Although based in Toronto, Canada, BW&BK features writers from the US, Germany and the UK, allowing the magazine to represent metal music from an international prospective.

Issue #1 was 16 pages, and featured interviews with Pantera, Entombed, Gwar, Cannibal Corpse and Geezer Butler of Black Sabbath.

By this time, current writers Carl Begai, Chris Bruni, Mark Gromen, Allan Grusie and Aaron Small had joined the team.

Inside the issue, interviews with Ozzy Osbourne and AC/DC were featured, while Metallica's ReLoad was chastised in BW&BK's Cross-Fire review section.

The magazine also included a CD, Brave Words & Bloody Knuckles Proudly Presents Blood Tracks II, with the February 1999 edition.

[6] Chronicling the rise of power metal, BW&BK printed interviews with Rob Halford, Demons & Wizards, Stratovarius and Eidolon.

The covers over this annum included first-time appearances from Megadeth, Children of Bodom (one of BW&BK's top-selling issues), Fear Factory, Behemoth, Soulfly, Kataklysm, Candlemass and Gene Simmons of KISS.

In conjunction with BW&BK #100, the magazine held a birthday party at Montreal's Les Foufounes Électriques concert venue/nightclub and also produced the fourth installment of its annual 6-Pack metal festival.

The final print issue of the magazine was published in January 2009, citing declining advertising revenues and its small readership,[7] but the website BraveWords kept going.