‘We Can’t Stand The Stench Any Longer’ – Long-Running Man Utd Fanzine Red Issue Folds After Finally Surrendering To The ‘Bullshit’ Of Modern Football

Chris Wright

12th, January 2015

18 Comments

By Chris Wright

red-issue-one

Red Issue, issue one

Today is a sad day – or, more specifically, yesterday was a sad day – with the news that one of football’s longest-running fanzines ceased operations after 26 years at the coal face.

Alas, Sunday’s issue of long-running Manchester United fanzine “Red Issue” (issue 259) was and is to be the last, with  magazine co-founder ‘Zar’ citing the tiresome “bullshit” of modern football as the main reason behind his decision to call it a day.

In his final editorial at the end of issue 259, Zar wrote:

“The game we’ve been clinging onto is gone. Football now is happy-clappy families, half-and-half scarves, tourists and selfie sticks; there’s no point trying to fight that.

 “We’ve been through all these points and arguments over and over again during the last 20-odd years raging against the killing of a culture that’s long been deceased.

“A United employee told us on Warwick Road recently, ‘Everyone in the club offices reads Red Issue. It’s like the antidote to working there’.

“But where’s our antidote? The Bullshit Industry’s become overbearing, and we can’t stand the stench any longer.”

Columnist ‘Mr Spleen’ also added: “You can only kick against the pricks for so many years before the toe caps on your boots wear out.”

How true.

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Red Issue, issue 259

Indeed, in response to fans’ queries on Twitter, Red Issue were also keen stress that their folding was not due to financial pressure and that their current circulation meant the magazine was still a “viable entity” from a sales perspective.

Alas, it seems that they just couldn’t cope with the endless, relentless onslaught of the corporate sanitisation of the game they once loved.

Now, Pies don’t claim to be fans of Red Issue or their frequently dicey politics (here, here and here for examples) but it’s the bigger picture that concerns us.

With fanzines going under at a rate of knots these days, it’s telling that one as relatively flush as Red Issue is calling time on the medium as the internet forums take over.

Quaint and nostalgic yes, but when done well a fanzine can be a work of folk art, a social document; an intrinsic part of football (especially British football) culture.

Who knows, maybe the fact that we’re now losing them hand-over-fist is equally telling?

(Via MEN)

Suggested further reading…

10 Things Pies Just Can’t Bloody Stand About Modern Football

Posted in Featured, Man Utd, Media, Newsnow, Opinion

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18 Comments

  1. Ron says:

    This is essentially how I feel with sports at large and, to be honest, life at the moment. I’m an American. I’m a historian. I try to take the long view but…for fucks sake, we’re mired in a morass of self-indulgent, corporate owned bullshit.

    I’ve given up on most sports, especially the U.S. ones. The NFL is just a corporate hoax to sell people shit. The NBA is a joke. I watch some ice hockey, some futbol, lots of cycling (yes, plenty of flaws but the racing is still fun AND without commercials!)

    I’m 35. Seeing a European/British soccer match when I was a kid was glorious. A real treat. Now I can turn on NBC when visiting the inlaws (I don’t have a t.v.) and watch six games on Boxing Day. It was amazing. But…it’s also a new, weird sport.

    Very unhappy that there are a few giants and then a bunch of teams fighting to just stay alive. And, the egos of modern players is just outrageous.

    I’m sure we have it easy in the U.S., but seeing a bunch of fucks in replica jerseys yelling at the t.v. at a bar when they can’t kick more than a toe ball, that just sucks.

    Sad to read this news, would like to know how to fight it, but…I think until we destroy all the MBAs who are trained, like animals, to squeeze more and more and more money out of everything, this is the way we are going.

    As in futbol, as in life. The income gap is just getting worse as I type. Filthy rich fucks/clubs…and then a bunch of us fighting over scraps. It’s fucked up. Gonna have to implode at some point.

  2. Anonymous says:

    They need to pull their head out of their arse. Man Utd have been the worst offender and the pioneer as a corporate entity for almost all of that 26 year run and they have only just noticed now? Why dont they write about FC United? Or better still, Bury, Rochdale or Stockport?

  3. Jamie says:

    Totally agree with this.

    Whilst I enjoy watching football at all levels – I find it difficult to stir the emotions in myself to argue with modern football anymore. The stories are the same year on year, flick back through the Pies archive and you’ll see that big issues we’re getting in a fluster over were the exact same last year, and the year before, and the year before.

    The upper echelons of football are closed off to the teams with money and nothing can change that. Look at Manchester United – a problem season and £150 million can be spent on new players. City won the title within 5 seasons and now have franchise clubs on 3 continents. Chelsea, Madrid Barca, Bayern, it’s just all so boring at the top level. Every now and then a club (Southampton in this case) will punch above their weight and we’ll rightly praise them. But we know that long term they’ll back down with the rest of us in no time.

    It’s why I prefer International football. Nothing can be bought – a winning team takes years of planning and development right down to grass roots level. The team that wins are a group of players who haven’t been bought and have stepped up on the big stage. Although Fifa try and ruin the World Cup as much as possible with their corruption and commercialism it still feels like football in it’s ‘purest’ form.

    Don’t get me wrong I still love getting along to a game on a Saturday. But at the top level football just feels like an American sitcom. There’s hundreds of episodes, they’re all formulaic, they provide some entertainment but the plots and stories are roughly the same as they’ve always been. This isn’t a dig at genuine ‘big club’ fans by the way, and I’m sure many such as the Red Issue lads would agree with me.

