Welcome to Fan Club. We’re putting on monthly events at Rough Trade, (Nottingham), to promote and celebrate female artists, musicians, writers, illustrators, whatever. Women doing awesome things is what we love, and we want to share that with everyone. We want to make the night super inclusive, so if you feel you want to get involved, just shout! Fan Club parties will happen on the first Saturday of every month, at Rough Trade, Broad Street, Nottingham. You can email us at: ‘fanclubnotts@gmail.com’
Huge thanks to: Melissa Chaib, Hellen Jo, Chloe Douglass, Daria Hlazatova, & Maryam Hassam. We will have a lot of their work for sale at our events, so make sure to come along with plenty of cash! I’d also like to thank Reel Equality Film Club, Kelly Bennaton, Rough Trade for hosting us, and the Hollaback! girls for bringing such an important cause to shout about to Nottingham. I’d also like to thank my galentines (& palentines) from ‘TFB’, who have done everything to support me in starting this project, and who also happen to perform the best choreographed dance to Kate Bush you’ll ever see. Fan Club thanks Rookie, Girls Get Busy Zine, Nasty Girl, Atta Girl, Girl Glue, TYCI and Sad Girls Club, basically for being awesome. See you next month! Kaylea xo
@FANCLUBNOTTS FACEBOOK>COM/FANCLUBNOTTS
Hellen Jo Hellen is an illustrator and cartoonist, currently living in Los Angeles. Hellen has worked on storyboards for the Regular Show, and more recently, Steven Universe. She draws the coolest BADDEST of heroines; you wouldn’t want to mess with them. She hails influence from Love & Rockets, Tekkon Kinkreet, ghost stories, chewing gum, and leather jackets.
“Fan Club sounds really cool; I wish I had access to such an event / space when I was younger. “ When I first started drawing comics, I went to lots of drinkn-draws and comic jams where I was the only woman, and usually the youngest, so it was a kind-of a rough introduction to the scene. - Hellen Jo on Fan Club.
is the artist behind our front cover, posters and flyers. With girl culture at the root of Melissa’s illustrations, she draws anything from Bowie babes to bubblegum-punks. Melissa’s characters play video games, read zines, play in bands, listen to pop-punk, hang out in girl gangs... they’re pretty awesome.
Prints, notebooks, stickers, pins, temporary tattoos, portraits & custom business cards. You can purchase Melissa’s products at: www.nobadayshop.com
Alternatively we have a selection of Melissa’s products available to buy at the Fan Club events (first Saturday of every month).
“Some days you just don’t have the energy to fight.” Maryam Hassan is an all-round
badass, taking photos by day, and fighting the inherent
sexism in the punk and alternative community by night.
So I was at a show at the Old Blue Last in London, which is a pretty small venue. I was taking photos and was there with my friends and had gone to the bar to get a drink. The deal with my taking photos at shows is that I am usually running to a show after work, luckily I don’t work at a job that requires uniform so today I was in a denim skirt, a tank top, tights, boots and a long rainbow striped cardigan. A man at the bar strikes up a conversation with me. HIM: Who is supporting tonight? ME: I don’t know, I’ve only come to see the main act. HIM: When does it start? ME: I think at 8, there’s a poster around here somewhere if you need to find it. HIM: You’re useless, I thought groupies were meant to know the details about the show as well as sleeping with the bands.. ME: EXCUSE ME? HIM: You know because you’re wearing such a low cut top, I assumed you were sleeping with a band. I should have shouted at him, but I just walked off with my camera. Some days you just don’t have the energy to fight. The issue was it didn’t matter how low cut my top was, how short my skirt was, or to be honest with you it didn’t even matter if I was or wasn’t sleeping with a member of any band
playing; none of that was his business and none of that gave him the right to judge me. Which leads us to the problem, to paraphrase Jane Austen, it’s a falsehood universally acknowledged that a single woman not in a band working in the punk scene is in want of getting laid with a member of a band playing. You can be stood there with a massive dSLR camera in your hands, sat at the door taking money, stamping hands, promoting and putting on the goddamn show. or doing sound, but someone will always assume the reason you are doing this job is to get some band cock.
