Zines in 2010

The very first post of this blog was a list of the zines I had done, & I've updated it since with new ones or ones I've remembered. Here is an update : the zines I made in 2010.

January 2010
Newcastle Zine Review, 2nd edition A6 portrait & chunky printed (though made in 2009)

January? 2010
Hybrids: A5 cut-ups of star & shadow programmes as part of attempted series of 'crafty creative sessions' at the cinema (which did not continue).

February 2010
Anarchist New York A5 landscape, colour cover, 150 copies. A mistake with stapling meant the reader had to take out the staples and rebind it - instructions given.

February 2010
Self-guided Zine Trail around the Star & Shadow (I think it's fallen apart by now)

March 2010
Mail Art Session at Star & Shadow, a low-key thing, cut n pasting onto postcards.

Spring 2010
A present for Elodie
Foldout minizine in many languages for Elodie Applejack.

April 2010
Washington Arts Centre Zine Trail, for P.R.E.S.S. small publishers' event.

April 2010
30 Minute Zine Challenge at DIY Aye!

June 2010
Beach Zine, 150 copies, A6 with colour middlepages, about a week walking up the Northumberland Coast

Summer 2010
Contributions to 'Art ... and that' anthology by Paper Jam Comics Collective, also to 'History ... and that' anthology and upcoming 'Music ... and that' CD/comic.

August 2010
Trail Zine, A5 20 copies, one page drawn by each participant on the Great Baikal Trail camp of August 18-30. Mix of English & Russian language, printed in Ulan Ude.

October 2010
My Anarchist Pilgrimage: Sampler, A5, 150 copies, for distribution at London Anarchist Bookfair: the full version is my main project of 2011.

October 2010
Mongolian Cartoon Diary, A6 landscape, 60 copies, pretty straightforward print of my cartoon diary from 2 weeks in September.

October 2010
Love Letter from Helsinki, A6, 24 pages, 24 copies, done as part of 24 hour comic day in October.

November 2010
Gaelic Language Cut-ups. 7 copies, in envelope. 30p. Done for Footprint Zine Fair in Leeds University Student Union.

November 2010
Collaborative Comics on the theme of 'tea', workshop at the Footprint Zine Fair.

November 2010
Opinionated Geordie Monsters Review the Local Band Scene (1), A5, participatory and a quarterly from now on. 125 printed so far.

December 2010
Wor History Calendar, A3, colour cover, inner pages printed with our own photocopier. 50 copies, all sold for £2. Cut n pasted from previous wor diaries.

January 2011
'Fellow Drawer' Invite to draw about the city with me, foldout minizine in envelope.

New Year, New Collaborations

Here are a few cut-ups I've done already for the next 'Opinionated Geordie Monsters Review the Local Band Scene' zine. I'm hoping for lots of unknown people collaborating, and some friendly faces too.

I've reprinted 20 more of the first edition, too (on coloured paper!) to leave out around Newcastle tomorrow.

And I also have hopes of doing a more left-field, more experimental but very Newcastle focussed collaboration, too: although you won't be able to read it, here is my invitation. If you draw comics (or something like that) and live in Newcastle, you will receive a real one soon when you see me.

Also Haz says she's going to post me something every day this year. I didn't ask her how long she's going to keep it up, but me and my postman say thanks.

I'm also meaning to do something for Teesside, too, seeing as it's the current zine capital of the North East.

And also, stuff you're doing, I want to know.

Wor History Calendar ready

ANNOUNCEMENT! (yay):

I've printed 50 copies of a calendar cut n pasted from old wor diaries.
It's strictly one for the participants and the fans, to remind them to get involved for next year.
It only cost £2 to make, so it only costs £2 to get (unless it needs posting).

Public Availability:
5 copies have been left in the travelling man comics shop on grainger st (at £3 cos their small press stand automatically adds 33%)
5 copies have been left in the new 'Made in Newcastle' shop, also on Grainger st, next to Greggs, which opens tomorrow.
5 copies also left in the Star & Shadow.

The rest have already been claimed by fans and participants of Wor Diary.

