White Stuff

White Stuff was a 1977 UK Punk fanzine by Sandy Robertson that ran for eight issues and was centred around Patti Smith. It was clearly a cut above other punk fanzines around at the time in terms of look, content and style setting it apart.

Sandy and Alex were in a short-lived band called The Nobodies and were featured in Ripped & Torn but their destinies lay elsewhere. Sandy also contributed to early issues of Ripped & Torn.

Sandy Robertson In 1976 I was 23 and I knew I could never forgive myself if I lived out my life in Scotland doing mundane jobs as my parents wanted. They said it was impossible to go to London with no contacts and get into the music press, but I had to try. I’d always been adventurous – I went to the Isle of Wight festival at 17 in 1970 alone to see The Doors. And Alex wanted to play in a real group.

We went down January 77 having previously arranged a flat. I took my synthesiser and flogged it the day I arrived, signed on the dole and had my savings transferred to a London bank. Alex sat in our room annoying me with incessant guitar, me irritating him by tapping on a portable typewriter. I’d paste up WS myself then put it together in a print shop in town. I found you could use coloured paper,another way to make it a little different.

I was a Patti Smith fan before she made any records of her own, having read about her in the music press gossip columns. I managed to get her poetry books like Seventh Heaven and Witt, as well as collecting any records she wrote lyrics for or guested on, such as those by Blue Oyster Cult and Ray Manzarek. She seemed more intriguing and literate than other rock performers.

I’d wanted to be a music writer for ages – Nick Kent, Lester Bangs, Richard Meltzer, Sandy Pearlman, John Mendelsohn and Richard Williams (the only person to champion VU when Loaded came out) were my favourites – but the prospects for work in Scotland were nil.…So when I eventually came up with the idea for White Stuff after seeing the London fanzines I decided it HAD to be different enough to get noticed or it’d sink without trace.

Although he took inspiration from Iggy Pop, Kim Fowley and others, Patricia Lee Smith, described by him as an ‘explorer of the marvellous’ and ‘THE female artist of all time, and certainly the greatest artist in rock n roll this decade’, was absolutely central to his zine.

White Stuff was named after a line in her Ain’t it Strange from Radio Ethiopia, and the debut issue featured Patti on the cover [as did every single issue], while inside, in a piece titled Patti Smith: Why She is the Best, he argued against the generally negative reaction heaped on her recently released second album He also set out his own Patti-esque manifesto, which was to ‘take rock n roll back from the musicians, it isn’t just music, it’s an independent artform.’

Further issues followed with pretty much rapid-fire regularity, #3 reprinted an early Patti piece from Warhol’s Interview mag, #5 included a long essay on her poetry; a range of subjects with music was tackled and a piece on a radical Austrian psychoanalyst or surrealist poet was always more likely than one on Sham 69 or Slaughter and The Dog’s latest gig at the Vortex Club. Guest writers like Jon Savage, Glenn Marks and the Tony above D, who’d also moved south and hooked up again with Robertson, were given space.

Before 1977 was out, six issues had been published and White Stuff was one of the best and most highly regarded UK fanzines. Early on, Sandy had sensed that punk would confuse the biz and create a window of opportunity for foot-in-door new boys and he was proved right, landing a job with Sounds, where he interviewed the likes of The Clash and even Mick Jagger (who called Patti ‘awful’ and ‘a poseur of the worst kind’).

Sandy Robertson Then the impossible happened. I was in Rough Trade’s original shop trying to get them to take copies of the zine when Viv Goldman of Sounds came in. She agreed it was well written and later tested me out on a couple of half-page things. I passed the test and soon I was interviewing people like Mick Jagger. I was accused of selling out by some, but I’d never hid my ambition. At around the same time Alex joined Mark P’s Alternative TV, formed off the back of his Sniffin’ Glue mag. Whoopee!

He continued, though, to bring out ever more ‘technologically elevated’ issues of White Stuff. The production values of #8 resembled those of a ‘real’ magazine.

As for Patti and Sandy, well, despite being probably her biggest supporter in the British music press, Patti Smith ‘excommunicated’ him after he dared give her one less than gushing live review.

Sandy Robertson I should add that I am not into Patti now. She got very arrogant – Jay Dee Daugherty told me ‘if Patti gave Lenny (Kaye) shit to eat he’d ask for toast to go with it’. Myself and other writers who began to question her attitude (Lester Bangs, so I’m in good company) were excommunicated. Kaye said about Bangs summat like ‘is a person who writes criticism of art as important as that art?’ Well the answer’s yes. Oscar Wilde was a critic and he maintained it was an art. Patti’s band waited for her when she had her accident – yet later this woman who said, ‘You don’t give up’ I believe, quit for domestic life. I know she returned many years on and seems a nicer person now but I can’t get excited about her music now.

Punk77 says: not sure about the statement that a critic is as important as the art. Very contentious!

Check out and read the whole of White Stuff #2 at the excellent Still Unusual Blogspot

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This entry is 98% based on an excellent article Sandy Robertson & White Stuff Fanzine from Total Blam Blam #2, Glam Rock, Punk and 70s eFanzine, Spring 2013, Copyright 2013: Jamie Havlin & Lauren Stone

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