Thursday, January 01, 2004
Copyright © Las Vegas Mercury

Editor's Note: Mercury begins 4th year; hell still cold

I have always been confident the Mercury would enjoy a long and productive existence, but I'm enough of a realist to have considered the possibility that this grand experiment might not work out. After all, numerous observers have doubted whether the Mercury could survive the financial pressures posed by two worthy competitors in a community not known for its alternative culture mindset or a reading-minded population.

But here we are. This issue marks the start of the Mercury's fourth year, and there are strong indications this will be the paper's best year yet. After 156 issues, the Mercury is no longer an experiment, but a full-fledged fixture of the Las Vegas news media.

We have come a long way. The Mercury started small, focusing largely on satire, offbeat commentary and a smattering of news and entertainment coverage. Over the past two years we have expanded dramatically, adopting some "traditional" alt-weekly elements while retaining many of the irreverent features and voices that set us apart from the pack.

Tod Goldberg, for example, has been a Mercury columnist from the beginning. Tod's day job is writing novels (he has two in print, Fake Liar Cheat and Living Dead Girl), yet he has submitted his funny and insightful column well ahead of deadline for three years now, and its quality remains high every week. Tod is among the Mercury writers who set us above and apart from the competition, and he will continue to do so in 2004.

Another of those top-echelon writers is Kyle Gilliland, the anonymous author of the Basement Files, a satirical column that has been a Mercury staple from inception. Kyle's pitch-perfect satirical ear makes the Basement Files a constant pleasure. We are incredibly lucky to have Kyle's exclusive weekly contributions since he clearly should be a member of the writing staff for "The Simpsons" or "Saturday Night Live."

While George Knapp isn't a member of the Mercury founders club, he has been with us now for two years. And what a great two years it's been. The veteran KLAS Channel 8 reporter has the best sources in town, and it shows week in and week out in his column. What's amazing is that George's column almost never repeats anything he's done on TV. He has so much good stuff in his notebook that there's plenty to spread around. He'll surely be an informative and entertaining contributor in 2004 as the political campaigns heat up.

Speaking of politics, Mike Green has been writing for the Mercury almost from the start, always bringing a wealth of knowledge and wisdom to the table as he dissects local, state and national issues. Where Knapp has the very latest information at his fingertips, Green, a CCSN history professor, is adept at finding parallels with the past. He embodies the notion that we must learn from history or be doomed to repeat it. Mike, too, will be an invaluable resource during the 2004 election cycle.

James Reza, author of the Go and Eat columns, is another authoritative voice on the Mercury staff. Reza, who introduced the alternative weekly newspaper to Las Vegas in the early 1990s with his founding of Scope magazine, is our nightlife guru, a title he has earned through years of reporting and a taste for on-the-town adventures. His Go column is a must-read if you have any interest at all in leaving your house once the sun sets.

The Mercury has made great strides over the past two years in expanding and refining its arts and culture coverage, and much credit for that must go to associate editor Andrew Kiraly. In addition to writing his hilarious biweekly snack food and TV column, Idiot Box Savant, as well as cover stories and CD reviews, Kiraly manages our excellent music section (written largely by Mike Prevatt and Newt Briggs) and other arts coverage.

Thanks to the talents of Tony Allison, Jeannette Catsoulis, Mike Prevatt, Robert Chancey and Tammy McMahan, the Mercury has the best and most knowledgeable film critics in town. They are hard to please, to be sure, rarely giving Hollywood a break (even when their editor disagrees), but they also know what they are talking about. They see film as an art form, and so when a film does not aspire to be a work of art, they are disappointed, and often enraged. Readers seeking glorified advertisements for high-gloss trash will have to look elsewhere.

Those, of course, are just some of the people behind the Mercury. Andy Taylor is our graphics editor (and another founders club member), a challenging and important job when you are surrounded by so many word-centric people. Heidi Walters is our news editor and all-around great reporter/writer, consistently delivering refined and sensitive news stories and making other people's writing better. Ched Whitney and Melissa Nunnery design our covers, spinning the hodgepodge of material we give them each week into gold. Other regular contributors include Larry Wills (news features), Christine Wetzel (photos), Lynn Benson (calender listings), John Ziebell (book reviews), Erika Yowell (art reviews), Lynnette Curtis and Barbara Scherzer (stage reviews), Joyce Hsu (2 AM column), Roger Naylor (Agnes Fliff), Brock Radke (concert reviews) and Chad Lietz (CD reviews).

It's important to note that editorial content is the most important but by no means the only cog that makes the Mercury go. Advertising fills roughly half of the newspaper's pages, and it, too, makes the Mercury an enjoyable and informative publication to peruse each week. Sales manager Rick Denton and sales and promotion executive Nate Hashbarger do much of the heavy lifting in this area.

Of course, none of this would matter if you, the reader, didn't bother to pick us up each week. Thank you for your attention. We promise to offer even better reading in this, our fourth year.

--GEOFF SCHUMACHER