When Tony LaBarbera saw that the Illinois Entertainer was starting a new heavy metal magazine, he kept his own counsel. He saw what was happening–the four-color covers, the paucity of local coverage, even the potshots that those in the know could see were directed at Tony and his friends–but kept quiet.
“I guess freedom of the press is so much easier when you own it,” the essay concludes.
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LaBarbera himself calls his publication a newsletter, and to his credit he makes no pretenses at all about the Rocker’s intents, which focus primarily on promoting LaBarbera’s business and the local heavy metal scene, not, again to his credit, necessarily in that order. On the other hand, since LaBarbera dominates the scene like no one else, to a large extent the two objectives are the same anyway.
CAMM started five months ago, with Jeanena Spencer, a Kentuckian who moved to Chicago some years ago, as executive editor. She published her own metal fanzine for some years and hooked up with Roberts through her job as production manager of the Entertainer, which she continues. (the Entertainer and CAMM do not share offices, though.)
Joseph Entertainment said that the show was an elaborate coproduction of themselves, Stardate, and Ogden Allied Entertainment Services (Chicago’s Jam Productions had a piece of the action as well), and that it was Ogden Allied, in conjunction with the Park District, that handled the doors.
