We Peaked At Paper has been many years in the writing. It wasn’t helped by COVID as all the interviews were done face to face but it’ll be out in a week. It’s a chronological sweep through the world of fanzines and comprises of 20 interviews with different editors. The book covers music (Pete Paphides, Karren Ablaze, Rhodri Marsden, Mark Perry, Mark Hodkinson and the Smiths Indeed and Pynk Moon zines), football, personal politics, sci-fi – and Sian Pattenden’s surreal How to Win Friends and Influence People. Many of the zines are no longer with us but there are also interviews with editors keeping the zine flame burning, including Pint-Sized Punk, the zine started by a 10 year old during the first lockdown. And all endorsed by Mark Ellen, Pete Doherty and Jude Rogers. Hoorah!
When Saturday Comes and Football Fanzines
When Saturday Comes recently celebrated its 30th anniversary with a special edition that contained a facsimile of its first issue (the ugly cut & paste layout reminding you long ago 1986 was).
I didn’t read WSC#1, but I remember staring to read it in the late 80s, when it was the most prominent of the football fanzines that you would find outside football games as well as in record shops and other places. WSC and a few competitors covered the national scene (in Scotland we had The Absolute Game). But the most interesting thing about the scene was how each club would have at least a couple of fanzines fighting for prominence.
The whole thing would make a decent case study for an MBA student. Was First Mover Advantage always important for a club fanzine, or could you be disrupted by a later competitor with a better cartoonist and access to a colour photocopier? Were consumers loyal to their club’s fanzines or would they read well-regarded zines from other clubs? (I always enjoyed Aberdeen’s The Northern Light despite being a Celtic fan, but I drew the line at reading one that covered the other lot). The fanzines were crude, » Continue Reading.