Why would you recommend 'The Girl Chewing Gum' to an aspiring graphic designer?
I recommended it cause I...someone showed me it when I was in first year graphics and I've watched it loads of times since, cause it was like the perfect project in terms of...it probably didn't cost much to make, it's very funny, it's very quick, you get the idea straight away, it's very stylish, looks great...and it's just all those things at once, without having to be too overcomplicated I suppose. And I think in terms of making design, or anything really, if you can have all those things at once: humour, style, quick, small budget, doing something on your own... then maybe it'll be a good project. So that's kind of why I chose it.
How did you find graduating uni and going in to a creative field of work?
Um...very...scary. Basically...I was finishing up my graphic design degree and I was really rubbish at it, and even my tutors were like, a bit worried about what I was gonna do because everyone else in the class was getting all these jobs with these ad agencies called like... 'MMBCH' and 'DDBCD' or whatever, and I was like yeah yeah yeah, no I'll probably just do that...but I didn't want to.
So I was a bit, I was really, really worried and then, um, one of my teachers offered me this placement at It's Nice That, so I went and joined in there. And for me, it was ideal because all my friends around me were very good at designing and...I couldn't do that, but I was really enthusiastic about what everyone else was doing, so it was like a good way in.
Basically, it made me realize, which nobody told me when I was at uni, that you can be sort of...creative, and you can enjoy design and enjoy typography, but you don't have to be the one who makes it, and you can still work in the world of it, so I'm lucky in that I just ended up using enthusiasm as my job. But I just wasn't aware that that was even an option when I was studying, so when I first went into it, my first job at It's Nice That, they were just like 'Oh, bring in stuff that you think is cool, like books or zines or comics or music videos or ad campaigns, or like anything, and then just explain in sort of two hundred words why you think it's good'. and I was like 'Well great, that's like, the ideal job for me'
Um, so I found it quite easy straight up cause I had all this knowledge but when you're at uni and you're being told to make the work I wasn't good because...I couldn't really make things look nice but I had load of...it all up here instead, so it was nice to use writing to do that, and writing I've always found very easy, so I was kind of, I was getting away with it, by going into a job with writing. But it was scary to just walk into that industry...with no skills, really - well you think you've got none but actually you do have some.
Did you find your creative process had to change when you went into the industry?
Well, yeah, in terms of that I...from the last few weeks of uni, when I was making a portfolio - I havent used InDesign since. Thank God, because I hate it! And I felt that I quite literally left behind...everything that I thought I had to know like coding, or InDesign or Photoshop, or you know, how to get stuff printed and that kind of thing you learn at uni, I just sort of left it all behind, so I suppose my process went from feeling really overwhelmed by having to know everything and use all these programmes, and do all these things and know all these different people to just...quite literally, I'll just write stuff now. And leave everything else behind..which is...quite lazy, so...maybe that was just me being happy that I didn't have to do as much work as before.
But it was definitely good to change process by just...only having one thing to be good at. It's like when you're in school and you're doing like, maths then French then art then drama then biology then physics then, like, more maths, and your whole day is just fucked cause you're like 'urrgh'...I found uni to be a bit like that, so it was nice to just have it a bit cleaner.
You stated in a podcast for Stacks that you felt lonely doing freelance work; what is it about working with others that you enjoy so much?
I do get lonely, in fact I'm lonely now. Not any more but I was lonely today, um, I just, literally am lonely every day in freelance because you've just got no one to hang out with. I just, genuinely don't think anyone should have to go through this, and it's terrible, cause you just don't get any of the humour that you get from hanging out with people, you don't get any of the chat - no one saying 'oh I see you like this music, how about you try this music'...no one sort of, like there's nothing coming in in terms inspiration or humour or someone's advice or someone's opinion, everything's just in your own head.
And that's why so many freelancers sort of lose their marbles because I think you just constantly...there's no one to tell you to shut up, or to tell you to...keep going or anything, and I think you just need people around you to do that otherwise you do start overthinking, cause, or like I do, I sort of over-talk to the postman or something cause he's the only person I can talk to [laughs] or when someone phones you up at 3pm and you're like ...'hello'... because you haven't spoken to anyone all day. And also, it makes you...I go out and get drunk in the evenings more because I'm like 'people!' and that's just... counterintuitive to everything.
But in terms of creative environment, which is probably what you meant... I know it's not great to be in a team where it's bad, cause that's probably one of the worst environments you can be in if you're working in a group and you think the group's shit, or you're working in a company where, you know, the person who sits next to you is a complete dick, it's not an ideal situation.
But, when you do get like a good amount of people together, and that kind of magic thing happens where everyone's just on it and works together and really something else, that is just, so nice. I've only had that a few times in my whole working life - one when I was at It's Nice That when five of us round a table became, like, incredibly good at working together, and that only lasted for like a year. So it's not often you get it but, I would like to have that again.
