Side 4 of our gatefold magnum opus. More puns, ‘taches and mullets, the list has grown to. 104 songs and is now 6 hours 34 minutes long but I’ve left “Freed from Desire Out” because I hate it with a passion. My list, my rules.

I’m sure if you look at the list you might be able to spot more.

False Positive

The 2007 Welcome to Paradise fanzine by Celtic fans almost certainly had nothing to do with the Song by Green Day but it’s a great playlist addition. To balance out the false positives out in Glasgow lets add Chelsea/ Rangers/ Linfield fanzine The Blues Brothers to the list with “Everybody” as that’s who they were apparently trying to support, It’s a great song anyway.

Ob(li)vious

That’s Aztec Camera on the list for no reason other than they were brilliant. Singing the Blues appears on the list of fanzine names three times as fanzines of Everton, Linfield and Manchester City. The playlist has 2 versions of the song, the best-selling version from 1956 by Guy Mitchell which has stood the test of time well and then there’s the version by Terry Curran of Doncaster and Sheffield Wednesday fame because of his ‘tache/mullet combo alone.

As an aside, 69 year old Curran was manager of Central Midlands Alliance Premier Division North side Doncaster City in 2022 when they applied to participate in the Scottish Cup. They were trying to exploit a loophole in the Treaty of Durham which gave Doncaster to Scotland, a clause that has never officially been withdrawn. Just count yourself lucky I haven’t found a fanzine called Diamond Lights.

Blackburn Rovers fanzine 4000 Holes was clearly named after the Beatles song “A Day In The Life”. Do I need to remind you of the line?

Fortune’s Always Hiding was a relatively short lived but well-respected West Ham fanzine and another reason why Cockney Reject appear on the list with “Blowing Bubbles” but they will also appear in an upcoming blog about famous cartoonists…look out for more details later.

Always Look On The Bright Side was a general football fanzine from 1993 and the Monty Python song became a favourite on the terraces for a while.

True Faith is still an active Newcastle fanzine and thankfully gets New Order involved.

Tangerine Dream, the still just about functional German electro band lent their name to a long-lost Blackpool fanzine.

Come on Feel the Wanderers was a short-lived Bolton fanzine from 1995 that was unfortunately not named after the Slade classic but was named after the Lemonheads album Come on Feel (details available) The Album was re-released recently for its 30^th anniversary but there was unfortunately no news on the fanzine

From 1996 to 1999 there was a Burnley fanzine called Kicker Conspiracy, the name also being song by The Fall. How? Why? Well, the video for the song was filmed at Burnley’s home Turf Moor for reasons no one knows. There’s no way Coldplay could write something as brilliant as

“In the booze club,

George Best does rule,

how flair is punished,

his downfall was a blonde girl, but that’s none of your business!” 

Here is the video in all its glory, worth watching for the advertising hoardings alone! https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=JjyQkt04Urc

Never Mind The Title…

Meadowbank Thistle fanzine AWOL was heavily into music and apparently didn’t sell guns to Iran but did used to give away free singles of local Edinburgh, punk bands. I haven’t been able to track any of these down online BUT “International Rescue” by Fuzzbox appears as they “appeared” on the front Cover of the fanzine. Killing Joke were also mentioned and so “Love Like Blood” means AWOL has the honour of 2 tracks on the playlist.

Happy Hour by the Housemartins appears because when researching the Shamrock Rovers fanzine, The Glenmalure Gazette from 1988 I came across this extraordinary item on the Come Here to Me website[1] revealing that the Housemartins sent a letter to the Gazette, expressing their support of fans opposition to property developers buying the club’s ground ( Aka Milltown) Sadly, this didn’t help and it is now a housing estate called Glenmalure Square.

Another Kingston upon Hull based lullaby comes with The Expression She Pulled the name of a Leeds general football and music fanzine of the 90s. It’s an odd turn of phrase which bothered me for a while until I remembered another Housemartins favourite “5 Get Over Excited” which jollies along before sidestepping into an attack on Margaret Thatcher as many fanzines quite rightly did at the time “Feigning concern, a conservative pastime, Makes you feel doubtful right from the start, The expression she pulls is exactly like last time, You’ve got to conclude she just hasn’t a heart” Thankfully the fanzine is still alive in twitter form @ESPfanzine

‘She’ll be Coming Round the Mountain’ or more specifically the chorus “Singing Aye aye Yippy yippy aye” has been used for a variety of inventive football chants over the decades. The original song was published in Old Plantation Hymns in 1899. It apparently refers to the second coming of Christ and the subsequent rapture, with the she referring to the chariot that the returning Christ will be driving. Happy days but I doubt many football fans thought of that when they were singing “It’s All Gone Quiet over There”.

Even more doubtful that Caledonian FC players did sing this version of the song but the fantastic Caley fanzine (On a) Life Support Machine (in itself from a cheerful song sung to opposition fans) carried this cartoon of the 1979 squad protesting against the proposed merger with Inverness Thistle in 1991

Half Man Half biscuit also appear on the playlist with their 1987 classic “All I Want for Christmas Is a Dukla Prague away kit” ( https://youtu.be/na12OyJEgJ8 )

The reason I’ve included it (as well as it being a brilliant song about Subbuteo) is that HMHB brilliantly represent the punk ethos so often associated with fanzines. They apparently turned down a spot on the Friday night cultural phenomena that was “The Tube” because they would have missed a game, this despite the producers of the show offering a helicopter to transport the band home[2]. In those days their beloved Tranmere Rovers played all their home games on Friday to avoid fixture clashes with their illustrious neighbours either side of Stanley Park and so HMHB remained in the (floodlight’s) shadows.

The Final Countdown

The links between football fanzines and music are well documented so when analysing the list for patterns it wasn’t a surprise how many fanzine names were music related. Despite the passage of time, we’ve been able to piece together quite a few stories behind the titles and discovered some tremendous backstories linking fanzines to music. We’ve only covered 60 of the 104 tracks in these blogs and I’m sure if you look at the playlist you find more. At some point we’ll cover some more, the story of why Brentford fans were the first to sing Hey Jude way back in 1968 for example.

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[1] https://comeheretome.com/2012/01/07/i-miss-fanzine-culture-and-the-housemartins/

[2] Give Us An ‘R’ interview. – Tranmere Rovers fanzine issue 52.