Remember when Toronto used to be a “two blog” town? When BlogTO and Torontoist were the main players when it came to local, and locally reported, online content? Thanks to new(ish) startups like Toronto Standard and OpenFile, it’s fair to say that our online media landscape is changing. As in, our two-voice-strong chorus has turned into a veritable cacophony.
Today, we’ve bookmarked yet another website offering more (or less) of the same, Toronto-oriented, arts and culture content. A.V. Club Toronto went live today, and we took a few minutes to chat with the new site’s editor (and occasional Post City contributor), John Semley.
So, what’s the A.V. Club Toronto?
Well, it’s actually kind of confusing. The Onion has a print edition in a handful of American Cities. And inside the print edition is the A.V. Club — which is The Onion’s sister publication — which does arts and culture, and entertainment stuff. It’s real — not satirical or parodic or anything. In that, there’s a section with local content: listings, film, music, and comedy stuff that’s going on in town. But all of this print stuff throws to the real meat and potatoes, which is the website. And the website — for us that’s the A.V. Club Toronto — covers arts and culture stuff in Toronto, with the same irreverent tone as the A.V. Club national. It’s there, online, that most of the action will be happening. We’ll have recurring features, interviews, foodie stuff from around town, a concert calendar and so on.
So you’ll be overseeing A.V. Club Toronto print and web editions?
I’ll be overseeing the entire thing. I’m nursing the entire thing at my teat! I might have to get an intern or two, sooner or later.
When does the A.V. Club Toronto officially launch?
It launches on Tuesday, Sept. 27. And there’s a launch party at The Drake on the 28 — where we’ll have print copies available. Officially, the print edition goes on the street, on racks, on the 29.
Speaking of which, how’s the print edition being distributed?
Well, I don’t have the full breakdown right in front of me, but we have the same number of issues in the Toronto as Chicago or New York — which are ostensibly bigger markets. So there’s, I think, about 50,000 a week that go out. A bulk of that will be available around Ryerson, U of T, York — college-y areas. Then there’ll be racks out where all the other weeklies and freebies can be found — where you find t.o.night and Xtra and all those other ones. Then they’ll be newsies, I think [laughs]. I always feel embarrassed for the Metro ones! I guess they work, though. TorStar handles all of this for us.
Yeah, so what is the relationship with TorStar?
It's separate but connected. I work with both The Onion and ToStar. Basically, TorStar is the publisher of The Onion and the A.V. Club Toronto.
I guess your Torontoist experience is coming in handy?
Totally — yeah! Torontoist just went through that redesign, and switched from Movable Type to WordPress. And when I got this job, I had to adapt to another content management system with The Onion — but I think my mind was still spongy from the switchover [at Torontoist], so I picked the new system up pretty quick.
Certainly, Torotoist helped me develop my voice and tone. A clearly defined editorial voice. And I kind of built that from scratch at Torontoist over the last couple of years. And covering film and music stuff for Torontoist — writing far too many stories in a week — also helped. Also, the associate editor of The Onion was a former editor at Chicagoist. So he understood the work of running and working for one of those types of sites.
And what will the A.V. Club Toronto’s tone be?
I’d say: smart, irreverent — aimed at college-educated people who love arts stuff and culture stuff but also have the kind of withered skepticism of 65-year old man at the same time. The unofficial catch-all of the A.V. Club is “cautiously optimistic” which, I think, is a good way to sum up the tone.
I actually have a chart of what every post should sound like. "It should at least have one of these elements, and one of these elements. It should be well-reported and irreverent.” But I don’t really want to get into the algebra of that [laughs].
How does the A.V. Club Toronto fit into Toronto’s media landscape? Do we have a need or a market for another Toronto-focused site?
