No Way Back #2
165 x 240 mm, 208 pages
London, UK
First published 2025
Editors: Andy Crysell and Mark Maddox
Design: Daniel McGhee and Lee Belcher (BAM)
‘Learning from, not longing for, the past’
This exciting new launch surveys pop culture, looking back at a different era every issue through contemporary reports published in the music and youth culture press.
In a rejection of linear canonisation—the inaugural issue looked at the post-punk eighties—issue two turns its attention to the period spanning 1979-1997, with cross-genre reports on The Mudd Club from Rolling Stone, Chicago’s ‘House fever’ from The Face, and Britain in ’94, when Jungle was massive, in i-D.
Plus there’s a wonderful set of photo stories, including Steve Eichner’s heady documentation of the halcyon days of New York’s Club Kids, and Eddie Otchere’s love letter to London’s grassroots creativity at the close of the decade.
What will be a nostalgic trip for some, will be a revealing resource for others. We can’t wait to see future editions.
From the Journal
At Work With Andy Crysell: ‘I don’t think there’s anything wrong with looking back. In fact it’s an inspiring and quite natural thing to do, and clearly lots of younger people like to do it, too—often to times and events they didn’t experience firsthand. But it’s about what you make of the backstory…’
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