“What is it?”
“A fanzine.”
“What’s it for?”
It was 1978 in small town Newark, Nottinghamshire. I’d never heard of a fanzine, but here’s my friend John enthusing about how he can write about the bands he likes, cut a stencil on the machine at the theatre where he works and duplicate hundreds of fanzines.
It did take me a while to understand that it was a form of punk self-expression, a way of influencing the kids and just being very very cool.
“It’s called Cautious Talk Seduces Your Children – or CaTSYC if you like” I guess that was a clever name though I didn’t understand it.
The writing was good. It was just like Paul Morley, but in purple ink. I liked the way that John wrote about famous post-punk groups with the same reverence that he wrote about our own newly formed trio – The Devices. When we played a gig in the theatre shed/workshop, John gave us an amazing hyped-up review. You can do that if you control the press.
