The Next Generation

John Atkinson (left) and Larry Archibald (right) remininisce about JA joining Stereophile in 1986. (Photo: Larry Greenhill)

It was the summer of 1976. My career as a professional musician was not panning out as I had hoped. I’d played bass guitar on quite a few singles and three albums, and toured with erstwhile teen singing sensation Helen Shapiro—but I was better at playing than I was at getting paid. My then wife, Maree, showed me a classified ad in the British newspaper The Guardian: the magazine Hi-Fi News & Record Review was looking for an assistant editor.

“You read Hi-Fi News,” she said. I had, for several years, and had put together what I thought was a pretty good-sounding system.

“Call the number in the ad,” Maree instructed. I did. To my surprise, I got the job.

To my even greater surprise, it turned out that working for an audio magazine tied together the three different aspects of my education: I’d always been good at the sciences, so my bachelor’s degree was in Physics and Chemistry; I’d lived for music since joining a choir at the age of 11, and later had become proficient on violin, guitar, bass guitar, recorders, clarinet, and viola da gamba; and while on the road with bands as a bass guitarist after leaving the research lab at which I was working in 1972, I’d studied for and got a postgraduate qualification as a high-school science teacher. Like a good teacher, a successful consumer magazine informs and educates, but also entertains.

For a while at Hi-Fi News, I kept my ears open and my mouth shut. Six years later, at the age of 34, I took over from my mentor, John Crabbe, as editor in chief. I kept my shoulder to the wheel for the next four years—by the end of 1985, I’d doubled the magazine’s revenue and almost doubled its circulation by creating a magazine that people wanted to read—when I got a call from then Stereophile owner and publisher Larry Archibald, whom I knew from crashing the infamous Stereophile parties at the Consumer Electronics Shows.

“Would you leave Hi-Fi News . . . ?” he asked. I would indeed, if he allowed me to buy into the company.

“. . . and do the same thing for Stereophile?” I did.

By the time Larry and I sold the company to Petersen Publishing, in June 1998 (footnote 1), we’d quadrupled the circulation and increased the magazine’s revenue tenfold—without selling out or departing from founder J. Gordon Holt’s vision of judging audio components primarily by how they sound.

Now, 33 years and 390 issues after crossing the Atlantic, it’s time for me to step down. I celebrate my 71st birthday this June, and while my hearing is still excellent, a younger person needs to take the reins, to successfully steer Gordon’s and my magazine into this century’s third decade. That person is Jim Austin, whom you’ll be familiar with from his long association with the magazine as a reviewer and essayist. Jim has been working with me to prepare this issue, and, having had many long discussions with him over the past few weeks, I know he will take Stereophile forward and upward.

If I was Kirk, Jim is Picard. But perhaps I should now be Spock—I will still be associated with the magazine, but with the title of Technical Editor. I will continue to provide the measurements to accompany Stereophile‘s reviews, something I’ve worked on since 1989, when I established our current test regimen. A quick glance at my test archive indicates that so far I have measured 400 digital products, 600 amplifiers of all kinds, and almost 900 loudspeakers. I will also continue writing reviews for Stereophile. I haven’t done an actual count, but a rough estimate suggests that the past 390 issues of the magazine contain more than 3.5 million words under my byline—and a lot of graphs!

An editor doesn’t work alone, of course. I take this opportunity to thank my deputy editors over years—Art Dudley, Stephen Mejias, Jonathan Scull, Richard Lehnert, and the late Wes Phillips—and my managing editors and art editors—Jeremy Moyler, Natalie Brown-Baca, the late Daniel Bish, Elizabeth Donovan, Nerissa Dominguez Vales, Pip Tannenbaum, Polly Summar, and the late Debbie Starr—as well as music editor Robert Baird, longtime cover photographer Eric Swanson, and all the writers who’ve worked with me all these years, for taking Stereophile to the top and keeping it there.

I would especially like to thank Richard Lehnert and Jon Iverson. Richard has been Stereophile‘s copy editor since the Vol.8 No.3 issue in 1985 and was music editor from 1987 to 1996. This issue is also Richard’s last (see “My Back Pages,” p.122). He taught me not only how to up my game as a writer, but also how to think more analytically. Jon Iverson has been my consigliere since he walked though the door in spring 1997 and told Larry and me that he would create a website for our magazine. Jon launched www.stereophile.com in December 1997, and since then it has steadily grown into its current magnificence.

So, guys and gals, thank you. Not only my career, but my life has been enriched by knowing and working with you all. And thank you, too, to the tens of thousands of Stereophile readers. My last day as editor was March 31, 2019. That evening, I lifted a glass of Veuve Clicquot La Grande Dame in your honor!

You have the conn, Jim.—John Atkinson

Footnote 1: Larry Archibald ended his association with the magazine in November 1999.

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