Why have you launched Scream City?
 | | John Cooper |
“I have been doing the website, Cerysmatic Factory, about Factory Records for some seven or eight years and thought that it was about time I actually produced something tangible that people could get their hands on. You can't go up to someone and give them a website, whereas you can with a 40 page fanzine. It's a tactile thing. “Also, Cerysmatic is more of an online archive and news source, whereas I wanted Scream City to be more objective and opinionated and to include articles on Manchester music which are not specifically related to Factory Records.” Where did the idea come from?
 | | Scream City |
“I thought that it would be cool to go all old school and put out a printed paper fanzine just as everyone is lapping up blogs, downloading music and everything else electronic. “There have always been things I haven't thought were quite right to put on Cerysmatic Factory or even on the internet at all! “Basically I thought of the title and developed a cover concept early last year. I also decided that I would need guest contributors to write much of the content, because I wouldn't be able to do it all myself. I showed a mock-up of it to Tony Wilson at the Nuits Sonores Festival in Lyon, France last year when we did a Factory Records conference together with Matt Carroll. He liked it and it went on from there.” Why's it called Scream City?
 | | My Cat's Eric |
“It's an anagram of Cerysmatic, as is 'My cat's Eric' which is the alternate title on the back cover. I liked the sound of Scream City and that's the one that stuck as the main title. Cerysmatic itself is derived from the Welsh pop cum folk singer Cerys Matthews, who I know has nothing to do with Factory or Manchester but I like her anyway!” What's the aim of the fanzine? | "Manchester has a great fanzine heritage with City Fun, Debris, Freaky Dancin', Manchester Rains, to name but a few. I hope to uphold that tradition..." | | John Cooper on his addition to the fanzine scene |
“Manchester has a great fanzine heritage with City Fun, Debris, Freaky Dancin', Manchester Rains, to name but a few. I hope to uphold that tradition and produce something that is both an entertaining read and attractive to look at. There has been a good response to the first issue and I am looking to put the next one out in late May/early June.” Who's involved? “It's basically me and a few of my friends. I did all the editing, layout, sorted out the printing and persuaded other people to write stuff.
 | | Ancient, Historic, Modern (pic: Moist) |
“Andrew James is a big Factory fan who lives in Edinburgh via Chicago and Hackney, Aloysius Munn - crazy name, crazy guy - runs an excellent website called Hey Asda! and also lives in Edinburgh. Chris Amies, who wrote the piece on Jeff Noon, is a sci-fi writer himself and David Nolan wrote the book 'I Swear I Was There' which is about the people who went to the famous Sex Pistols Lesser Free Trade Hall gig in 1976. “Matt Carroll, whom I've also been working with on the official Central Station Design website, did a couple of illustrations, and my mate Moist took the photo of the tower block, the railway viaduct and the Roman fort. With no small hint of irony he likes to call it ‘the three ages of Man(chester)’ but in the 'zine we went for ‘Ancient, Historic, Modern’.”
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