About the Author

Born in 1979, Andy was a committed computer geek by the age of 8. By 14 his interest in his Spectrum, Megadrive and Amiga waned and he headed out to the bright lights of Weymouth - writing up under 18 club reviews for a local youth magazine.

Andy's first fanzine appeared shortly after his 16th birthday, a flimsy article obsessed with Garbage and Placebo. 12 months and 6 issues later Andy's new interest in oddball indie records lead him to re-launch and re-brand with quirk, a fanzine that started out covering immeasurably unsuccessful bands like Bis, Dweeb, Kenickie and his very own Satsuma. Andy played guitar and wrote songs with Satsuma for 18 months, by which point they'd made a 7" single and been featured in every fanzine Andy knew of (around 25). No-one took them very seriously outside of a hardcore fanbase of approximately 97 so when Andy headed off to university they were no more.

Once at Uni Andy tried to do everything he could related to music. He was Music Editor on the student paper, a DJ on the radio station, the Marketing Officer for the Alternative Music Society, a Sub Editor on the Drowned In Sound website, a student rep for Sony Music, a guitarist in several bands and a familiar face on the London toilet gig circuit. Andy wrote his fanzine sporadically and added the infamous brackets when Melody Maker stole all his feature ideas and didn't credit him. Being an academic of sorts Andy was aware by now that when you credit a source in an article or essay you should put the source in brackets afterwards.

Andy graduated with a 2:1 in Psychology and worked crap temp jobs whilst promoting monthly club nights in London with various friends. He was recruited as a freelance A&R Scout for Gronland Records and joined the Warner Music Street Team - which lead to a 6 month placement in their Marketing department. The placement didn't lead to employment and hacked off with the mainstream industry as a whole Andy applied for a proper job. Shortly after his Teaching course place was confirmed he fell into managing Yumi Yumi, a Japanese punkpop band. Andy and Yumi Yumi worked together for a year, in which time he secured the band a 30 date UK and Ireland tour, coverage on Radio 1 and a record deal with Velocity Records. Due to differences in vision he split from the band in April 2004.

Aged 24, Andy moved to Essex to teach primary age children, first in Basildon and then Chelmsford. Three years later he got bored of his chavvy surrounds and finally moved to London.

Now teaching a year 6 class in Hackey, Andy continues to promote the well established "Come Out 2nite!" clubnight with his friend Mel and also plays guitar in Want Take Have.