I had read the rumours over a month ago, but experts had summarily dismissed them as simply rumours and so I breathed a sigh of relief. But now I find that it’s true: Mongrel is no more.
In my mind, Mongrel was the best Irish magazine around and certainly the best free one. Managing to be funny without descending into puerility too often. Even when they did, it was with a grace all of its own. Like a Homecoming Queen drunkenly puking – disgusting but in an eminently graceful way. Their music reviews were for the most part straight, to the point and unmercifully vicious. Basically it was my favourite magazine from the way it looked to Eoin Butler’s social diary and from the Cunts List to their random articles about various subcultures and freakshows.
All the other bloggers who’ve been talking about it – Aoife Mc, Jim Carroll, John Cav and David Maybury – have pondered who will arrive to fill the vacuum. They mention State of course (which I await with bated breath) but that’s going to cost 5.50 and while it may indeed be a great magazine, it won’t have the underground they-can’t-shut-us-up cool of Mongrel. Then they talk about the one or two other Dublin free sheets around, like Analogue. This is all well and good – they come from Dublin and Mongrel was primarily a Dublin magazine, but more and more its attention had shifted to encompass much of this crazy country of ours. I learned one day, after witnessing it with mine own eyes, that Eoin Butler himself delivered the magazine down to the Second City. That’s how DIY Mongrel was. So while Dublin may have Analogue and all their other fancy-pants capital ways, what about us down here? (more…)
