Hellooo! Bit of a different post for today! Against The Current have collaborated with Rock Sound to celebrate the release of their new album, Past Lives. Along with appearing on the front cover of the November 2018 issue, the magazine is filled with ATC content and Rock Sound also released two limited edition bundles with ATC! Both bundles have now sold out however, I thought I'd write this to give an insight into what the bundles are like should Rock Sound choose to release bundles with future magazines.
For this issue, there were two bundles (see images to the left from the Rock Sound website) named the PAST LIVES bundle and the AGNST bundle. The PAST LIVES bundle was £18.99 and the AGNST bundle currently says it was £19.99 however I'm fairly sure at the time, the AGNST bundle was £21.99. I'm not sure what happened but maybe it was just my mistake! Anyway, the magazine on it's own is £4.99 and can be ordered from the Rock Sound website or bought from your local stockist. The PAST LIVES bundle included the magazine, a hand-signed poster print, an exclusive photo lookbook, a deluxe art print and a vinyl sticker. The AGNST bundle included the magazine with an exclusive cover, a hand-signed poster print, a limited edition tote bag, a deluxe art print (different from the PAST LIVES bundle) and a vinyl sticker (different from the PAST LIVES bundle).
After much indecision, I decided to go for the PAST LIVES bundle and I'm pretty impressed with it! The hand-signed poster print and deluxe art print are on thick, high quality A4 paper and the vinyl sticker is a good size. The photo lookbook is A5 sized and initially, I was disappointed with it as it appeared to only contain 4 sides of A5 however, I later had another look at it and found that the pages were stuck together inside and there was actually 8 sides of A5 inside. Again, this is printed on high quality, thick paper. All the items are designed in the Past Lives album colour scheme and it's all VERY pretty!
Rock Sound have upped their game with this issue! I'm not sure how long they've been printing with this format but the magazine physically feels very fancy and exclusive with a simple cover and also has a spine making it feel more like a book than a magazine. The new layout throughout the magazine feels very clean and I really like it!
Chrissy Costanza (ATC's lead singer) included in her column for this month's Rock Sound how she felt while writing the album and touched on some hard times in her life. While talking about mental health, Chrissy wrote, 'I wanted to put that into this record, that no matter what it was that was hurting you, you didn't have to hurt alone' which stood out to me as such a powerful statement. Further on in the issue, the 18 page interview included plenty of full page images/posters of the band along with an abundance of interview content. Chrissy talked a lot about how she grew to feel like she was a different person backstage to the person she is on stage. Along with this, Chrissy spoke about how she struggled on the In Our Bones world tour and how she was conflicted with how much of herself to show on social media. I found it interesting to read as it showed a different side to the Chrissy to what is seen on stage. I also liked that Will (drummer in ATC) and Dan (guitarist in ATC) were involved with the interview and shared what they learnt throughout the journey with Against The Current now in their eighth year as a band. Of course, the interview also included sections on Past Lives and how it compared to ATC's debut album, In Our Bones.
All in all, I really enjoyed the piece on Against The Current and Andy Biddulph's writing. I think it was an important interview for ATC to do and it definitely did the band justice. I also loved the presentation of the entire piece and the colour scheme of kind of monochrome and pink, matching the Past Lives branding. Along with this, Elliott Ingham's photos completed the article perfectly!
The price of the bundle made it £14 more than buying the magazine on it's own and I'd say £14 for a signed print, another print, a photo book and a vinyl sticker was definitely worth it! All the items look great and are such high quality and I'm SO happy with them! The design of the entire bundle including the article within the magazine are all cohesive and it feels like Against The Current had a huge input into the bundles which I love! I'll definitely be looking out for future limited edition Rock Sound issues and I'd definitely recommend checking them out!
Thanks for reading!
Sophie
