Psychotronic, Issue 8, Winter 1990

Another of the finds from that box I retrieved from under the model railway baseboards: a copy of Psychotronic magazine, from Winter 1990.  I actually thought that I had more of these, but this second anniversary issue is the only one which has so far turned up.  Like Shock Xpress, back in the pre-internet world, Michael Weldon's Psychotronic was essential reading for those interested in exploitation films, B-movies and basically anything cinematically weird and offbeat.  These publications, all of them, at best, semi-professional fanzines, were a treasure trove of hard to find information on such movies and the people who made them.  Eventually, Weldon would spin the magazine off into his Psychotronic Film Encyclopedia, (which I also own and was also an invaluable resource when I first getting into this stuff in a serious way).

This issue is pretty typical, packed full of reviews and interviews.  The latter include in-depth talks with noted B-movie leading men Lawrence Tierney and Russ Tamblyn and nudie director A C Stephens.  It is also packed full of adverts from various suppliers of dubious quality videos of the sort of films the magazine covered.  (All, of course, in the US, as Psychotronic was a US publication and here in the UK had to be obtained via specialist outlets like Forbidden Planet).  Thanks to the internet, most of these films have since escaped onto video sharing sites and subsequently onto dodgy Roku channels, for everyone to watch freely, (until the copyright police turn up and spoil the party).  Looking back at this and other, similar magazines and books, that I still have, it is fascinating to contemplate that what was, such a relatively short time ago, an underground pursuit for a handful of weirdos like me, is now, sort of, mainstream and trendy.  How times change.