Lably
Skip to content

Rolling Stone

American monthly music magazine

  • 27 min read
  • 7 chapters

Related on Lably

Through Music and Politics

LabThe Sound GardenLab · Class 5–10AI Music ComposerLab · Class 6–12Writing & EditingLabThe Colour Atelier

The magazine was first known for its coverage of rock music and political reporting by Hunter S. Thompson. In the late 1990s, the magazine broadened and shifted its focus to a younger readership interested in youth-oriented television shows, film actors, and popular music. It has since returned to its traditional mix of content, including music, entertainment, and politics.

The first magazine was released in 1967 and featured John Lennon on the cover, and was then published every two weeks. It is known for provocative photography and its cover photos, featuring musicians, politicians, athletes, and actors. In addition to its print version in the United States, it publishes content through Rollingstone.com and numerous international editions.

The magazine experienced a rapid rise during the 1970s, followed by a sharp decline into financial turmoil in the 21st century, leading Jann Wenner to sell 49 percent of the magazine to BandLab Technologies in 2016 and 51 percent to Penske Media Corporation (PMC) in 2017. PMC eventually acquired the 49 percent stake from BandLab Technologies in 2019, giving it full ownership of the magazine.

History

1967–1979: Founding and early history

Rolling Stone was founded in San Francisco in 1967 by Jann Wenner and Ralph J. Gleason. To pay for the setup costs, Wenner borrowed $7,500 (equivalent to $72,000 in 2025) from his family and the parents of his soon-to-be wife, Jane Schindelheim. The first issue was released on October 18, 1967, cover dated to November 9, 1967. It featured John Lennon in costume, wearing a Brodie helmet for the film How I Won the War on the cover. It was in tabloid-sized pulp newsprint format, with a lead article on the Monterey International Pop Festival. The cover price was 25¢ (equivalent to $2.27 in 2023) and it was published bi-weekly.

In the first issue, Wenner explained the magazine's title and mission:

You're probably wondering what we're trying to do. It's hard to say: sort of a magazine and sort of a newspaper. The name of it is Rolling Stone, which comes from an old saying, "A rolling stone gathers no moss." Muddy Waters used the name for a song he wrote. The Rolling Stones took their name from Muddy's song. Like a Rolling Stone was the title of Bob Dylan's first rock and roll record. We have begun a new publication reflecting what we see are the changes in rock and roll and the changes related to rock and roll.

Some authors have attributed the name solely to Dylan's hit single: "At [Ralph] Gleason's suggestion, Wenner named his magazine after a Bob Dylan song." In a 2017 article celebrating the publication's 50th anniversary, Rolling Stone's David Browne stated that the magazine's name was a nod to the Rolling Stones in an addition to "Rollin' Stone" and "Like a Rolling Stone".

Rolling Stone initially identified with and reported on the hippie counterculture of the era. It distanced itself, however, from the underground newspapers of the time, such as the Berkeley Barb, embracing more traditional journalistic standards and avoiding the radical politics of the underground press. In the first edition, Wenner wrote that Rolling Stone "is not just about the music, but about the things and attitudes that music embraces". One interviewee, speaking for many of his peers, said that he bought his first copy of the magazine upon initial arrival on his college campus, describing it as a "rite of passage".

The magazine's long-running slogan, "All the news that fits", which first appeared in 1969, was provided by early contributor, manager, and sometime editor Susan Lydon. She lifted it from an April Fools' Day issue of the Columbia Daily Spectator that boasted "All the news that fits we print", which itself was a parody of The New York Times' famous slogan, "All The News That's Fit To Print".

In the 1970s, Rolling Stone began to make a mark with its political coverage, with the likes of gonzo journalist Hunter S. Thompson writing for the magazine's political section. Thompson first published his most famous work, Fear and Loathing in Las Vegas (1971), within the pages of Rolling Stone, where he remained a contributing editor until his death in 2005. In the 1970s, the magazine also helped launch the careers of many prominent authors, including Cameron Crowe, Lester Bangs, Joe Klein, Joe Eszterhas, Ben Fong-Torres, Patti Smith and P. J. O'Rourke.

Some of Rolling Stone's most famous stories were published during this period. The January 21, 1970 cover story about the Altamont Free Concert and the killing of Meredith Hunter received a Specialized Journalism award at the National Magazine Awards in 1971. Later that year, Rolling Stone published a 30,000-word feature on Charles Manson by David Dalton and David Felton, including their interview of Manson when he was in the L.A. County Jail awaiting trial, which won the magazine its first National Magazine Award. Four years later, they also covered the Patty Hearst abduction odyssey.

In 1972, Wenner assigned Tom Wolfe to cover the launch of NASA's last Moon mission, Apollo 17. He published a four-part series in 1973 titled "Post-Orbital Remorse", about the depression that some astronauts experienced after having been in space. After the series, Wolfe began researching the whole of the space program, in what became a seven-year project from which he took time to write The Painted Word (1975), a book on art, and to complete Mauve Gloves & Madmen, Clutter & Vine (1976), a collection of shorter pieces and eventually The Right Stuff (1979).

The magazine began running the photographs of Annie Leibovitz in 1970. In 1973, she became its chief photographer, and her images appeared on more than 140 covers. Rolling Stone recruited writers from smaller music magazines, including Paul Nelson from Sing Out!, who became record reviews editor from 1978 to 1983, and Dave Marsh from Creem. In 1977, the magazine moved its headquarters from San Francisco to New York City. Editor Jann Wenner said that San Francisco had become "a cultural backwater".