    Rant over – now to check the fixtures for Saturday.

  4. gamblino says:

    Was gutted to see the wolves fanzine A Load of Bull die a couple of years ago. Picking a copy of that up was one of the few things that made the ‘matchday experience (TM)’ feel as though it was still rooted in something approaching the sort of football culture we try and hang on to. Only other option is 4squid for the ‘official matchday magazine’ which says it all really.

    It’s true that the cuture attempting to survive is dead unfortunately so can see why they no longer want to put all the effort into united. No reason why fanzines and more traditional support cant continue in the lower leagues away from the money though. Perhaps they should invest their efforts in a team that needs the support like the chap says above. United fans already have a cool ‘retro’ united all packaged up and ready to support as it is if they want to. Probably not as many half and half scarves in the evo-stik.

  5. One Man Went to Mow says:

    In my opinion they are folding to ‘modern bullshit’ because their club are stuggling now. If sir Alex was still at the helm and Utd were still a force they’d still be in business, but those days are gone and so they can’t be bothered to put put out any more pathetic drivel about an increasingly irrelevant football club. Good redience.

  6. Sad Indeed says:

    What Ron really means is, “Look at me guys! I’m one of those COOOOOOL Americans.”

  7. Neil #2 says:

    Agree with Anon. ManU are the biggest corporate entity in football. The editors of this sh*tty magazine (judging by its covers) probably just got tired of doing it and wanted a bit of attention on the way out.

  8. Royston Vasey says:

    As anonymous said, United were the pioneers of the corporate football club. Something tells me Red Issue would have limped on regardless if only United were still the best team in the land. One and a half questionable seasons and suddenly it’s all too much to bear? Rats leaving a sinking ship.

    • IanP says:

      Another ‘holier than thou’ lower league fan. You don’t get it do you? For the Red Issue lads, Manchester United IS their local club.

  9. Dave says:

    There is a place in football where the bullshit is kept to a minimum. It’s called the lower leagues. I travelled to Chesterfield on Saturday to watch one of the most pitiful Port Vale performances of recent years yet I still wouldn’t swap supporting the Vale for United any day of the week. We have something they will never hope to understand.

    And our two fanzines, Derek I’m Gutted and The Vale Park Beano are thriving and continue to be outstanding reads.

  10. Kcuf Ti says:

    There IS a solution… DO NOT FEED THE MACHINE.

    Simply stop buying into it. Do not give penny one to these slags. Until you adopt this stance, nothing will change.

    They don’t care about our beautiful game, as much as Damien “Geoff” Hirst doesn’t with true art. If Hirst says that the *real* art form is in plundering pockets, why is the same not true of football? At least Hirst had the balls to admit it.

    We all know the world is going down the shitter. Just ask yourself, who benefits from our situation? As in most thefts, simply follow the money.

  11. Anonymous says:

    @Dave… hear, hear!

    Best footy day out I ever had was watching Redditch Utd v Birmingham City in the Birmingham Senior Cup, 2004-5 season (Nico Vaesen & Clinton Morrison were in the Blues squad). The place was rammed, the songs were coarse, the contest genuine. Redditch were 0-2 down at half time but rallied to 2-2, then in the 93rd minute scored the winner after a pinball moment in their box & twenty players clustered around the ball just like back in school, resulting in three players & the ball being bundled over the line. Last kick of the match & the place went wild, cue pitch invasion & mass hysteria.

    Afterwards we went into the bar & had a few pints with the lads, congratulated them on an amazing game & staggered off home into the night, sated. Cost? £7 entrance fee & £2 a pint.

    Q. Where the fuck were Sky?
    A. Who gives a shit.

    For those of you who scoff, yes it’s not Surreal Madrid, or Liverpoo, Scamchester Untied or even Rochdale FFS. But at least it is REAL, and I know for a fact that the gate money went into the club. No doubt that money was re-circulated locally.

    Capitalism (the real essence behind modern football) works on a small scale. When it embiggens itself to the size we all see today, it just looks bloated & insane. So, for the love of OUR game, please stop feeding faraway trolls & their obscene bank accounts.

    Cease your social insecurity, disconnect from success by association, and above all, get out there & support your local community.

    Ask yourself this (no, not you Dave!). Are you a part of the problem? Or a part of the solution?

  12. IanP says:

    Red Issue was founded in 1989, a pretty lean time for United , care to elaborate on the ‘rats leaving sinking ship’ argument. To the idiot who says that they should write about other less glamorous clubs – err what sort of nu-fan nonsense is that?! Manchester United IS their local club, as is the case for all large clubs, no matter what the global corporate presence is. Each of these clubs has a local support that has become marginalised.

  13. Supervillan says:

    Got to give a shout out to “Heroes and Villans” a long-running and fucking brilliant Villa fanzine. Always a good read.

  14. TravisKOP says:

    Funny the Boro fanzine, Fly me to the moon, is 25 years old and doing very well. seems the red shite just cant hack it at their club for other reasons

  15. TravisKOP says:

    Sorry actually let me clarify, Boro’s fanzine is OLDER than the red issue, funny how that works

  16. Stephen burrows says:

    Thank you for the memories, as we know the game we loved has gone but however hard you try you can’t stop loving your team so thanks again Manchester United will never die!

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