One of the sources that I’m using as part of the ongoing research for the book is the original wave of anarcho-punk fanzines – which offer a pretty unique insight into the activities and culture of the movement.
Aside from the bursting boxes of fanzines in my own personal archive, one obvious place to pick up copies of anarcho-fanzines ought to be online auction sites – foremost amongst them eBay. But the predictable reality is that obscure anarcho-punk fanzine titles (which sold back in the day for 10p-25p) are now highly sought by collectors and change hands at the absurd prices which reflect depressing bidding wars, last-minute price-hike ‘sniping’, and the ethos of the stamp collector. All of which feels so antithetical, it scarcely requires comment.
The obvious alternative to individual, personal acquisition is the growth of open-access electronic collections, which serve up digitised versions of the original fanzines, or free-to-access physical print archives. As well as the work of individual bloggers and web auteurs, there are some positive developments in this respect which are hopefully the start of a more general trend. I’ll aim to post the URLs of some of the services which I’ve found of anarcho-fanzine archives (of whatever scale). I’d be more than happy to receive details of other useful sources…
The Hippies Now Wear Black 
Hi – one of the best on-line old zine resources is to be found at
http://www.punksishippies.blogspot.com
Not all anarcho, but y’know all punk!
Punks is hippies archive is great
http://punksishippies.blogspot.com/
x.
Hi irishdave and devotionalhooligan – thanks both for the http://punkishippies.blogspot.com link.
Another potentially interesting ‘print’ format development is the working being undertaken at the National Library of Scotland – a project to source and catalogue “the countless thousands of fanzines published in the UK over the past 70 years.” So the reach is broad, and the ambition is pretty daunting – but a publicly accessible, catalogued and preserved collection of UK-wide works would be quite something…
It’ll probably be a while before there are any catalogue records to search (and I don’t know the project timescales), but the story on the BBC News site certainly caught my interest.
Anyone know any more about this one?
Not sure if you are aware that the British Library is collecting “Punk fanzines” – not sure how much of it is anarcho though.
http://www.bl.uk/learning/histcitizen/21cc/counterculture/doityourself/punkfanzines/punkfanzines.html
Good luck with the book
Rowan
(another old anarcho punk)
Hi Rowan – good to hear from you. Yes, I was aware of the British Library’s collection, which does look interesting, but – as you say – which does not have a specific anarcho-focus. I do need to re-check how far their efforts at cataloguing the collection has progressed though. Work on the book is progressing, although not at the speed I’d like. I’m hopefully of making some serious progress over the coming months – including updating the blog more regularly!
I used to do neu carnage fanzine in 1978 up to 81 or 82.messing on internet some time ago saw copies for sale,couldnt fkin believe it as had none myself.neu carnage got a good mention from gary bushell and was pretty po for a while thanks to me dad god bless hims ability to use his factory photocopier.some japanse and brazilian collectors have copies of nc and i kept images of the cover
on computer.When yr book comes out i will buy copy sounds overdue good idea.
Hi
I’ve got a few flyers/ fanzines uploaded here which you’re welcome to steal.
http://www.facebook.com/album.php?aid=15436&id=100001501388167&l=415b11cf9b
I’m assuming you’re aware of the Kill Your Pet Puppy blog?
Hi Nick – thanks for that; I’ll certainly take a look. Yep, I’m a regular at the Kill Your Pet Puppy site; but thanks also for the heads-up.
barbara fitzgerald from silchester park in glenageary now works in rte.she used to do a good punk fanzine called imprint and frequented the magnet gigs in 1977-1980.if you want to contact her she might be able to help you-if yr still out there.
Hi there,
you may be interested in having a squint at my blog, Essential Ephemrea – there’s a fair sprinkling of anarcho fanzines uploaded so far and I intend to post lots more.
All the best
Si
Thanks Si – I was aware of Essential Ephemera, and had visited the site several times, but I’ve not blogged about it as yet: an oversight on my part which I’ll now correct. Please keep on posting!