Sounds (magazine)

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Sounds
Sounds 2451980.jpg
Cover of Sounds (24 May 1980)
CategoriesMusic newspaper
FrequencyWeekly
First issue10 October 1970
Final issue6 April 1991
Company United Newspapers
CountryUnited Kingdom
Based inLondon
LanguageEnglish
ISSN 0144-5774
OCLC 56364019

Sounds was a UK weekly pop/rock music newspaper, published from 10 October 1970 to 6 April 1991. It was known for giving away posters in the centre of the paper (initially black and white, then colour from late 1971) and later for covering heavy metal (especially the new wave of British heavy metal (NWOBHM)) [1] and punk and Oi! music in its late 1970s–early 1980s heyday. [2]

Contents

History

It was produced by Spotlight Publications (part of Morgan Grampian), which was set up by John Thompson and Jo Saul with Jack Hutton and Peter Wilkinson, who left Melody Maker to start their own company. Sounds was their first project, a weekly paper devoted to progressive rock and described by Hutton, to those he was attempting to recruit from his former publication, as "a leftwing Melody Maker". Sounds was intended to be a weekly rival to titles such as Melody Maker and New Musical Express (NME).

Sounds was one of the first music papers to cover punk. [3] Mick Middles covered the Manchester music scene for Sounds from 1978 to 1982 writing about many of the up and coming bands of the time from Buzzcocks and Slaughter & The Dogs to The Fall and Joy Division. [4] John Robb joined in 1987 and used the term "Britpop" [nb 1] to refer to bands such as the La's, the Stone Roses and Inspiral Carpets, [6] although it did not develop into the Britpop genre/movement at that time (as these acts were grouped under labels such as Baggy, Madchester and indie-dance).

Keith Cameron wrote about Nirvana after Robb carried out the first interview with them. [7]

The Obscurist Chart ran for about a year, first appearing on 5 September 1981 issue, [8] as an alternative to the main, sales-driven record charts, allowing bands and music outside the mainstream to be recognised. [8] The chart was started by Paul Platypus, who played with Mark Perry in The Reflections and compiled the first nine charts. The last chart appeared in 11 December 1982 issue. [8]

In 1987, Morgan-Grampian had been acquired by United News and Media (later to become United Business Media), first as part of the United Advertising Publications (UAP) division and later as part of the then CMP Information portfolio. A legacy of Sounds was the creation of the heavy metal/rock magazine Kerrang! , which was originally issued as a supplement before being spun off as a separate publication. [1]

Sounds was one of the trinity of British music weeklies, along with NME and Melody Maker, that were colloquially known as 'The Inkies'. [9] Sounds folded in 1991 after the parent company, United Newspapers, decided to concentrate on trade papers like Music Week and so sold most of their consumer magazines titles to EMAP Metro, with Sounds being closed at the same time as its sister music magazine, the more chart and dance music oriented Record Mirror .

Contributors

Contributors included Garry Bushell, [10] Sandy Robertson, [11] Giovanni Dadomo, Mick Middles, [12] Phil Sutcliffe, [13] Geoff Barton, John Robb, Phil Bell, Mick Sinclair, [14] Caroline Coon, Antonella Gambotto, Vivien Goldman, Jonh Ingham, Alan Moore (a.k.a. "Curt Vile"), [15] Lizo Mzimba, [16] John Peel, Barbara Charone, Edwin Pouncey (a.k.a. "Savage Pencil"), Cathi Unsworth, Jon Ronson, Jon Savage, [17] Sylvie Simmons, Penny Valentine, Marguerite Van Cook, Mary Anne Hobbs, Mat Snow, Johnny Waller, James Brown (who went on to form Loaded ), Andy Ross (who wrote as "Andy Hurt" and went on to form Food Records), Steve Lamacq, Kev F. Sutherland and Russ Carvell's UT strip, and photographers Michael Putland, Ian Dickson, Jill Furmanovsky, Andy Phillips, Steve Payne, Virginia Turbett, Tony Mottram, Gavin Watson, Ross Halfin and Janette Beckman. [18]

Notes

  1. Journalist and BBC Radio 6 Music radio presenter Stuart Maconie is credited with first using the term Britpop in 1993 in relation to a new "Great British pop" movement which would counteract the success of alt. rock and grunge from America. The term "Britpop" arose when the media were drawing on the success of the Young British Artists, collectively also referred to as "Britart", and applied a "Britart-esque" label to a number of new British indie musicians, coming up with "Britpop", though recounting the event in a BBC Radio 2 programme from 2020, Maconie believed "Britpop" was a term used in the 1960s, around the time of the British Invasion. [5]

Related Research Articles

Britpop was a mid-1990s British-based music culture movement that emphasised Britishness. It produced brighter, catchier alternative rock, partly in reaction to the popularity of the darker lyrical themes and soundscapes of the US-led grunge music and to the UK's own shoegaze music scene. The movement brought British alternative rock into the mainstream and formed the backbone of a larger British popular cultural movement, Cool Britannia, which evoked the Swinging Sixties and the British guitar pop of that decade.

