We love a good tour diary, both for the insight they give into the scene as well as the humorous scrapes that happen along the way, but some are better than others. Earth Island Books has been speaking with life-long punker and zine editor Welly Artcore about his trips through the US and Canada with Chaos UK and Four Letter Word in the nineties and are very pleased to announce that we will be publishing his debut book telling these stories.
Directions to the Outskirts of Town: Punk Rock Tour Diaries from Nineties North America will be a 328 page book telling these stories, packed with over 250 unpublished colour photos and flyers from the trips. We're just finishing the final proof-reading and layout now before sending off to the printers and the book should be shipping late May.
You can pre-order it now, direct from Earth Island Books, to receive your copy on the day of publication, along with a limited edition poster and bookmark, and a few other goodies. And very soon you will be able to order it locally your own country too.
Get ready to go on a punk-rock adventure...
In 1994 punk rock fanzine writer Welly Artcore jumped in the van with legendary British punk band CHAOS U.K. for a two month tour around the U.S. Four years later he did it all again with his own band, FOUR LETTER WORD, this time also travelling across Canada.
From the impossible drives, to scrapes with the authorities, and the bands they shared stages and floors with along the way, often with nothing more than the name of a club on a scrap of paper that turned out to be a disused unit in an industrial estate, they somehow made most of the gigs.
All the while, he did something so many others don’t, he wrote it all down.
Directions to the Outskirts of Town is a candid and humorous account of life on the road packed into a 6” x 9” paperback with over 300 pages, over 250 unpublished colour photos, flyers and illustrations, and a foreword by Kaos of CHAOS U.K. The book also comes with a poster and a bookmark.