that causes many cases of cervical cancer.• The Rail Runner hits the tracks. • Croc hunter Steve Irwin dies after being impaled by a stingray on camera.• 55,000 acres of undeveloped land, belonging to Westland Development, is sold to California-based developer SunCal Companies.• Pluto is demoted to "dwarf planet."• By the end of the year, 12 red-light cameras will be installed at busy Albuquerque intersections and drivers pay out millions in fines.Feature
Cover by M. Wartella