<span class="mw-page-title-main">Grunge</span> Genre of rock music

Grunge is an alternative rock genre and subculture which emerged during the mid-1980s in the U.S. state of Washington, particularly in Seattle and nearby towns. Grunge fuses elements of punk rock and heavy metal. The genre featured the distorted electric guitar sound used in both genres, although some bands performed with more emphasis on one or the other. Like these genres, grunge typically uses electric guitar, bass guitar, drums and vocals. Grunge also incorporates influences from indie rock bands such as Sonic Youth. Lyrics are typically angst-filled and introspective, often addressing themes such as social alienation, self-doubt, abuse, neglect, betrayal, social and emotional isolation, addiction, psychological trauma and a desire for freedom.

Indie rock is a subgenre of rock music that originated in the United Kingdom, United States and New Zealand in the early to mid-1980s. Although the term was originally used to describe rock music released through independent record labels, by the 1990s it became more widely associated with the music such bands produced.

<i>NME</i> British music journalism website and former magazine

New Musical Express (NME) is a British music, film, gaming, and culture website and brand. Founded as a newspaper in 1952, with the publication being referred to as a 'rock inkie', the NME would become a magazine that ended up as a free publication, before becoming an online brand which includes its website and radio stations.

Alternative rock is a category of rock music that evolved from the independent music underground of the 1970s. Alternative rock acts achieved mainstream success in the 1990s with the likes of the grunge, shoegaze, and Britpop subgenres in the United States and United Kingdom, respectively. During this period, many record labels were looking for "alternatives", as many corporate rock, hard rock, and glam metal acts from the 1980s were beginning to grow stale throughout the music industry. The emergence of Generation X as a cultural force in the 1990s also contributed greatly to the rise of alternative rock.

The new wave of British heavy metal was a nationwide musical movement that started in England in the mid-1970s and achieved international attention by the early 1980s. Editor Alan Lewis coined the term for an article by Geoff Barton in a May 1979 issue of the British music newspaper Sounds to describe the emergence of new heavy metal bands in the mid to late 1970s, during the period of punk rock's decline and the dominance of new wave music.

<i>Melody Maker</i> Historical British weekly pop/rock music newspaper (1926–2000)

Melody Maker was a British weekly music magazine, one of the world's earliest music weeklies; according to its publisher, IPC Media, the earliest. It was founded in 1926, largely as a magazine for dance band musicians, by Leicester-born composer, publisher Lawrence Wright; the first editor was Edgar Jackson. In January 2001, it was merged into "long-standing rival" New Musical Express.

Grebo was a short-lived subgenre of alternative rock that incorporated influences from punk rock, electronic dance music, hip hop and psychedelia. The scene occupied the period in the late 1980s and early 1990s in the United Kingdom before the popularisation of Britpop and grunge. The genre and its attributes were largely absorbed into industrial rock, which would emerge after the sub-genre's demise in the late 1980s, which then led to the development of industrial metal in the 1990s.

<span class="mw-page-title-main">British rock music</span> Rock music from the United Kingdom

British rock describes a wide variety of forms of music made in the United Kingdom. Since around 1964, with the "British Invasion" of the United States spearheaded by the Beatles, British rock music has had a considerable impact on the development of American music and rock music across the world.

<span class="mw-page-title-main">Popscene</span> 1992 single by Blur

"Popscene" is a song by English alternative rock band Blur, released as a non-album single on 30 March 1992. Despite its relatively low chart placing, it has since become critically praised and regarded as one of the pioneering songs of the Britpop genre.

<i>Suede</i> (album) 1993 studio album by Suede

Suede is the debut album by English alternative rock band Suede, released in March 1993 on Nude Records. It was recorded in London at Master Rock studios late 1992 and early 1993 and was produced by Ed Buller. At the time the fastest-selling debut album in British history in almost a decade, Suede debuted at the top of the UK Albums Chart, won the 1993 Mercury Music Prize, and is often cited as one of the first Britpop records. Displaying a sound of Britishness and glam rock, its music and lyrical content has been compared to The Smiths and early David Bowie.

"Love Buzz" is a song by Dutch rock band Shocking Blue. It was written by Robbie van Leeuwen and first released on the group's 1969 album At Home. The original song is notable for its psychedelic rock style and its extensive use of the sitar, played by Leeuwen.

<span class="mw-page-title-main">Punk pathetique</span> Punk rock subgenre

Punk pathetique is a subgenre of British punk rock that involved humour and working-class cultural themes.

<i>Inflammable Material</i> 1979 studio album by Stiff Little Fingers

Inflammable Material is the debut album by the Northern Irish punk band Stiff Little Fingers. Released in 1979, at the height of The Troubles, most of the album's tracks detail the grim reality of life in Northern Ireland in times of polarisation and conflict, with songs containing themes such as teenage boredom, deprivation, sectarian violence and police brutality.

