New Book: Tales from the Ghost Town

January 9, 2022

Alan Rider after many years intense work, has finally got his his awesome book on the Cov fanzines scene out to print – Tales from the Ghost Town by Alan Rider – buy this book!

Blurb from Alan: “The period 1979-’85 (usually referred to as the ‘post-punk’ period) witnessed an unprecedented and never-to-be-repeated explosion of grass roots musical creativity across the country and internationally. That, in turn, stimulated a plethora of fanzines of all shapes and sizes to spring from bedrooms, dining room tables, and even school playgrounds. Nowhere was that urge expressed more prolifically than in Coventry, England. Galvanised by the energy created around Two Tone, but extending far beyond, over 50 fanzines were produced in Coventry and the surrounding area during that brief time.

Examples ranged from scruffy, faintly photocopied efforts that blinked into existence for just a few issues, to more polished productions that ran for several years. From the tongue in cheek style of Ded Yampy, to the politically aware polemic of Issue, the in-depth local coverage of the front runner Alternative Sounds, to the confrontational design lead stylings of Adventures in Reality, the teenage anarchist diatribe of Antisocial, to the barbed commentary of Private Enterprise, the diversity of views and styles on show was almost endless.

With a foreword by The Specials’ Horace Panter, Tales From The Ghost Town collects together rare copies of every fanzine produced in Coventry at that incredible time. With an in-depth review of each, accompanied by covers and inside pages alongside exclusive interviews with their original creators tracked down from across the globe, it is THE definitive record of this unique, punk inspired, explosion of grass roots creativity expressed in cut and paste form.”