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Pulp Librarian Profile picture
@PulpLibrarian
Aug 24, 2018 • 11 tweets • 5 min read Twitter logo Read on Twitter
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Time to look back at the glory that was Smash Hits magazine. Posters, lyrics and a free badge please... #FridayFeeling
Smash Hits was created by ex-NME editor Nick Logan and launched as a monthly magazine in September 1978, with Belgian new-waver Plastic Bertrand on the cover.
The monthly format only lasted a few issues however: sales were phenomenal and Smash Hits soon switched to fortnightly publication.
The big selling point of Smash Hits was it published lyrics to chart songs. If you were listening to AM radio - or taping the Top 40 with your finger hovering over the pause button - it was the only way to reliably understand what some artists were actually singing about!
True story: for years I thought the lyrics to Vienna by Ultravox went "It means nothing to me... old piano!" because I'd taped it on an old C60 cassette from Top Of The Pops.
At its peak Smash Hits sold half a million copies every fortnight and versions were published in France and Australia. Getting the cover spot was the sign you had definitely made it in pop - at least for a while.
The success of Smash Hits spawned a number of rival publications, but the Smash Hits brand and its strong sales ensured it remained the go-to magazine for music pluggers, #PR people and wannabe pop journalists.
Neil Tennant was assistant editor of Smash Hits during the 1980s before launching the Pet Shop Boys. Had the band not succeeded he would have pursued a career in music journalism.
The Smash Hits Poll Winner's Party became a must-watch annual TV event in the late 1980s, not least the 1991 awards when presenter Phillip Schofield was rugby tackled by Carter USM after they trashed the stage!
Alas sales began to slide in the 1990s as Smash Hits tried to reposition itself as an entertainment magazine. It wasn't enough though, and Smash Hits folded as a publication in February 2006.
Pop music mags were a staple of teenage life in the 80s and 90s, and Smash Hits is still fondly remembered today. Collecting them is relatively cheap and who knows - you may even learn the right lyrics to your favourite song too!

More stories another time...

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More from @PulpLibrarian

Pulp Librarian Profile picture
Dec 2, 2018
It is the greatest frog-worshiping zombie biker occult horror film ever made. Possibly the only one. It's certainly like no over movie you've ever seen.

Today in pulp, I look back at the 1971 classic Psychomania...
By the early 1970s British horror films were trying to get 'with it' to attract a younger audience. So it wasn't surprising that in 1971 screenwriter Arnaud d'Usseau tried to create a biker horror movie.
d'Usseau had previously written Horror Express, an Anglo-Spanish sci-fi/horror movie loosely based on John W. Campbell's novella Who Goes There. Christopher Lee, Peter Cushing and Telly Savalas did their best with the material.
Read 18 tweets
Pulp Librarian Profile picture
Oct 9, 2018
"The gun is good! The Penis is evil!" bellows a huge stone head floating over the Irish countryside. It's quite a strange start to any movie, but it's about to get even stranger...

This is the story of John Boorman's classic 1974 film Zardoz.
In 1970 director John Boorman began work on a Lord Of The Rings film for United Artists. It would be an unusual adaption; The Beatles would be the Hobbits and Kabuki theatre would open the movie . Alas the studio said 'No', but the idea of a fantasy film stuck with Boorman...
So in 1972, following the commercial success of Deliverance, John Boorman started work on Zardoz - a fantasy film into which he would cram many unorthodox ideas. Initially Burt Reynolds was to play the lead role of Zed, but pulled out citing other filming commitments.
Read 13 tweets
Pulp Librarian Profile picture
Oct 8, 2018
As it's #LibrariesWeek let's look back at Britain's favourite library book*: the 1977 Usborne Guide to the Supernatural World!

(*according to my readers)
Supernatural World was an anthology of three existing Usborne pocketbooks: Vampires, Mysterious Powers and Ghosts. As an Usborne hardback it was deemed perfect for the nation's libraries.
Usborne had previously fascinated and frightened readers with its 1977 World Of The Unknown series: a terrifying triptych of ghosts, monsters and UFOs. Supernatural World would continue in the same vein.
Read 12 tweets
Pulp Librarian Profile picture
Oct 7, 2018
It was a university course for the price of a packet of cigarettes: Pelican Books! Maybe the blend wasn't to everyone's taste, but there's no denying the addictive nature of the range.

Today in pulp I look back at the autodidact's bible...
In 1937, two years after Allen Lane founded Penguin books, the company decided on a new imprint to provide academic and intellectual non-fiction for the general public. Lane believed there was a market for “intelligent books at a low price” which he was determined to serve
Over its lifetime Pelican sold a quarter of a billion books covering almost 3,000 subjects. Lane apparently came up with the Pelican name when he overheard a woman at King’s Cross railway station mistakenly asking for a Pelican book instead of a Penguin one.
Read 14 tweets
Pulp Librarian Profile picture
Oct 7, 2018
📩PULP POSTBAG TIME!📩

And today's letter is home computer related...
Mr Derrick Wibley from Penge writes: "Dear PL, I recently invested in a 48k ZX Spectrum to help run my stationery business 'Penge Pens'. However I'm worried it's not powerful enough to meet the needs of my ambitious business expansion programme. What should I do?"
Well Mr Wibley fear not! The ZX Spectrum is a fully-scaleable integrated solution to your business needs - provided you buy the right peripherals!
Read 13 tweets
Pulp Librarian Profile picture
Oct 6, 2018
The Time Machine, Brave New World, 1984: these weren’t the first dystopian novels. There's an interesting history of Victorian and Edwardian literature looking at the impact of modernity on humans and finding it worrying.

Today in pulp I look at some early dystopian books…
Paris in the Twentieth Century, written in 1863, was the second novel penned by Jules Verne. However his publisher Pierre-Jules Hetzel rejected it as too gloomy. The manuscript was only discovered in 1994 when Verne’s grandson hired a locksmith to break into an old family safe.
The novel, set in 1961, warns of the dangers of a utilitarian culture. Paris has street lights, motor cars and the electric chair but no artists or writers any more. Instead industry and commerce dominate and citizens see themselves as cogs in a great economic machine.
Read 26 tweets

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