Deadlines in 2011 (taken from the calendar):

First Meeting for 2012 Wor Diary is April 1st in the Spital House pub, 7pm.
We hope to add a feature to the website by which you can choose a week to draw - the deadline for these bagsied weeks would be September 1st
On September 2nd the remaining weeks are distributed and on Saturday September 3rd we'd have a collective drawing/cut-n-pasting session for those who like the company.
Wor Diary 2012 will be available from 23rd October 2011.

How's that for forward thinking, eh?

Anti Digital December

Hi,

I found I was spending too much free time on the internet, instead of staring into space.
So I have got rid of my laptop for the month and therefore will not be updating this blog so much.

There are, however, various papery projects that I am making happen:

1. The First Edition of 'Opinionated Geordie Monsters' is out. 20 pages, 7 contributors, and hopefully about to start a life of its own!
And while I could only afford to do a run of 90 copies, it seems that there is a major dearth of decent gigs in Newcastle this month anyway so I can't give that many out ( there are a FEW good gigs, but they're sold out or when I'm out in Northumberland).

2. Wor History Calendar.

I got a bug and had to clear the house out so my first start on this stalled. But I will do it for Christmas, and rather than doing it really thoroughly and distributing it to the geordie public, it will just be for the most keen fans of wor diary, to help tide them over till the next one which we will start next year, to be ready for 2012. If you don't know wor diary, it's a participatory radical local history project whose website is being resurrected.

3. Cartoon Diaries.

Spending a lot of the last month snotting out green goo in bed, I have at least written a few diaryesque comics that may end up making sense as a zine in their own right. They're a bit melancholy, so would fit a winter theme.

Post 3 of 3: Opinionated Geordie Monsters!

Opinionated Geordie Monsters Review the Local Band Scene

DEADLINE FOR SUBMISSIONS: 28TH NOVEMBER

COMING OUT: 30TH NOVEMBER

This fanzine is going to be a quarterly for Newcastle upon Tyne.

So far I have 4 pages submitted by other people (4 monsters, 4 reviews), and lots by me. My hope is that, over the next year, this fanzine will become a familiar and loved feature of the local band scene, in which not just my thoughts but the thoughts of all sorts of people are converted into the drawing of a monster saying something about a local gig.

It's not big, it's not clever. It's easy to contribute a monster review, so send one to me at oldglen@gmail.com

Post 2 of 3 - the Footprint Zine Fair

Last weekend, Leeds University Student Union, I did my first ever solo zine stall, yay! It was the first time I've ever asked for money for my zines, but it was a very loose thing and I still gave most of mine away.

I fashioned a stand out of a biscuit box, and borrowed my house's radiator hangers to help make my stall.

I made a series of 3 cut-out comics from a gaelic language guide (highlands & islands, not Ireland) , on the themes of drinking, women, and work and enveloped them up.

I was happy to be REPRESENTING Newcastle and the North East, with Mayday and Classwar Classix pamphlets from County Durham (sold a few, gave more away); anarcha-feminist zines advertised from Newcastle (several people copied down the details and I feel good that I've helped spread that); small press comics from Newcastle and Teesside, borrowed from the Paper Jam Comics Collective; William Pilgrim's latest and a few spares that I found left over, which people had sent me for DIYAye 2010 (Lather Rinse Repeat; ).

I also gave out some of the out of date mars bars that my housemate liberated from a skip, and had my collection of North East zines available for any real fans. Interestingly, I met a lot of people who at one point had been in Teesside and I learnt a lot about the shit that went down there in the late '90s, and how the DIY scene has recently re-emerged with a smile and youthly beauty, yay! I also realised I have NO zines from Sunderland. Durham, check, Ashington, check, Sunderland, no. Am I missing out?

(I did an interview for Dissident radio which is here, in which for some reason I totally misrepresent the guy who started the Wor Diary project, as if he was incapable and trapped in his house, when he so isn't. Beware mouths running away with themselves! Other than that I don't mind what i said, oh, except I also gave a way-too-low estimate of the costs of printing wor diary it's at least twice as much.)

