It says August 2004 on the cover but I started working on it in September of 2003 and it was done by June 2004.

The Lite-Brite cover has probably exhausted the possibility of these crafty covers. That’s the sun in the top cover with some nice rays shining on the tattoo machine.

Issue five has a lot of information in it, including an important essay entitled “Machine Systems.” It’s perhaps a little hard to read but there’s a lot to it. I mean it, it’s important.

This issue was sort of like the first couple of issues. At this point, we weren’t too worried if some things were a bit controversial. Issue five is a pretty good issue, certainly tighter than issue one and two, and better than three and four. So I’d say issue five was the best issue yet.

There are four, count ’em, four full-length interviews. It took me three months just to transcribe the interviews, and there were hardly no ads.

Best Line in Issue 5

Tommy Stegall talking about the internet and the tattoo discussion forums.
(Tommy Stegall interview, p. 34).

Tommy: It’s a weird thing, certain people get attacked and other people get patted on the back for the exact same things. To me that’s not about what’s fair, and it’s not about what has actually got merit; it’s all about politics and what certain people think.