THIS IS WHERE IT ALL BEGAN...
May 1993, and a new Duranzine is launched. It is 'rough and ready' (i.e. cheaply produced, low production value but full of enthusiasm) and hoping to find an audience. Without knowing it, it hits a gap in the Duran-fan market for something that is not about meeting the band, pretty pictures or unquestioning adoration. It is fun, interesting, wordy and has jokes in it that make people overlook the various spelling mistakes and smell of glue and scissors (do scissors smell?).
It quickly built a faithful audience and raced along through 11 issues in a little over a year. It was much missed when it came to its abrupt halt in 1994, but as we now know, that was not the end of the story for the Cherry Lipstick community...
Volume 1 Issue 1 May 1993
(or, as it was then known, 'Issue 1')
"Quite unlike any other Duran fanzine I've ever read! Keep it up!" So said Jackie Dent in a letter printed in Issue 2.
Volume 1 Issue 2 July 1993
The long lost issue. The least read issue. Actually, only 50 of these were ever printed.
Volume 1 Issue 3 September 1993
The issue that saved Cherry Lipstick. It wasn't just the fortuitous Q 'Small Ads' notice in the August 1993 issue. It was that CL was picked up in Europe and America introducing Manon Wortel and John Cutcher to CL. Both remained key contributors all the way through to 2001.
The shockingly bad front cover is of a church in Nottingham standing in for the cancelled UK tour. You don't get exclusives like that any more (or indeed any where else in 1993).
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Volume 1 Issue 4 October 1993
If memory serves this one came out about 3 weeks after issue 3. Contributions were so great that they just needed to go get printed and distributed. This pace generated greater interest, and the amount of names now featuring also created more submissions. This was exciting times, with the postman bringing lots of mail with cash and cheques every day to CLHQ which at the time was a little flat on the outskirts of Nottingham.
Two readers' letters about CL so far:
"The article about Wham! was tedious... try and make articles look more interesting... I don't want CL to disappear down a hole after a few issues."
"The way you spend half the magazine slagging off Duran is quite daring."
"CL is the most beautiful thing I have ever read!"
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Volume 1 Issue 5 December 1993
This was the issue that was originally touted around the arenas of the UK to sell outside the concert venues. Not a clever front cover to have to unsuspecting and doubting customers. "Is it about vegetables?" asked one person. God bless The Hedonists for this cover, who remain much missed from CL.
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Volume 1 Issue 6 January 1994
In response to the above comments, this issue was hastily created for a friendlier front cover to sell at Wembley in Jan 1994. Things were going much better until security guards grabbed and binned the lot because we did not have a permit to sell.
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Volume 1 Issue 7 February 1994
Oooh, a tour to report on! The scribbled front covers really were shabby. But it was all part of the charm (thankfully).
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Volume 1 Issue 8 March 1994
CL increased in size from the previous 28 pages to 32 pages for this special Readers' Poll issue. Younger readers - that is Mr Blobby on the cover. You may have to Google that.
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Volume 1 Issue 9 May 1994
Wow. Marisa McCall created the CL logo (at desperation from the scribbles) which remained until the end in 2001.
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Volume 1 Issue 10 June 1994
There is a surprising amount of George Michael bashing in the first two issues, partly to create a bit of an 'enemy' for CL to rail against (this has swung against Tony Hadley more recently - hey it's just for fun, even if he did get decapitated in a recent article). This issue upped the game to 36 pages, but also announced the end of the fanzine. CL was going great guns, but I got a teaching job in the-then exotic and unknown country of Poland (even now there are few Westerners who venture to Radom).
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Volume 1 Issue 11 September 1994
What with me packing my bags, this was an issue to cram full with everything left over. After all, Cherry Lipstick was never going to be seen again, was it? And so this issue was EIGHTY TWO AND A HALF PAGES LONG. Yes, that's right. It was meagre 80 pages, but then The Hedonists sent in a crossword after publication (tsk) and this got photocopied and sent out with the issue.
There are some lovely comments in this issue which I did not appreciate fully at the time.
Volume 1 'Best Ofs'
CL Vol 2 started in Jan 1997, and with it many new readers who had not been part of Cherry Lipstick's original run.
There were 40 pages in each issue of the best bits of Vol 1. Published in:
November 1997 August 1998 November 1998.
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