I had some great conversations with other people at the fair, swapped contacts, got offers, got a load of zine and comic swaps, and then I did a comic drawing workshop.

8 of us drew a page each around the theme of 'making tea' and then passed our page to our left, giggled at what we saw and tried to do a follow-on page. Some of the random results are below, each page done in less than 5 minutes! Great fun.

Here's a page from one:

This one was called "Copper Tea is Theft":

This one went down a politicised surrealist avenue:

This one featured the adventures of Grannny Smedley:

This one featured the hero, "Random Dude":

And finally:

Post 1 of 3! - the clearout

Since my return from Siberia, I have spent a lot of time sorting through the piles of things boxed up and forgotten in bags in my room, attic, etc...

I have tried to get rid of all my spare old zines in order to clear a space in which to do new ones (and especially the anarchist pilgrimage mega-zine). Still my two bedroom tables are covered in drifts of paper but I WILL clear them this week, I WILL! The Footprint zine fair in Leeds was great and it let me give out, sell & swap lots of zines. Since returning from there, I have established that I have SEVEN copies of each of the following seven zines:

secret anarchist history of newcastle (spring 2008)
examzine (summer 2008)
george zine (2008?)
bothy zine (autumn 2009)
Roman philosophers (early 2010?)
beach zine (summer 2010)
mongolian cartoon diary (autumn 2010)

I also have dozens more of the bothy and anarchist history zine, but these are not intended for zine swaps and stalls. Instead, they will continue to be left out in the spaces which they refer to: bothies and newcastle. (Incidentally, I am glad it is these 2 that will persist, because they are the most 'weighty' of my contributions in the last 2 years, most of which are pretty frivolous!)

Also I had 8 copies of george zine left, but serendipitously Matt came round and said he'd lost his copy and did I have any spare. So good, down to the magic number 7.
I have a few extra exam and roman philosophers zines, which will continue to refill the free zine boxes (1 is permanent on the bar of the Star & Shadow Cinema, no.2 is roaming and comes with me to gigs, where I leave it in a well-lit spot for punters to go 'oh, free zines!')

So what about these SEVEN? Well, today I am wrapping them up into bundles, and I will be sticking a price on them. Not to make any money, but to ensure that they only go to someone who's new to them and keen to see them. So I hope they will remain with me for at least a year, and then at some stall in the future or some encounter with someone perhaps newer to zines, I will flog them for £3.50. I just made up that price, 50p a zine, sounds alright to me.

I reckon this blog post is about the most boring I have ever and will ever make, but it is somehow satisfying to put into words where I am at with this side of my life. I have got really a bit over the top at zines in the last year or two, and loved it, really loved it. But it means I've got loads of oddities and leftovers and I've got a bit lost in what I've done, so it helps clear up your mind if you clear up the debris around you. I'm also very happy that zines of mine have gone off to exhibitions and libraries in Denmark, Australia, New York and Germany. And Alnwick this week! Through my unbalanced enthusiasm, quite a few people have encountered zines for the first time through me, especially amongst bothy-users and people who go out in the evenings in Newcastle. If I stop now and find a new hobby, like stamps, I will still have done a little bit for zine culture and so today I'm feeling quite happy about that. Coz making zines is a beautifully pointless thing to do. People occasionally suggest I should do stuff 'properly', get funding or try and make cash out of it. But I've been doing it for the opposite reason: because I love doing stuff amateurishly without planning, without corrections, when my heart is urging me to do it; and because fanzines are about fandom, about enthusiasm, NOT about career-building or commercialism. It's this other side of life that I want to be part of. Love, outpouring, messy experimentalism, temporary collaborations, not knowing how things are going to turn out, all that 'lifestyle anarchism' stuff!

And if in future I return to look at this zine blog of mine, finding it all dusty and a part of the past, remember this Mr.Mike:

- in Wainhope bothy last month, during the 'any other business' part of the meeting, when you piped up and said "I did a zine about..." and the whole room turned round and said "It's YOU!" and gave such love and appreciation for it.