This chapter explores the important roles played by women in the development of punk-related and fanzines cultures. It focuses on women fanzines producers and writers, suggesting that fanzines provided space for female voices to heard and female perspectives presented.

Punk-informed fanzines covered more than just music. Taking the US publication Re/Search as an example, S. Alexander Reed examines how zines served as cultural conduits to radical literature and radical ideas. Indeed, Re/Search proved crucial to disseminating the intellectual foundations of industrial culture.

The connection between punk and what became known as ‘indie’ were evident in the latter’s commitment to an ethos of DIY. Fanzines were very much part of this, a link that Pete dale makes explicit by examining the politics and meanings ascribed to music and fanzine production within the indie scene.

Over time a growing body of cultural artefacts – documentaries, biographies, compilations – have emerged seeking to tell the ‘truth’ about The Clash. In these competing renditions of the band, one of the voices that has often been drowned out is that of the fans. Drawing on the author’s own experience of running away from home to follow The Clash on tour, this chapter seeks to capture what the band meant to those who witnessed their legendary live performances, typically without the privilege of backstage access. This autobiographical ‘true fiction’ offers a perspective that underlines one of the most important affirmations of the group’s much-disputed ‘authenticity’. While the members of The Clash were often unforgiving to one another, they were unremittingly generous to their travelling fans. The chapter also suggests that the focus on metropolitan London in many accounts overlooks the importance of suburban centres in nurturing the early punk scene. A case in point is that of High Wycome, a setting neglected in the standard accounts of the period, but which in fact deserves its own place in the story of the subculture.

This chapter seeks to examine the turbulent political context in which The Clash recorded their enduring body of work. The songs that the band crafted together provide a compelling account of the rise and ultimate triumph of the neoliberal project as the 1970s turned into the 1980s. While The Clash were one of the critical voices raised against this dramatic turn to the right, their political power was always compromised by their proximity to a corporate world they claimed to despise. As many bands before and since have learned, the culture industries have a facility for incorporation that diminishes the political valence and authenticity of even the most critical artists. In spite of the constraints of the corporate environment in which they were operating, however, The Clash wrote scores of songs that have retained a political resonance even today. The political power of the band derives ironically from previous cultural movements that they often claimed to loathe. In large measure, the enduring influence of The Clash comes from their rechanneling of the 1960s counterculture and the band should be seen then as heirs to that prior movement of radical cultural dissent.

The introduction outlines the ways by which fanzines were integral to the development of punk-related cultures and embodied the ethos of do-it-yourself (DIY). It assesses some of the previous writing on fanzines and outlines the content of the book.

Industrial culture emerged and developed in parallel with punk, though often sharing audiences and component themes. This chapter looks at way fanzines informed the transgressive mentality that helped define industrial culture.

Anarcho-punk emerged as a distinct strand of punk culture into the 1980s. Typically associated with the band Crass, the tenets of anarcho-punk were also developed through artworks, writing and debate conducted within multiple punk fanzines. The chapter looks at the contested development of anarcho-punks politics and aesthetic.

Fanzines serve as portal back in time, but also as examples of history being created. Professor Robinson asks what fanzines can teach the historian, both in terms of methodology and in archiving the past.

Tom Vague produced on of (post-)punk’s most notable fanzines, Vague. Here Vague recalls the rationale for his fanzine, the processes he went through to produce it and the shifting historical and cultural context the informed the content.

Before goth, there was positive punk, a term coined by Richard Cabut. Writing as Richard North for NME, he outlined the foundations of what later soon became known as goth. However, the influences, ideas and aesthetics of this were first developed in fanzines such as Cabut’s Kick. Here he recalls what informed his notion of a ‘positive punk’

One of the abiding controversies that attends The Clash centres on their ‘authenticity’ as a political band. While some recall seeing the band live as a moment that altered their perspective on the world, others have dismissed their politics as posturing framed by a certain cinematic version of outlaw chic. In this chapter, the author leans towards the former, more optimistic reading of The Clash’s cultural politics. The focus here is on the band’s 1982 tour of Australia during which they championed the cause of Aboriginal rights. Each night during their cover of the reggae number ‘Armagideon Time’, the group would segue into an instrumental section during which activist Gary Foley would take the stage and address the predominantly white audience. The attendant media attention for these moments was sparse and it remains difficult to establish whether they had any real political impact. That The Clash were willing to provide a space for the airing of what were at the time controversial views serves to underline that here was a band that, for all their shortcomings, had a genuine concern for the promotion of human rights and global justice.