Soon everyone will be able to explore 40 years of local music, journalism, and saucy commentary with the launch of the Stylus Magazine digital archives.
Founded in 1989, Stylus is a storied downtown media outlet and one of the oldest independent music magazines in Canada. With the help of a Manitoba Heritage grant, the UWinnipeg Archives recently digitized the entire run of Stylus Magazine to make it available online for researchers, students, and the community.
To celebrate, CKUW, Stylus Magazine, and the UWinnipeg Archives are hosting an Archive Demo show at the West End Cultural Centre on November 5. The night will feature live performances from Prairie and Vav Jungle as well as interviews with former columnists Jay Flores and Jill Wilson. It's a unique opportunity for musicians, contributors, readers, researchers, and alumni to connect and celebrate the magazine's history.
University Archivist and Digital Curator Brett Lougheed will also be on stage to provide a demonstration of the archives.
"The launch event is a free educational celebration of the local music scene in Winnipeg," said Lougheed. "We hope that everyone can come out to listen to some great local music while we trick you into learning more about an oft-neglected element of Winnipeg's history."
Digitizing a media-rich collection like Stylus involves more than scanning paper on plated glass. For almost a year, Stylus Assistant Editor and Joint Master's in History student Maggie A. Clark worked with the archives on cataloguing the collection, creating computer-readable information about the people who produced each issue - editors, writers, photographers, and cover artists - as well as subjects like bands, venues, festivals, and features.
"You can't always count on people having a perfectly linear memory," Maggie said. "But they might remember trace details that recording this as metadata helps them to find it. There are a lot of issues that will be made [re]available for the first time in decades which I am very excited about."
Historically, Stylus has occupied an irreverent journalistic space on campus. In addition to coverage of the Canadian music scene, the magazine has a reputation for publishing inflammatory features, political commentary, and evocative graphic design.
"A lot of the early years of Stylus especially were very provocative, almost gonzo journalism; a lot of stuff that I see now and am surprised they could get away with and still be willing to publish," Maggie said. "Stuff you'd only see in a counter-cultural magazine."
Both the print and digital archives are almost completely intact; only a few issues were unavailable or never printed (during the early pandemic) and one is held by the Manitoba Legislative Library. The collection is current through the beginning of 2026 and Brett Lougheed said that Stylus intends to keep donating copies to maintain the records.
"The Stylus digital collection helps to fill a gap in the city's documentary heritage by ensuring that one of the oldest and most comprehensive records of Winnipeg's independent music and counter-culture scene is preserved," said Lougheed.
"By making Stylus available online, local musicians, the listening public, concert goers, and Stylus' contributors over the years can relive their past experiences in the Winnipeg independent music scene, engage in nostalgic appreciation of certain eras, and participate in the ongoing conversation about the connections between music, people, and place that Stylus has long facilitated."
Visit the Archives Website for information on how to access the archival collection.