Yes, we do have a lot of interesting online stuff. Well, That’s the one thing that I’ll have to figure out on the fly. I mean, as excited as I was to get this job, I was terrified to leave Torontoist for this — because Torontoist is kind of the behemoth of this kind of local reporting. The one thing is that A.V. Club Toronto is all arts and culture based. Which is not to say there won’t be other stuff. I mean, given the tenuous status of arts and culture under the Ford administration, there’s sort of an obvious overlap between the arts and civics these days. So, it's not going to be entirely a-political or anything like that.
It also has the advantage of having the brand name associated with it, which will bring a lot of good people in. Actually, The Onion just brought in a paywall; you can only read five articles before you have to pay. So I’m hoping that drives people to look for the physical editions!
Wait, so this paywall effects the A.V. Club's website, too?
No no no, it doesn’t effect the A.V. Club at all. It’s just for The Onion — for the comedy stuff. My hope is to get a lot of good writers in, and to get a lot of good recurring features.
To go back to where we fit in with the site, I really want to think myself around stuff like traditional Q&As… to say "it’ll be fun!" makes it sounds stupid… but, yeah, kind of slightly outside of the box thinking.
We want to report on stuff in a way that’s engaging, not totally wordy, not going The Grid way where everything’s an infographic — and there are no words. I don’t want to harangue The Grid because they’ve paid me a bit to write stuff. And I don’t necessarily think it’s a bad publication, but Eye Weekly is gone. And Eye Weekly used to be this vibrant voice for 20 and 30-somethings. And then The Grid kind of became run by these 50 and 60-somethings. It’s like they’re trying to dust off Led Zeppelin records to try to give to kids or something like that. So I hope A.V. Club Toronto can kind of fill that void. And hopefully — and I know this sounds sort of prosaic self-aggrandizing — it’ll be a thing that people in their mid-twenties, thirties — renters with disposable incomes, who are kind of half-suspicious about authority — are really excited about. I hope we tap into something there. To do that, I hope to hire people who are like that to write.
I’m glad you outlined the distinction between The Onion and the A.V. Club—
—Yeah! [Laughs] I’m getting a lot of comedy pitches which I can’t stand! Oh my God, I’m like, not only is this not funny — but I have no use for it at all!
I think I know how I want my business card to read:
Editor, A.V. Club Toronto
Absolutely No Comedy Pitches.
But it does sound like you’ll have a bit of a satirical or humourous approach to some items.
Yeah, It’ll be funny, right? Ever since Sean O’Neil, who’s the news editor of The A.V. Club proper, took over, I think the real news coverage of The A.V. Club has gotten as funny as the satirical stuff on The Onion. But it’s like Jezebel or Gawker — where you are writing about real things, but you can take funny jabs.
Since we’re on the subject of humour: who, in your opinion, is most deserving of some satirical treatment right now?
Ha — well, who do you think? I don’t want to say Ford, because, I dunno, it’s too obvious I guess. I get sort of reactionary-punk-ish about these things. I mean, there are all these people who’re starting these one-off Ford things to protest the cuts… like, "We’re going to turn Ford’s office into a daycare! We’re going to squat in his parking spot all day!" And there’s 90 different things a day. You know, I think those things are pretty funny. They’re earnest, and it’s great that these things are working and that people don’t like the mayor anymore, but… yeah, as far as who’s most deserving, I might say anyone but Rob Ford. How about Doug Ford? He’s harder to caricature; he’s like the Lady MacBeth of the whole thing.
When the A.V. Club Toronto editor position was listed, it clearly stated: PLEASE, NO COMEDY, PHONE CALLS OR OFFICE VISITS. Did you adhere to these guidelines?
No, totally! I made, like, one joke in my cover letter. It wasn’t even a joke. Because in the application they were like "get ready to tape up your hockey stick… and put together your Rush mix tape,” and all these bullshit things of what America thinks Canada is. So the only joke in my application was that I wrote, "For the record, I can put together a superlative Rush mixtape." Which isn’t even a joke, because I can.
And your strategy worked!
It worked. I managed to deceive and beguile them into giving me the job. Before I’m eventually overthrown by a fleet of interns.