What influence has music had on your work and did working for Rough Trade change this?
Yes...because I thought I knew everything about music, and then I joined Rough Trade and realised that I didn't know anything about music at all. I suppose it was a bit of a reminder of how much of a world out there there was, that I hadn't yet realised.
But, I suppose in terms of pop music having an effect on work, I just, I've been trying to be cool since I was born, and pop music is very cool, so I've always sort of thought like pop music is the coolest thing so it would be nice to work in the region of pop music, if that makes sense. Cause pop music is like happiness, and fun, and fun, and silliness, and... like, juicy-ness, it's all the kind of things that make life good, so I think I've always wanted to work in that realm.
That's very attractive - and that's why I like magazines, because it's kind of silly, funny irreverence, that doesn't really mean anything. Interviewing pop stars is probably one of the most stupid things you could ever do but people have spent years doing it - it's quite literally pointless, because it doesn't have an effect on anything, does it, it's not like...that's why some people call me a journalist, it's like, I'm not, I just talk to pop starts which is not journalism, it's just asking people, like, 'so, have you got a pet?' I mean it doesn't really, it's kind of silly irreverence.
And nowadays, especially with the world coming to a swift end, I feel like there's definitely a need for more of that. So I think I'm gonna try and make a new magazine which is like, Irreverent Music Magazine, where everything's just silly, it's not gonna be...cool, or serious, or try and 'rate music out of ten', it's just gonna be like, Interviewing Patty Smith about that time she trod in some dog poo. Or something. You know what I mean. There's something really beautiful about things which are completely useless and I think that's been what pop music has taught me, is like...it's okay to like that stuff. It's okay to like silly things.
How did you decide to focus on writing & direction rather than visual design?
Well, I sort of covered that earlier - I genuinely couldn't do the visual stuff. I thought I was meant to be an illustrator so my whole like I was drawing, and then, I got to art foundation and my teacher was like 'Oh, you should do graphic design instead', and I was like 'No, no, I want to be an illustrator'... Cause I was really good at drawing, the only thing I was good at, literally, and then, I chose graphic design instead but that was a big mistake because I just didn't have any interest in it really. So if the question is why I chose writing, it's just because...illustration wasn't an option any more, graphic design - can't do that, and writing just came very easily, it's the only thing I can kind of do without thinking really.
Did you find it was harder to promote a music magazine that didn't feature the artist on the cover? - How did it affect Rough Trade's acceptance?
I quite liked it because it means that if you give it to someone who's not into music, then it's more open to everyone. If there's a music magazine with someone famous on the front and you don't know who it is, it can feel a bit like, um, you're not cool enough to know who this is and it can feel a bit like 'music geek'. So the idea of putting things that weren't musicians on the front was just to open it up to anyone, and for it to not necessarily be thought of as a music magazine. In the same way, if you make a food magazine, you don't have to put bread on the front - you can put anything on the front and it can be okay.
But in terms of it affecting sales and stuff, I don't think [laughs] my boss thought it was an ideal decision, but I don't know how it affected it - to be honest, we weren't trying to sell it in WHSmith, we just had to sell it in the shop, so just having the Rough Trade logo on the front was enough to sell it - I mean thank God the company has such a well known logo, otherwise people might not have picked it up. I remember, we felt that logo was enough to kind of show people what it was going to be inside.
And also, when Rough Trade started it was more about community, and people, and feminism, bizarrely...than it was about selling records, or CDs, it was about a lot more than just that. And they sell books, and there's so much more going on than just the music so it would be silly just to put a pop star on the cover. And it was the only way we could make it stand out from the other music magazines because no other music magazine did that.
Did you find you had to change any part of your creative process when switching from designing a music magazine to a 'smart magazine for women'?
No...I didn't design either magazine... and Riposte Magazine started in 2012 which is before Rough Trade magazine, so I...well with Riposte magazine I might have been overseeing a bit since the beginning, or like helping Danielle, the creator of it, to make it, but I haven't really been involved in how it looks. Sometimes picking photographers and stuff.
But in terms of that, in Rough Trade magazine I was commissioning the photographers, but that was because I only had a certain amount of time to get the entire issue done, you know, three weeks to get a 64-page magazine ready, it was more a case of 'which photographer lives in this place and can they go and photograph someone very quickly for not much money' rather than choosing them for their aesthetic - although that was important too.
I suppose with Riposte it wouldn't be, we wouldn't feature the kind of photos we would in Rough Trade magazine. Cause Rough Trade we would sometimes just print the contact sheets, or we would just cut up stuff and make collages and make it a bit zine-ier, but riposte magazine is much slicker than that. I think I prefer the non-slick attitude.
Do you think your writing tone is different between the two?
Yeah, definitely...In fact maybe not. In Riposte I write about, like, farts and...like, girl stuff. Not that only girls fart. But it's writing to women. With Rough Trade, I was writing to like, the music industry, and that was quite scary, cause they can be like 'I think you'll find that album was released in 1964, not 65' - I mean, they're a bit more, um, bit more a burning audience who will get cross if it's not up to scratch.