<i>A Kiss in the Dreamhouse</i> 1982 studio album by Siouxsie and the Banshees

A Kiss in the Dreamhouse is the fifth studio album by British rock band Siouxsie and the Banshees, released on 5 November 1982 by Polydor Records. The record marked a change of musical direction, as the group used strings for the first time and experimented in the studio. Guitarist John McGeoch played more instruments, including recorder and piano. For Julian Marszalek of The Quietus, the release proved the Banshees to be "one of the great British psychedelic bands."

<span class="mw-page-title-main">John Robb (musician)</span> English music journalist

John David Robb is an English musician and journalist best known as the bassist and singer for the mid-1980s post-punk band the Membranes.

<i>We Are...The League</i> 1982 studio album by Anti-Nowhere League

We Are...The League is the debut album by English punk rock band, the Anti-Nowhere League.

Rock's Backpages is an online archive of music journalism, sourced from contributions to the music and mainstream press from the 1950s to the present day. The articles are full text and searchable, and all are reproduced with the permission of the copyright holders. The database was founded in 2000 by British music journalist Barney Hoskyns. As of November 2018, its database contains over 37,000 articles, including interviews, features and reviews, which covered popular music from blues and soul up to the present date. Rock's Backpages also features over 600 audio interviews with musicians from Jimi Hendrix and Johnny Cash to Kate Bush and Kurt Cobain.

Oi! is a subgenre of punk rock that originated in the United Kingdom in the late 1970s. The music and its associated subculture had the goal of bringing together punks, skinheads, and other disaffected working-class youth. The movement was partly a response to the perception that many participants in the early punk rock scene were, in the words of The Business guitarist Steve Kent, "trendy university people using long words, trying to be artistic... and losing touch."

<span class="mw-page-title-main">Garry Bushell</span> English journalist, musician and activist

Garry Bushell is an English newspaper columnist, rock music journalist, television presenter, author, musician and political activist. Bushell also sings in the Cockney Oi! bands GBX and the Gonads. He managed the New York City Oi! band Maninblack until the death of the band frontman Andre Schlessinger. Bushell's recurring topical themes are comedy, country and class. He has campaigned for an English Parliament, a Benny Hill statue and for variety and talent shows on TV. He has been a columnist for several newspapers, including The Sun, The People and the Daily Star Sunday, and has worked as the review editor for the Sunday Express.

References

  1. 1 2 Tucker, John (2006). "Denim and Leather – 1979". Suzie Smiles... The New Wave of British Heavy Metal. Church Stretton, Shropshire, UK: Independent Music Press. pp. 22–23. ISBN   978-0-9549704-7-5. Sounds (...) produced more and more features as the editorial staff realised that metal was one of the main reasons the paper sold
  2. "Cockney Rejects: History and Pictures / Oi Music / Punk Rock". Punkmodpop.free.fr. Archived from the original on 28 August 2009. Retrieved 24 March 2010.
  3. Bushell, Garry (2016). Sounds of Glory: The Punk and Ska Years review. New Haven Publishing Limited. ISBN   978-1910705469.
  4. Middles, Mick. "Rock's Back Pages: Mick Middles" . Retrieved 13 January 2019.
  5. "The Britpop Top 50 with Jo Whiley". Bbc.co.uk. Retrieved 3 September 2020.
  6. "'I had no idea they would be so big' – John Robb on Manchester music, Britpop, and being the first to interview Nirvana". Inews.co.uk. Retrieved 23 June 2019.
  7. Robb, John (25 October 2009). "Classic Interview: Nirvana 1989". Clash . Clashmusic.com. Retrieved 24 March 2011.
  8. 1 2 3 Platypus, Paul (15 August 2010). "Obscurist Chart Archive" . Retrieved 18 September 2020.
  9. "From weekly to weakly". TheGuardian.com . 3 February 2002.
  10. "Madness: Bluebeat and Sax. By Garry Bushell : Articles, reviews and interviews from Rock's Backpages".
  11. "Articles, interviews and reviews from Sandy Robertson: Rock's Backpages". www.rocksbackpages.com.
  12. "Articles, interviews and reviews from Mick Middles: Rock's Backpages".
  13. "rock'sbackpageslibrary" . Retrieved 11 February 2023.
  14. "The Mick Sinclair Archive" . Retrieved 20 March 2013.
  15. "The Sounds Collection". The Alan Moore Store. 4colorheroes.com. Archived from the original on 7 July 2011. Retrieved 24 March 2011.
  16. Display Ad Awakenings The Observer; 17 March 1991
  17. "Articles, interviews and reviews from Jon Savage: Rock's Backpages".
  18. "ACAPULCO GOLD INTERVIEW: JANETTE BECKMAN". Archived from the original on 7 January 2008. Retrieved 9 January 2008.