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been the downfall of journalistic rigor and civic engagement, but that nobody’s earned enough money to make the effort worthwhile: “Those guys are picking up nickels in front of steamrollers.” The logical move, Abeyta said, if one is interested in media, is to “own” an audience, feeding them material they like to read along with stuff they want to buy. That is his way, and what became the basis of Project M. hen Abeyta set his eyes on Revolver, in 2016, he sent an out-of-the-blue LinkedIn message to Brandon Geist, who had worked at Revolver for ten years and was now the editorial director of Rolling Stone’s website. Geist had been gone from Revolver only two years, and he wasn’t dying to return to what he called the “small and very complicated pond” of metal. Besides, Revolver was trending toward oblivion; at one point when Geist was in charge, his online budget was zero dollars. In meetings, he’d have to justify himself to the owners by explaining Slayer’s importance. But Geist was exhausted from the pace at Rolling Stone and told Abeyta that he’d be willing to talk. They got together near Geist’s office, in Midtown Manhattan. Abeyta showed up sweating in spandex; he’d biked there. “Initially, I’m like, ‘What the fuck?’ ” Geist said. Abeyta detailed his vision for Revolver and Project M. “You could tell there was a lot of exciting energy coming off him,” Geist recalled. To conclude, Abeyta opened his laptop: “He showed me a spreadsheet
CJR
of every concert he’s been to in his whole life, meticulously laid out. All these details were noted, and he told me his various rules about what counts as a show. It was really kind of amazing. It spoke to his personality, but also to his fandom.” After Abeyta bought Revolver, he tattooed the magazine’s logo, a single R, on his hand. Geist was impressed by Abeyta’s devotion to heavy metal, but it’s also true that Abeyta is, more broadly, a fan of fandom. That’s the lens through which he regards media, as an array of outlets serving their fan bases; Revolver is to metalheads what Fox News is to Republicans. Abeyta is not a moralist and claims that he isn’t political; he only wants to cultivate a community of active consumers, united by their interest. In his acquisitions, he is bundling publications with similar audiences, centralizing what had been decentralized. It took him some time to work out the particulars. For the first two years, Project M’s expenses were too high, and there was no money coming in. Abeyta and Edmund Sullivan,
VO IC ES OF THE PA ND EMI C
What We’ve Learned Food media has a good lesson to learn from the pandemic. Our food systems are kept afloat by unsustainably low wages, by undocumented workers, by food that is not ecologically sound.
You have to dig deeper into the political and economic forces that control how food gets to a plate. —Alicia Kennedy Freelance food journalist
