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Nov 23, 2022 By Mark Redfern

Under the Radar is having its annual Black Friday Sale starting Thursday at midnight EST/9 p.m. PST and continuing through Tuesday. This year we’re offering 35% off all print subscriptions and 50% off all back issues. Our just-announced My Favorite Movie Issue is 20% off and our 20th Anniversary Covers of Covers album on CD is also 20% off (plus there’s a bundle with the 20th Anniversary Issue and Covers of Covers that’s also 20% off). No promo codes are needed.

With this sale a four-issue U.S. subscription is only around $12.35 (usually it’s $18.99). Each issue also includes a free download sampler featuring at least 38 MP3s, as well as all the interviews and reviews. Every print subscription comes with free access to the digital version of the magazine (for smart phones and tablets) and every digital issue includes extra content not found in print, such as extra photos and/or interviews and/or reviews.

So for $12.35 not only are you getting four issue’s worth of America’s best print music magazine delivered to both your door and your smart phone/tablet, but also around 152 free MP3s when the four samplers are taken into account! Talk about value for money.

Back issues are only $3.75, versus the usual $7.50, so it’s a great time to stock up on some classic issues you may have missed, such as this year’s double 20th Anniversary Issue, 2021’s The Protest Issue (with Japanese Breakfast and HAIM on the covers), 2019’s My Favorite Album Issue (with Angel Olsen and Sleater-Kinney on the two covers), 2011’s 10th Anniversary Issue (featuring Joanna Newsome and Fleet Foxes’ Robin Pecknold on the cover together), 2011’s Music vs. Comedy Issue (in which musicians and comedians interviewed each other, including Patton Oswalt vs. St. Vincent, David Cross vs. Wayne Coyne, Nick Offerman vs. Iron & Wine, and Aziz Ansari vs. TV on the Radio), 2009’s Best of the Decade Issue, and most of our older Protest Issues (where we examined the intersection of music and politics, with the issues from 2008, 2012, and 2016 still available). If you want to dive deep into the magazine’s history, we still have some rare copies of 2002’s issue #2 (featuring interviews with The Divine Comedy, Elbow, Death Cab for Cutie, Stereolab, and more) and 2003’s issue #5 (featuring interviews with Black Rebel Motorcycle Club, Belle and Sebastian, Spiritualized, Broadcast, Broken Social Scene, Super Furry Animals, and more) available.

We’ve said it time and time again, but print music magazines are an endangered species these days. Most of the magazines that were around when we started have either gone out of business or switched to online-only. We feel there is still something to be said for creating a more permanent journalistic record, as opposed to a homepage that will simply be updated with more disposable content hours later. We are in the business of creating well thought-out and memorable print magazines that take days or weeks to read and can be collected. If you’ve read this far, then that’s hopefully something you’re interested in supporting as well. Under the Radar has made it work in part thanks to loyal subscribers and readers.

We are in a continued time of mass media consolidation, where many other music magazines and websites are owned by bigger corporations, and where there are hardly any print music magazines left in America, certainly not ones who reliably cover indie rock music (and associated subgenres). A truly independent print magazine such as Under the Radar, one that is not beholden to corporate interests and that covers the music we’re honestly passionate about, depends very much on subscriptions and back issue sales to continue printing. Advertising is simply not enough these days. So if you’d like to see us continue then please support us this holiday season and also take advantage of these great limited deals.

For Black Friday discounts on print and digital subscriptions go here and for 50% off all print back issues go here.

The sale runs from Thursday at midnight EST (9 p.m. PST) through to Tuesday, November 29 at 11:59 p.m. EST.

Also, if you’d like to support Under the Radar in other ways you can sign up to our crowd-funding Patreon page for a regular monthly donation, starting as low as only $1.00. You’ll get access to some exclusive content. Having more regular funds would help us enormously in our quest to cover even more bands, review even more albums, and put out the best print music magazine we can.

Keep in mind that all print subscriptions start with our next issue (currently due out in late January) and if you subscribe for four issues then you will receive our next four issues, regardless of when they come out, meaning that you aren’t buying a one-year subscription, but a four-issue one. If you want our new My Favorite Movie Issue, you’ll have to order it separately, it won’t be included in the subscription.

As with every year, we are very thankful for our lovely readers and hope you have a wonderful holiday season.