1st Lowrider Magazine vs 1997 Reprint
In December 2002, Lowrider Magazine included a copy of the 1st issue. Subscribers did NOT get this issue, I had to buy mine at the store, they were bagged together. Since then, a lot of people have tried to pass off the reprint as an original, and it's actually pretty hard because the reprint is made of a sort of thin newspaper type of material, and feels old. But the original is actually made of a thicker shiny paper that ages pretty well.
Thanks to Sam Henry, I was able to put the two magazines side by side to show how you can tell them apart
The first 5 issues were actually a little bigger than most magazines. So when they made the reprint, they actually had to shrink it down to fit in the same bag as the December issue.
Here you can see how much bigger the original is.
You can also see how the pages are not even. This is because since they were just starting, they were printing the pages all the same size, stacking them by hand, stapling in the spine, then folding them over. Of course when you fold them, the center page is the flattest and sticks out the most, and the next page sticks out a little less, and so on. A more sophisticated operation would have the pages pre-cut or it would be cut even once the magazine is folded
Side by side comparison, reprint on the left
I'm not sure why this is, but as you can see, when they shrank it down, all the print got adjusted, especially "January 1977", quickest way to tell
The second fastest way to tell is that the original centerfold drawing is in red and the reprint is black and white
The rest of the differences are pretty subtle - in the reprint, the first page is cropped and the number 1 was removed
Page 3 just has a simple but obvious crop
The number "7" was added to the reprint. Kind of weird that it looks hand drawn like the original pages
This is another comparison shot with the 2002 issue, 2002 reprint, original, and a later, slightly smaller issue
Photos of both issues the way they were packed in the plastic sleeve