Skin Trade

#8 $2.95 (Box 2583, Hollywood, CA 90078)
by J. Lianna Ness

Self-billed as the magazine where “sex and music collide.” Kinda like rap videos where scantily-clad women gyrate suggestively in front of swaggering, arrogant men who rap about “dem bitches, hos and honeys.” It’s these same sort of Neanderthal nimrods who will get the most satisfaction from Skin Trade. If editor Floyd Hardwick’s views and comments are intended as sarcasm, then I’m amused. His article about “High Maintenance Women” made me cackle. But if he’s actually serious about this, then may he be hunted down and captured by a group of irate feminazis, be nailed to a tree by his testicles and then set on fire while the angry mob performs a ritual dance around him as his flesh blisters and burns. The sex portions of the magazine are nothing noteworthy – there’s X-Rated movie reviews and black and white pictures of naked chicks. Yawn. As far as music goes, there’re over 75 kick-ass reviews of killer, trendsetting artists (some of whom we’ve reviewed in Lollipop, which goes to show that at least old Floyd has good taste in music) as well as live reviews and interviews with acts such as Lords of Acid (where sex and music definitely collide), Hate Dept. and T.H.C. The layout is pretty bland and there’s lots of typos, but other than that, it got me off.