The New Musical Express - the end of an era.

The New Musical Express - the end of an era.

Here in Britain - and in many parts of the world- the final edition of the music magazine New Musical Express must have meant the end of their world. For the perpetual romantics the New Musical Express was and will always remain one of the most popular, accessible and mainstream music magazines ever produced. But now time may well have caught up with NME and the smooth vibes and cool modernity that the magazine never really lost has now been condemned to that old jukebox and record player in the sky. Many a flood of tears have been shed.

Founded in 1952, the NME perfectly captured the mood of the nation, the essential zeitgeist of the 1950s, Bill Hayley and The Comets, Elvis Presley, Eddie Cochran, Jerry Lee Lewis, The Platters and the Ink Spots. In fact the NME represented much more than the rock and roll phenomenon that came to characterise the 1950s from day one. If you carried a copy of the New Musical Express in your pocket or shopping bag you were regarded with an agreeable nod in the street and complete admiration.

At the time nobody could have predicted just how great the audience the magazine would attract, a magazine, after all designed, for youngsters with inquiring minds and a genuine understanding of the growing vinyl record market. There must have come a point though when the NME would one day burn itself out. The demographic it seemed to aim at was the aspirational teenager with money in their pockets, a teddy boy hairstyle, leather jacket and a comfortable seat in a Soho coffee bar. Then the boys met the girls and a new music magazine for them had arrived like a meteorite from up above.

But that may have been the beginning of it all. Little did the magazine know that in the following years and the revolutionary 1960s, music would change its image and style so radically that eventually the New Musical Express would have to move with the times and decade. That it succeeded in doing so was perhaps a glowing testament to its timelessness and durability.

When the 1960s dawned the rock and roll juggernaut seemed to come to a grinding halt and the teenagers saw in the New Musical Express a magazine that would do its utmost to reflect and accurately summarise the latest bands and singers who simply exploded onto the pop music stage, retaining their proud position as pre-eminent stars. Far from shirking its duty though to inform and enlighten its fans about the power that the singles and albums charts could still exert, the New Musical Express gave us more detailed articles about Manfred Mann, the Beatles, the Rolling Stones, the Who, Deep Purple, Led Zeppelin, Procol Harum and the Animals. What a magazine and what a read it must have been.

It was a magazine that was so up to date, topical and memorably informative that regular subscribers to the NME would pine for the next edition to come out in case they might have missed out on something so vitally important that it had to be bought at all costs. Then there were those who may well have hoarded hundreds and thousands of the magazines under their beds and refused to let go of them once in possession.

I have to make a perhaps shameful confession here. The New Musical Express was never my preferred choice of magazine. But I can only assume that there must have been extensive references to forthcoming dates for band tours, announcements of historic import about new bands, new singers, new albums and new singles. If you were around during the 1960s the magazine pushed back all of those repressive boundaries, opening up a revealing world about their pop icons and highlighting everything that was relevant to that week or month.

Now of course, following the disappearance of the Melody Maker, most music fans may well find themselves in a desolate no man's land. How on earth are they going to find a music magazine that caters for all classes, backgrounds and tastes?  Music of course is the food of love and the absence of a popular music magazine probably seems tantamount to a major setback in their lives, an empty vacuum that can never be filled, a craving that can never be satisfied.

From a personal viewpoint there is something about a weekly magazine that is just irresistible, not perhaps an incurable addiction or a simple, harmless obsession that can't be kicked because if you do your friends or peers may look down at you. They may sneer contemptuously at your old Dansette record player and then think, rightly or wrongly, that you've lost touch with this generation.

My magazine collection revolved around the football magazine Shoot, a magazine so easy to read and topically absorbing that every Thursday I would find myself drawn to it like a moth to a light. There were the articles written with that familiar dash of simplicity, integrity and skilful directness that must have sold in millions at the time. But then other football magazines got busy and shoved  away Shoot to the far off terraces and stands of the lower divisions.

After hoarding a sizeable collection of Shoots which admittedly became unmanageable, the finest football magazine in Britain was wiped off the publishing map. Sales were dwindling dramatically and the magazine, following the bravest fight of them all, vanished. How I'd miss those League ladders featuring every team in every footballing division, the Panini stickers with every player in every team, the variable shirts, the long hair, the Adidas logo on their football shirts, the concentration on the smaller clubs, the endless inclusion of facts, figures and glorious trivia.

So as New Musical Express readers weep copiously into their mugs of tea or several cans of Foster's nectar amber it is time to lament the passing of another magazine. It is of course not a catastrophe because sooner or later some enterprising music enthusiast may well produce a press release proudly telling us about a new and vibrant music magazine, a publication that will stop the universe in its tracks and leave us all gasping for breath.

For the moment though a hollow sadness will pass over the pop, cum- rock community. It seems unthinkable and inconceivable that one of the most influential of music mags is no longer available for sale in your local newsagents. But the NME will always be remembered with the kind of affection that very few of us can explain. It may seem that here was one magazine that will always be irreplaceable but the memories will never fade. Rock on as they say.