By 1978/9, Coventry was rich in alternative magazines. Alongside Alternative Sounds (below) there was also FOLKS,
initiated by folk musician Pete Willow, (link to an interview with Covfolk Online)
with contributions from Arol (who I first met at Coventry Arts Umbrella in 1969 playing Jews Harp! Arol was a leading light in the creation of Broadgate Gnome in 1970 and later in creating Cov News in 1979. He also contributed to Folks. Caption shows Arol in action
FOLKS contained local news / reviews / feature articles / Letters - real and spoof! /History of Coventry folk / tablature of local singer songwriters such as Rod Felton. It even had a cross word! It carried ads for local folk clubs and folkies / music shops.It sold for 15p in some shops, folk clubs and the Wedge Bookshop.
Pete Willow is now a member of Oddsods Folk Group - here is their My Space ODDSODS
Rob Armstrong was featured in it, an ad for his Guitar Making Workshop (he made a guitar for Bert Jansch and was featured on the cover of one issue (below). Rod Felton's New Modern Idiot Grunt Band was also fetured as ws one of Rod's songs And I Love Her (his own song - not the Beatles song!). Singer Songwriter Dave Coburn wrote an
[this is good] Amazed to come across this! I still have hard copies of every edition of Folks - somewhere in the attic! I will see if I can dig them out. Arol and I were jointly responsible for the serialised story, The Adventures of Joe Folkie, featuring cartoons by Dennis Clarke - a ruthless expose of the sordid world behind the scenes of the glamourous, razle-dazzle world of folk music. Incidentally, one of the covers depicted in this blog was a drawing by the late Hazel Lester who introduced me to the Coventry folk scene when I moved back to the city from London in the early 70s - I wonder of any reader of this blog remembers her!
Posted by: Pete Willow | 01/20/2007 at 01:11 AM
Oh I remember Hazel. She was pally with one of the Gnome Crew, Tony (?),There were negotiations to expand our folk content and at her behest Tony took me out to a folk gig out in the country somewhere, could it have been Braunstone or Brinklow?
I can date this very well to the time we were thinking of relaunching as a monthly after some of the inner core burnt out (British Gnome store period)
I can visualise her now telling me something and raising my enthusiasm.
I know I filed the review but it never got into print.
Do dig out those issues, Pete and let me see something of them for the first time. If you can get them online somehow I can surprise Arol and this year's Christmas dinner and catch up.
Posted by: BroadgateGnome | 01/20/2007 at 06:06 PM
There's an evening of musical nostalgia on Sunday 22nd April when people who were active in the Cov folk scene in the 1970s play in a free concert at the Maudsley Hotel, Allesley Old Road, Coventry. The idea is for artisst to play the songs they used to perform then (although in some cases that probably hasn't changed that much!)
It's organised by Pete Grassby following a successful event last year. Guests include Rob Armstrong, Sean Cannon, Ninepenny Marl, Malc Gurnham, Ron Shuttleworth and yours truly - I'll be including one song with me old mucker Dennis Clarke.
It starts at 7.30pm. There's a charity raffle for cancer research.
Posted by: Pete Willow | 04/15/2007 at 03:10 PM
[this is good]
Unfortunately I'm too far from Cov to come and watch this but a review, some piccys and some audio for the site would be welcome if the spirit is willing Pete! Will be uploading some more soon (grabbing globuals of time at the moment!).
Trev
Posted by: HOBO - Coventry Music Magazine | 04/15/2007 at 03:46 PM