“Mugshot Magazine” 20th Anniversary

Since December 5 was the 20th anniversary of the once beloved hiphop platform, Mugshot, I wanted to recognized and big up my roots. The figures and stories behind the founding of Mugshot are legendary. As I said on social media, “This is where I got my start, Mugshot Magazine. I was a kid fresh out of college and the founders, Peter Feld, Amber Fosse, and Gida Snyder took me in. They turned every perceivable roadblock into a possibility. After taking that ride, I was different. I became unbounded and I never stopped dreaming. Happy 20 anniversary, fam. We made history.”

I remember discovering Mugshot at Fat Beats in New York City’s West Village. On the cover, the camera frames the midsection of a Dead Prez member. Pulling up his shirt, he shows off his belt buckle that says “Til we get free.” Looking back at some of our work, we were doing something different and our work aged mighty well. Eventually, all of the material and content that the Mugshot crew created will get its overdue shine, it has to. We covered what a lot of magazines overlooked. And the whole operation was started by two brilliant young ladies from Albuquerque, New Mexico who proudly proclaimed, “We got issues.”

To celebrate Mugshot‘s 20th Anniversary, here’s some pages from the archives, featuring words and images from the great street photographer Jamel Shabazz, your boy wrote about the documentary Afro Punk, Chino BYI interviews graffiti pioneer Crime79, plus Peter Feld’s flattering review of my poetry collection, still breathing…. My little self-published venture got to share a layout with the man himself, Dr. Cornel West and his book Democracy Matters: Winning the fight against imperialism. Zoom in to read the text. Enjoy. Peace.