1980–1999: Change to entertainment magazine

Kurt Loder joined Rolling Stone in May 1979 and spent nine years there, including as editor. Timothy White joined as a writer from Crawdaddy and David Fricke from Musician. Tom Wolfe wrote to Wenner to propose an idea drawn from Charles Dickens and William Makepeace Thackeray: to serialize a novel. Wenner offered Wolfe around $200,000 to serialize his work. The frequent deadline pressure gave Wolfe the motivation he had sought, and from July 1984 to August 1985, he published a new installment in each biweekly issue of Rolling Stone. Later Wolfe was unhappy with his "very public first draft" and thoroughly revised his work, even changing his protagonist, Sherman McCoy, and published it as The Bonfire of the Vanities in 1987.

Rolling Stone was known for its musical coverage and for Thompson's political reporting and in 1985, they hired an advertising agency to refocus its image under the series "Perception/Reality" comparing Sixties symbols to those of the Eighties, which led to an increase in advertising revenue and pages. It also shifted to more of an entertainment magazine in the 1980s. It still had music as the main topic but began to increase its coverage of celebrities, films, and pop culture. It also began releasing its annual "Hot Issue". As Rolling Stone began to focus on subjects other than music, a sister publication named Record Magazine was launched in November 1981. Record focused only on music. It was short-lived, and folded in 1985.

In the 1990s, Rolling Stone changed its format to appeal to a younger readership interested in youth-oriented television shows, film actors, and popular music. This led to criticism that the magazine was emphasizing style over substance.

2000–2015: Expansion of readership

After years of declining readership, the magazine experienced a major resurgence of interest and relevance with the work of two young journalists in the late 2000s, Michael Hastings and Matt Taibbi. Rob Sheffield also joined from Spin. In 2005, Dana Leslie Fields, former publisher of Rolling Stone, who had worked at the magazine for 17 years, was an inaugural inductee into the Magazine Hall of Fame. In 2009, Taibbi unleashed an acclaimed series of scathing reports on the financial meltdown of the time. He famously described Goldman Sachs as "a great vampire squid".

In December 2009, the Los Angeles Times reported that the owners of Rolling Stone magazine planned to open a Rolling Stone restaurant in the Hollywood & Highland Center in Hollywood in the spring of 2010. The expectation was that the restaurant could become the first of a national chain if it was successful. As of November 2010, the "soft opening" of the restaurant was planned for December 2010. In 2011, the restaurant was open for lunch and dinner as well as a full night club downstairs on the weekends. The restaurant closed in February 2013.

Bigger headlines came at the end of June 2010. Rolling Stone caused a controversy in the White House by publishing in the July issue an article by journalist Michael Hastings entitled "The Runaway General", quoting criticism by General Stanley A. McChrystal, commander of the International Security Assistance Force and U.S. Forces-Afghanistan commander, about Vice President Joe Biden and other Administration members of the White House. McChrystal resigned from his position shortly after his statements went public. In 2010, Taibbi documented illegal and fraudulent actions by banks in the foreclosure courts, after traveling to Jacksonville, Florida and sitting in on hearings in the courtroom. His article, "Invasion of the Home Snatchers", also documented attempts by the judge to intimidate a homeowner fighting foreclosure and the attorney Taibbi accompanied into the court.

In January 2012, the magazine ran exclusive excerpts from Hastings' book just prior to publication. The book, The Operators: The Wild and Terrifying Inside Story of America's War in Afghanistan, provided a much more expansive look at McChrystal and the culture of senior American military and how they become embroiled in such wars. The book reached Amazon.com's bestseller list in the first 48 hours of release, and it received generally favorable reviews. Salon's Glenn Greenwald described it as "superb", "brave" and "eye-opening". In 2012, Taibbi, through his coverage of the Libor scandal, emerged as an expert on that topic, which led to media appearances outside Rolling Stone. On November 9, 2012, the magazine published its first Spanish-language section on Latino music and culture, in the issue dated November 22.

2016–present: New ownership

In September 2016, Advertising Age reported that Wenner was in the process of selling a 49% stake of the magazine to a company from Singapore called BandLab Technologies. The new investor had no direct involvement in the editorial content of the magazine.

In September 2017, Wenner Media announced that the remaining 51% of Rolling Stone magazine was up for sale. In December 2017, Penske Media acquired the remaining stake from Wenner Media. It became a monthly magazine from the July 2018 issue. On January 31, 2019, Penske acquired BandLab's 49% stake in Rolling Stone, gaining full ownership of the magazine.

In January 2021, a Chinese edition of the magazine was launched, while in September 2021, Rolling Stone launched a dedicated UK edition in conjunction with Attitude magazine publisher Stream Publishing. The new British Rolling Stone launched into a marketplace which already featured titles like Mojo and BandLab Technologies's monthly music magazine Uncut. The first issue had a choice of three cover stars (including music acts Bastille and Sam Fender, as well as No Time To Die actor Lashana Lynch), with the magazine due to be a bi-monthly publication.

In February 2022, Rolling Stone announced the acquisition of Life Is Beautiful, saying, "Live events are an integral part of Rolling Stone's future."

In 2023 Rolling Stone was nominated for its first-ever Emmy award in the "Outstanding Interactive Media" category for its investigation into "The DJ and the War Crimes". The piece also won a National Magazine Award for digital design and an Overseas Press Club Award. In December 2023 Rolling Stone collected five National Arts & Entertainment Journalism Awards, four Front Page Awards, and a Deadline Club award.

In August 2025, Rolling Stone named Sean Woods and Shirley Halperin as co-editors in chief, with Halperin also becoming the magazine's head of music. Halperin is Rolling Stone's first female editor-in-chief.

Sign in to keep reading

6 more chapters are free with a Lably account.

More in Culture

The GuardianBritish national daily newspaperCNNAmerican news channelReutersInternational news agencyChristmasChristian holiday usually on December 25Associated PressAmerican not-for-profit news agencyEasterCommemoration of the resurrection of Jesus Christ