Sinister: Re: [Fwd: Belle and Sebastian] (fwd)

[Honey]

OK - I got a reply from those nice people at "Rough Guides" and
surprisingly they are gagging for an entry on B&S (well sort of).  Peter
Miller's submitted a first draft and no-one else sent any more boo hiss.

I think it would be GREAT if this list sent a "combined" entry to Rough
Guides, got it published under the list's name rather than an individual
and sent the 25 quid to David's poor PC.  But to do that we need more
contributions, corrections and maybe a bit more band history.  Can anyone
help?  Any old rubbish happily accepted as long as you're all prepared for
some fascist editing in the long run.

I'll send on Peter's first draft again in a minute - here's the
reply from Mr Rough Guides to inspire you.

Paul
mailto:owner-sinister at majordomo.net

---------- Forwarded message ----------
Date: Wed, 29 Oct 1997 17:35:27 +0100
From: Alan Spicer <aspicer at xxx.uk>
Reply-To: al at roughguides.co.uk
To: psm at Majordomo.net
Subject: Re: [Fwd: Belle and Sebastian]

Hiya Paul, thanks for dropping by...

> I'm mailing you to ask whether you would be interested in a submission
> to
> the Rough Guide about the band "Belle and Sebastian"?

Yup!

>  I know this all
> depends on the quality of the submission(!) but I would like to know
> what
> your criteria are for inclusion for the band themselves?

Our criteria are sometimes rigid, though more often made up on the
spot...I've been on the lookout for a B&S bio for sometime...so they've
passed the first hurdle.

>  
>
> I am asking because I run the mailing list for the band (details at
>
>         http://www.majordomo.net/sinister

Oho! Any chance of a freebie CD then? [shameless scrounge I know, but
the record companies are so tight fisted these days you have to be Paul
Du Noyer to even get on the list]

>  
>
> ).  There's a suggestion that members on the list submit an entry to
> your
> esteemed publication, which seems to support the best in music just
> now.

[preen preen] Ta!

> We'd like to see an entry, and we'd like to see a collaborative effort
> -
> currently 260 people on the mailing list, many of whom know more than
> the
> band themselves and some wonderful writers - we are currently judging
> a
> writing competition.  So we might also want the submission to be from
> the
> list itself rather than an individual - IF that's possible.

Oh but that'd be marvellous...I'm at a bit of a loss as to what to do
with the 25-quid fee though...perhaps you and I should invest it in
drink?

>  
>
> Anyway can you advise whether we should try?  It's understood that
> there's
> no guarantee of acceptance but I suppose I'd just like to know if we'd
> be
> ruled out from the beginning...

Try, old thing try...here's the blurb I send to all my wannabes, edit
away as you wish but there's the rough idea...

===================================================
ROUGH GUIDE TO ROCK II - THE AWFUL TRUTH

Essentially, you'll be writing for nothing except the glory of seeing
your name and writing on our site. If you can parlay that up into a
full-time career, great, but you won't get rich writing for Rough
Guides. So....what happens next?

Well, you write up your piece - preferably in Word or something similar
so you can email it to me - and let me have it at this email address or
the snailmail address at the end of this message. Then I do a swift edit

on the piece to polish it up and to justify my paycheck. The edited
version is submitted to you for your approval and, once we're both
happy, it goes online.

At this stage, you go tell all your friends and everybody gets to see
your name on the WWW (wow!).

Eventually, assuming the entry makes it into the printed version of the
book (which won't be published till '98 at the earliest) you get paid
the
princely sum of $40/£25 and we get all the rights.

Here are a few guidelines
If you go online to
http://www.roughguides.com/rock/entries/BUZZCOCKS.html, I've been using
that as a reference. You might want to do a bit of browsing around from
http://www.roughguides.com/rock to get a feel for the style we like and
check out a few of the other entries.

First up, apart from the name of the band, we need born/died or
formed/split up dates.
Next up, if you can come up with a great quote about or by the band
(except lyrics) that would be great, if not, no sweat.

A 1000-word biography will generally be
sufficient. The biog should be more than a simple history of who joined,

who left, which album came out next etc: we're looking for writing
that'll convey what the music sounds like to those of us who don't know,

that makes the reader shiver with anticipation, that'll convince couch
potatoes like me to get out and spend lots of  money - if you can fit in

a few interesting anecdotes and bits of gossip, even better. You
have to keep the laws of libel in mind though.

Next up; a selective discography, their best full-length recordings and
reviews written to convince me to buy them.

Finally, though this isn't in place yet for the Buzzcocks piece, a list
of websites run by fans or the record companies - if
there are hundreds of sites, recommend the best only.

The whole guide was assembled on the assumption that each
review would be generally favorable, though not afraid to criticise
where necessary.

And that's it.
================================================

>  
>
> Of course, we think they'll be massive..!

Despite not having heard anything BY them, only ABOUT them, I hope so
too.

>  
>
> Honey
> mailto:psm at Majordomo.net

  
--
_________________________________________

Al Spicer - Rock Editor - Rough Guides Ltd
1 Mercer Street - London WC2H 9QJ - UK
aspicer at roughguides.co.uk - tel 00 44 171 379 3329

_________________________________________
 

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