What artist has inspired your work the most?
Well, this is a really hard one, I've got some notes on this actually cause I found it really difficult to think about...probably magazines rather than people, I mean rather than artists, because I don't make art - or writers.
The magazines like Viz, and Private Eye, cause when I was younger I wasn't allowed to read them so it became quite like, mysterious and fun, and then magazines like The Face, the New Yorker, the writing in that I really love, because hat it hands down the best writing in the world and if you can try, at least, to replicate that, then it makes you...reading good writing basically makes you want to try harder.
And then also, in terms of, when I'm writing and I want it to be funny, I sometimes watch Muppets videos, or I watch videos of Rick Mayall from 'The Young Ones', or stuff like that just because it puts me in a funny mood and then I try and write in a better mood - because you can't be funny if you're in a bad mood. I think that yeah, just funny, irreverent people in magazines and writers - maybe Nora Ephron, who writes on great books, and films like 'When Harry Met Sally', just like conversational, flowing stuff, nothing too serious. I can't think of anyone else. I can't believe I just said Rick Male as my main artist. [laughs]
If you were in our position, what question would you most like to ask a creative?
I remember being in your position, and I remember a lot of people coming in to do talks - like, we didn't do this cause it wasn't invented then [laughs] - like we'd get an old man coming in who was like fifty, and people would be like 'Oh, how did you get a job in creative industries?' and he'd be like 'Well,' - you know, and he would say something that now isn't relevant.
And like I just said to you about, you know - nearly eight years ago getting that job at It's Nice That - that's kind of not relevant because things will be changing now, so I think if I was going to ask questions now, I'd probably ask about the future, 'How can we do stuff?' rather than 'How did you do stuff?', because things change all the time...for example It's Nice That, when I joined, was like four people around a table and now it has like, fifty employees, so that wouldn't happen now - so my advice to you isn't actually relevant to you at all.
So I think, probably just asking people about the future rather than the past, is what I'd say. I think if I was in your position the thing on my mind would be 'what do I do next?' so I think it would be about that. Whether anyone's actually got any answers I've got no idea.
If you were able to talk to your past self, what would you tell them?
[laughs] I would probably, oh God, I don't know...telling myself in uni...Oh, I think it would be 'Don't worry about what everyone else is doing', cause, as I kind of mentioned at the beginning, I was really worried that all my friends were becoming graphic designers and I was being shit at it and I didn't think there were any other options, and I was really worried that I should probably be going to intern at BBH-blah blah blah. When actually I didn't need to worry about that at all.
And, if only I'd known that...I remember looking round my class when I was at uni, and wondering what everyone was going to do, and there's always a few people where you're like, 'They're the best, they'll be fine' and there's the middle lot who are like, 'okay, probably get an internship somewhere', and then there's the people who you're like...'You're fucked, mate' [laughs] But now, looking back on that, everyone in my year has done very well, no matter what they're doing, even the duds are doing very well.
I suppose, why be worrying about what everyone else is doing, don't do that. And maybe just, try not to get drunk at events with free booze, work events, maybe...don't bitch about your boss on the overground...and maybe just having faith in yourself and being good, rather than worrying all the time about not being good enough. But I think everyone has that. And if you don't have that then you're seriously arrogant, so, doesn't really matter.
What stage is the magazine at at the moment?
We've got me, my friend Lucy, we'll be like making it. Bruce Usher is designing it, we think we've got a name - I won't be sharing it today - and we've got writers lined up, we've got columns lines up and we've got everyone in the music industry giving us pop stars to use. But we're being held back by my inability to actually just get on and do anything. So until I can get rid of this, sort of, overwhelming anxiety [laughs] of doing something big...hopefully it'll happen soon.
Also we don't know how we're going to get the money yet. I know a few people who have money...but I think I might go down the route of asking lots of people for a little bit - rather than trying to get a big amount at once. Cause it's a lot of money - like, Riposte magazine, I don't know whether I can tell you this cause it might be secret, but that costs about 10 grand per issue to make, and that's just a magazine. You could do so much with that money...I don't think ours will cost as much because it won't be as slick, but you know if we're putting it out every two or three months we'll be looking at spending 20k a year on this thing. I don't have that kind of cash lying around. But some people do, so we're gonna try and get some money.
There's a girl in Leeds actually, she makes a zine called 'Delinquent Zine'...her name is Jean, and she makes Delinquent Zine, and it's like a newspaper, music zine, and she gets them printed round Leeds and gives them out for free...And she just went to some local key cutters, butchers, local businesses, like, hedge trimming guys, tree surgeons, whatever, and has got a little bit off each of them, and then put a little advert in the back of each magazine and it's funding the whole thing. So that kind of model could work. And it's a great magazine.
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