I Ran a Punk Music Fanzine

Although there had been fan-based magazines around long before the arrival of punk rock, it was via that genre that I was introduced to them. In the early days, Mark Perry’s crude effort Sniffin’ Glue was as prominent in the music press as some of the bands. While I never actually came into contact with a copy of that Vanguard organ (the general consensus is that it wasn’t great), I’d seen enough by way of newspaper features to rouse the sleeping editor within me.

In line with the DIY ethos of punk, the homemade fanzine was a crude affair. In a typical issue, pale Xeroxed photos broke up blocks of typewritten text, beneath headlines that were applied via marker pen. In those days, cut and paste meant scissors and glue sticks.

It wasn’t until several years after the great punk explosion that I bought my first-ever fanzine. That was issue 1 of IQ32 (named after a Necros song title), which was produced by a guy from Sunderland who was based in Liverpool. The layout was rough and ready; handwritten text mingled with blocks of type, and crude cartoons filled the gaps. Yes, it had the required level of visual crudity and editorial naivety that announced it as being from the punk rock stable, but on reading it I discovered something I’d not hitherto considered: it was actually very interesting. That epiphany, more than anything else, was the germ of the idea that would come to fruition via my own fanzine. I still have, and cherish my copy of IQ32.

Perfect storm

I had no idea how to put a fanzine together, and nothing by way of equipment, but I did have inspiration by the yard, and enthusiasm in buckets. As I mulled over possible titles for my forthcoming organ, clouds were moving into a formation that would create the perfect storm for me.

My mother worked in the Newcastle offices of a multinational company. They were upgrading from manual typewriters to word processors, and anyone who fancied one of the old machines could take one home, free gratis. I acquired my own typewriter.

I bought the Pax Records compilation album, Bollox to the Gonads, Here’s the Testicles. Contact details of the fourteen bands that appeared on the album were printed on the reverse of the cover. Of course, in those pre-Internet days, they were postal addresses.

On my frequent Saturday morning visits to the Kard Bar, a shop in Newcastle that was very popular with local punk types, I came across the recent phenomenon of Viz Comic, which I’d seen featured in a local TV show. Aside from the cartoon strips, there were hilarious takes on readers’ letters, top tips, and spoof printed advertisements, many of which featured a shed. The irreverence of Viz, which caused a real stir at the time, inspired the tone of my own effort, but minus the blanket profanity.

So I now had the tools, the contacts, and a wealth of inspirational ideas. It was time to get serious about putting a fanzine together. But first, a dummy run.

I took two sheets of A4 paper, which I folded into an eight-page A5 fanzine; a one-off that was never destined for the printers. I called it Terminal Stupid, and it comprised sensational headlines, fake interviews, poor cartoons, and other nonsense. The few of my friends who read that early effort reacted favorably, and so I decided to produce my first printed fanzine.

Some early decisions I took were to call the fanzine Aural Nightmares and to opt for A4 size. I wrote to several of the bands from the aforementioned album, with questions that would appear as interviews. The replies I received opened my eyes to another aspect of the underground music scene, a network of bands, editors, and distributors, all connected via the Royal Mail.

After typing up the interviews, I reduced the print on a photocopier to create the blocks of text I would cut out and stick down on the page. This reduced text gave the finished page a slicker look than the bare typing of my prototype.

Serene absorption

I found that laying out the pages gave me a feeling of serene absorption akin to that to be had when doing a jigsaw puzzle. I’d move the text blocks and images about on the page, and pencil in headlines that I would later erase. Once happy with the layout, I’d paste in the cut-outs, and rub down my headlines in Letraset. Eventually, I had ten double-sided sheets, and I was ready to print.

In those days, I used to get a lot of flyers in my correspondence from like-minded people. These little slips of paper would advertise a band’s latest demo or record, a fanzine distribution service, forthcoming gigs, and suchlike. Among them, I came across an ad from a guy called Shane who printed fanzines. I bought some stamps and a large envelope, and my print run of 200 copies went to press.

When the finished product arrived, I was delighted. I immediately set about putting it together in production-line fashion. I laid out piles of each page in the correct order on a table and then went along taking one sheet from each pile and stapling the ten pages together.

Aural Nightmares ran to two issues, and for the second one I had cajoled my graphic designer friend Barry into creating a logo. After that, I produced a one-off fanzine called HYENA, the layout of which showed that I had learned a lot since my first crude effort. For that issue, I went over to the west end of Newcastle to do my first live interview with the band Reality Control at the house they shred. I also upped the quality of my postal interviews by asking follow-up questions, which added depth to interviews.

Fred Dibnah’s Chimney

So, HYENA was a vast improvement on my earlier issues (I can’t show an image because I don’t have a copy) but things went awry in a way that saw my publishing empire come crashing down like Fred Dibnah’s chimney.

I had stored all of my fanzine-related stuff in a tea chest at my ex-wife’s home opposite my flat. When she moved house, the chest was left behind so I lost everything apart from a shoe box with a few letters inside.

It was a worthwhile venture though, during which sold fanzines at gigs, and via distribution services advertised on flyers. Of course, the venture ran at a loss, but it was a labor of love through which I made several genuine friends I’m still in touch with today, and I communicated with people from all around the world.

And all without a single mouse click.