What's It Like To Be Scottish? where it all started... named because Caroline who did the fanzine with me asked that question to That Petrol Emotion - who are Irish...
Featured interviews and other stuff with The Wedding Present, McCarthy, The Waltones, The Groove Farm, Cud, and a feature on Subway Records, as well as a cartoon "101 things to do with your old Mission Records" or words to that effect drawn by Barry, who now works for CNN, and did the ace 'Dead Rat' comic that probably nobody outside of York Sixth Form College ever saw.
Production stopped on this one when Sixth Form refused to make any more for me. Might have sold about 400 copies?
It also featured a competition to win a half eaten packet of Grapper from the Wedding Present's cough sweets.
Shoot The Tulips was born the day my sister said those words in her sleep. I already had a Darling Buds interview done, which was to be for WILTBS2, except it never happened. So I started off on my own. Approached by some people in Leeds to invest some money into a flexi they were putting together, the first flexi I was involved with featured Pale Saints (Children Break), The Savlons (..And What's More) and The Amazing Adventures of Kerry Fiddles (Shiver Me Timbers).
The flexi also came with four different postcards, featuring each band, plus a Panic Recordings one. I got 500 of the flexis, the bands got the other 500. Total sold of this issue 500. Pale Saints released a second demo and ended up choosing between 4ad and One Little Indian who was gonna pay their wages for the next few years... Jason from The Savlons ended up in Liverpool band The Stairs for a short time, Graham from The Savlons now plays in a band called Geese. Kerry Fiddles was Jane Fox from the Marine Girls and the rest of The Savlons have been spotted in pubs around the country...
Bands featured - The Darling Buds, Bob, The Sainsburys, The Orchids, The Corn Dollies, Jesse Garon and the Desperadoes, Mega City 4, cartoons (Johnny Twaddle Lives in Bristol)
Issue 2 followed fairly closely to the first one, and included the flexi by The Williams (from Scunthorpe) and Esmerelda's Kite (from Leeds). There's actually two Esmerelda's Kite tracks on the flexi - flexi records made a mistake, it should only have been 'Roundabout' as 'In A Whirl' was to be for a Woosh (Newcastle based fanzine) flexi. Ah well. It didn't stop the late, great John Peel playing a track (The Williams 'I Know I'm Nothing Special To You' while plugging my fanzine, god bless him) - plus he sent a postcard to try and find out what was going on! Not long after this, Simon the singer, left Esmerelda's Kite, and became Gentle Despite, signing to Sarah Records, where he also had some help musically from Ian Masters from the Pale Saints. The Williams went on to do three dates supporting Primal Scream on the Ivy Ivy Ivy tour, with extra guitar from Robert, who then went on to play guitar for Creation band Adorable.
Interviews etc for this issue included The House Of Love (well Terry Bickers anyway), The Telescopes, Choo Choo Train, Last Party, Rodney Allen, Razorcuts plus more....
This one was the best seller of all my fanzines, sold approx 800 copies.
Shoot The Tulips only made it to three issues, this one being the last. And it kind of happened at the right time, and was, it could be said a bit "Madchester". Interviews with Happy Mondays, The Bodines, Inspiral Carpets (includes a mention of a certain Mr Gallagher), plus My Bloody Valentine, Nine Steps to Ugly, Close Lobsters, Blue Aeroplanes, Pat Fish and East Village.
The flexi was one I bought from Sheffield band, Blammo! who went on to a bit of success, and then later renamed themselves Speedy and had a bit more success. The flexi was the footy one they did, against ID cards. Pretty cool, played by Peelie, we like!
Sold approx 500 copies. Oh and because I like to be stupid, I officially released this on the 1st January 2000 just as the New Year turned. Nobody cared.
The cover was done by a lady called Ruth, who offered. I knew all my previous covers were rubbish, so let her do it, and she came up with this, which I was very happy with!
