This month, QXMEN celebrates its tenth anniversary!
That’s 120 issues featuring over 1,000 R18 movies. I’ve visited more sleazy fetish clubs and events in the U.K., Europe and the States than can be healthy for any hot blooded male, and I’ve been to that many saunas up and down the country that I’m surprised my skin’s not permanently shrivelled up like a pair of bollocks!
Why? Well, I could say I did it out of some kind of misplaced loyalty to you, the QXMEN readers. But I’d be lying… The reason I’ve watched all that porn, dragged my sorry arse around all those sleazy clubs and events and spent so many hours with sweaty men in saunas and steam rooms across the U.K. is because I’m just one big old perv! Here’s to the next ten years of QXMEN… that’s if it doesn’t kill me!
Michael, Ed.
In August 2006 QXMEN Magazine burst onto the scene with more cocks and more arses than a hooker’s had, well, cocks and arses. It was a hot and sultry summer so in issue one we told you about some of the best spots in the UK to go cruising, we reviewed Pack Attack: Kent North, the first in the hugely successful series from Hot House Studios. Tragically, just a year later Kent died from a suspected drug overdose
2007 was the year that QXMEN interviewed that gorgeous Czech twink, Eurocreme’s Alex Stevens. And as if that weren’t proof enough that this was the best job in the world, we also went on location with hot British totty factory Englishlads.com, those hairy muscle hunks at Alphamalemedia and the international studs from the Olympus line at COLT Studios!
In 2008 one of the biggest and sexiest parties in the world came to our shores for the very first time. Hustlaball had been entertaining a mix of clubbers, hustlers and porn stars in Berlin and New York for over 10 years and in the summer of 2008 the legendary circuit party arrived in London and it seemed like anyone who was anybody in the gay adult industry came was there including Jeff Stryker, Mathew Rush, Johnny Hazard, Carlos Morales and François Sagat, to name just a few! 2008 was also the year – and probably the only time – that QXMEN ran with photos of lady’s breasts when Haydon Bridge delved into the world of ‘Chicks with Dicks’
After three years as a website, in 2009 UKNakedMen.com released its first hard core DVD. Called Are You Being Serviced, the romp starred Matt (11 inch) Hughes in his infamous milkman scene. We were smitten and became instant fans. In June 2009 we reviewed Pirate’s Booty, our first (and last) look at fantasy-based gay adult CGI movies. And that very same year DominicFord.com released its first 3D porn feature film… We’re not sure if they made another one.
“2008 was the year that QXMEN ran with photos of lady’s breasts when Haydon Bridge delved into the world of ‘Chicks with Dicks’!”
Thousands of gay men descended on the capital for a week in July 2010 for the first of Recon’s Fetish Week London. It was and still is the UK’s largest gathering of gay men into fetish and put London firmly on the world fetish map. Beefcake Marco de Brute reclaimed the much sought after Mr Hoist title that he’d previously held in 2008, and in October we had the best night ever in a car park near London Bridge when two of the biggest names on the London leather and rubber scene, Hard On and Rut, got together and gave us Hotwired at Ewer Street Car Park!
2011 was a kinkier year than normal when we took a closer look at spanking, tickling and electro-sex. In July we took a trip to the Hoist to celebrate SMGays’ thirtieth birthday and we really thought we’d seen everything the fetish world had to throw at us until we were introduced to Buck Angel (the man with the pussy) and the world of transmen!
In 2012 Sleazy Michael (real name Michael Peacock) made legal history when he was acquitted of all charges following his arrest for selling gay porn DVDs that were in contravention of the Obscene Publications Act (OPA) 1959. It was thought the verdict might result in the repeal of the OPA, and at very least result in the British Board of Film Classification revising its guidelines allowing DVDs featuring water sports, hard core S&M and fisting to be passed. Sadly, to date nothing has changed.
In Spring 2013, along with a nation of adoring fans, we wept when one of gay porn’s most beautiful men released a 13 second black and white video in which, standing in front of the Disney Magic Kingdom, he said, “Hello, I’m François Sagat, and from this day forward, I’ve retired from porn.” Many scoffed as he’d retired two years earlier, but sadly, to date he’s stuck to his word. It was Hard On’s tenth ball-busting birthday and Suzie Krueger celebrated with an almighty party sponsored by Treasure Island Media and London’s Expectations and a XXX-rated show that, even by Suzie’s standards was risqué!
“We wept in 2013 when we heard the words, “Hello, I’m François Sagat, and from this day forward, I’ve retired from porn”
In 2014, Following a string of successful films, cleaning up at the industry’s raft of awards ceremonies and managing to garner headlines around the globe through various mainstream outlets such as The Huffington Post, OUT and even Cosmopolitan Magazine, independent adult film studio, CockyBoys becomes one of the most popular and talked about studios in the business, and the most profitable after just seven years in business.
In 2015 porn was getting a bad rap in the mainstream. Critics wanted to crackdown on pornography accusing it of being ‘immoral, dehumanising and exploitative’ and that it was having a negative impact on our brains and. A surprising yet extremely welcome voice leapt to pornography’s defence, and in May’s QXMEN world-renowned human rights campaigner Peter Tatchell proclaimed that “porn can be good for you.”
Which brings us smack bang up to date and it looks like in 2016 what we really really want is a horny tattooed bad boy such as Billy Essex or Cameron Diggs…
