New Additions To My Clip Book

The big news of the day is that my fifth cover story, a very fun interview with WWE Diva Candice Michelle (and yes, I know you love the above picture), will be hitting newsstands on the 28th and not only is the issue hot, but the coverage I’ve been getting for it has been fantastic. A writer from the WWE’s website contacted me a few days ago to let me know they’d be doing a story about the article and wanted me to comment on it. It was refreshing to finally have someone want to ask me a question after doing nothing but ask others questions for the past six years, and the article that ended up on WWE.com is, in a word, awesome. Check it out here: WWE.com – Candice Caught Exposing Herself. Also, big ups to my boy Flash over at RapReviews.com for taking the time to shout out the Candice Michelle piece on his wrestling website, TheAngryMarks.com. You can check out that shout out here: The Angry Marks Wrestling News 8/22.

Of course with the addition of fantastic new clips to the clip book it means I have to clean out some of the old ones. A writer should never have more than a dozen clips that he or she (and we’re sticking with “he” for the rest of this since I’m a he) sends out to magazines. This is never easy because no matter how much I love my new clips I also love my old ones. If it were up to me editors would read about 25 of my articles and love every single one of them. Sadly, this will never happen as no editor has that kind of time and by sending that many clips it’s more likely that said editor will throw the entire package in the trash rather than wade through the sea of papers to try to find what he wants. With that in mind, yesterday I cleaned out my clip book and there were quite a few casualties.

The first major casualty was my Ali Shaheed Muhammed piece from RIME (a magazine that still happens to owe me, and a lot of other writers, a lot of money). The article is one of my favorites and deals with being a Muslim artist living in a post-9/11 New York City. It’s a fascinating read about both Muhammed trying to live in the new NYC mindset and performing in places that endorse actions, such as heavy drinking and drugs, that go against his beliefs. Sounds like a great article, right? Well, my Ali Shaheed Muhammed story got the axe from my clip book because at one point he says that it’s the year 2004. I can’t let editors think my best work was done two years ago, so no matter how great the article is, it had to go. It’s OK, though, my Candice Michelle cover story more than makes up for the loss.

Casualty number two was my piece on Subliminal, Israel’s top selling Hip-Hop artist, that ran in XXL. I would have liked to have kept all my XXL pieces in my clip book, they’re fairly short, especially by my standards, but when choosing which ones would go in my Hushh and DJ Halo pieces fit nicely on a page together and both are stories where if someone wants to know more I can literally call up the article’s subject and reach them whenever necessary. The real kicker is that both are from Connecticut so it’s a nice way to shout out my state in my clip book.

Having as many cover stories as I do there is no way I can fit them all in my clip book. Not only would it be overflowing with pages, but I think after two cover story interviews with female celebs editors might want to see what my interviewing abilities are with some other types of people. For that reason the third and fourth casualties had to be two of my cover stories. My Amber Smith piece was the first to go simple because it doesn’t photo copy well. The background on one of the pages doesn’t lend itself to the black and white format. The second cover story to go was a rough choice, but I ended up leaving my Vanessa Branch piece out of the clip book. It’s a great article, and she’s a terrific person, but I felt the Candice Michelle and Paige Peterson interviews better exemplify how well I can do a flirtatious interview, which is something I’d like more men’s magazines to notice. Hey, look at me, I can do this!

After all this organizing of articles one might think I’m all set for a while, but thankfully that is not the case. I say thankfully because if I didn’t have to constantly reorganize my clip book it would mean that I wasn’t constantly having new articles being published. I know when the fall issue of Beyond Race, a free local magazine in New York City, comes out I’ll be reorganizing my clip book again because I have at least one, if not two, articles in that magazine that will be worthy of sending to editors.

With all this reorganizing, and the coverage my latest cover story is getting, this is the first time in a long time where I’m really feeling like something big is going to happen very soon. I’ve been working hard for the past five plus years at this and finally, FINALLY, I’m seeing some major results. I’m not viewing this as mission accomplished, though, it’s simply a new starting point. This is where I am now, some people are behind me, some are ahead of me, but other people aren’t my concern. I see where I am, I see what else can be accomplished, I see what I have to do. This is a new starting point and believe me, the fun has just begun!