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The issue here really isn’t that I’m not a groupie, because no-one should shame me for anything I do with any guy be he in a band or not, it’s the fact the term groupie exists at all. Wikipedia defines groupie as “a devoted female fan of a band or musical performer. A groupie will attempt to have a connection with the band and may seek sexual or intimate contact. Obsessive groupies will almost certainly involve themselves sexually with any members of the band including the roadies” and it’s ridiculous to say
that I can’t love a band’s music, meet one of them at the bar, have some drinks, be attracted to that person, and hook up with them without being tarnished as this horrible stereotype for the rest of my life - no-one should be! We don’t call men out on this so why are we still calling out women? Whoever you are, it is: a) not anyone’s business and b) not a bad thing. The point is IT DOESN’T MATTER. There was another instance where I was stood at the front waiting for a band to come on, ‘Apologies I Have None’, if we’re being specific, and I started talking to a guy who had followed them around the country for the last four shows, was wearing an Apologies t-shirt and had an Apologies
tattoo. One of the band walked past and he said, “He’s the singer, he’s such a nice guy”, and I said, “Yeah, I know. They’re all friends of mine actually”, whilst smiling, because I am a nice human being. He replied “If you know them, you’re a groupie right?”, and walked away disgusted. He thought that I was the one at fault. YEAH. No-one would ever say that a dude is just at a show on a detour to SlamTown, so why is it any different for me? The reason why no-one would ever say that to a dude is because there is no judgement on who he decides to hook up with. When was the last time we called out a guy for sleeping with anyone in a band? The simple fact is that you can enjoy the show, hook up with a person and never put a downer on anyone else’s night. because that’s the beauty of not being all up in other people’s business, it makes you free for other things like drinking or trying to talk to people you don’t know. The Front Bottoms - by Maryam Hassan But the other thing we all need to stop doing is judging women on what they wear or on outdated concepts of how they act. Women can work in punk because they are passionate about their local scenes, love punk music and want to give back to something that has given them a lot. If I’m friendly at a show it’s because I’ve gotten used to talking to people around me when I’m stranded on my own about to take photos at the front, because I put on shows and you make friends with bands and people they are touring with when you put on shows, because I work at a website where we run interviews and work at festivals and I meet all kinds of people.
I try and be social and friendly because that’s who I am, it does not mean I have slept with anyone to get into the show for free, to get some merch or because I have a band dude fetish; next time, keep your opinions to yourself. This all boils down to why I’m wary of dating in the punk scene. I do it, because let’s face it, at the end of the day I talk about punk a lot and it makes my life easier if the person I date likes punk as much as I do, but you keep everything on the down low because, no matter what happens, you’ll get judged. This is a shame, and although I’d keep my business to myself anyway I should never be wary at shows because dudes have a tendency to judge me on what I wear. It is hot at shows, I am a lady with a good pair of boobs, if I choose to wear a tank top, a short skirt, stand at the front and know the band, that does not in any way mean I am trying to lure one into the bathroom or the back of a van OR that I have done that at any point in the past. Let’s all move past the ridiculous notion of groupies and understand that the thing that ruins our punk scene is people who slut shame, people who judge and people who get involved in things that are nothing to do with them. You aren’t more punk than anyone else and if you’d like to say that you are, please jog on and leave the rest of us alone to enjoy the show.
@Maryamphotos
- Deputy Editor at Punktastic. The Menzingers - by Maryam Hassan
Daria Hlazatova
dariasgallery.blogspot.co.uk ameliasmagazine.bigcartel.com
Daria is an illustrator with a passion for drawing intricately with only pencil and pen, as well as handmade collages, finding inspiration in fairy tales, theatre, music and characters. This incredible artwork, ‘The Empress’, was created exclusively for Amelia’s Magazine. It features real gold leaf, and only 10 were ever printed. You can buy a copy via the link to Amelia’s Magazine above.
THE EMPRESS
Chloe Douglass When Chloe isn’t illustrating children’s stories, she can be found gardening, befriending neighbourhood cats, and daydreaming about ball gowns.
chloeillustrates.co.uk
Make^ Your^ Own^ Fortune^ Teller^.
Add your own fortunes to the blank triangles. Then cut across the bottom line, and fold into a fortune teller!