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Blog: How To Be In A Pop Group by Alan Jenkins

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For many years now I have been considering writing a book about how to be in a band. The young people of today are obviously far too polite to ask my advice on how to do this, but I'm sure they're quietly desperate to hear my words of wisdom about how to get a band together, what you should do in a recording studio, how not to play gigs and so on and so forth.

Luckily for them, me, and the universe at large, I now know that there is no need for me to do so because Alan Jenkins has already done it with his book How To Be In A Pop Group!

This is a re-issue of the book/big fanzine he published nigh on THIRTY FIVE YEARS AGO, and so some of it is probably out of date, although for someone like me who was first IN Pop Groups at that time it feels utterly modern and of the moment, especially when it talks about the old hippies who used to turn up with their old PA systems at gigs. It is basically a very funny RANT/loving mickey-take about what it's like being IN a band, so there's lots of great stuff about how to settle arguments between band members, how many guitar solos you should have, how rehearsals work etc etc.

There's also an ADDENDUM at the end where 21st Century Alan offers some advice about extra things like streaming that have come along since it was first published, but the real joy in the book for me is the way it captures what it was really like to be in bands around that time - you can almost smell the mildewed rehearsal room carpets!

Part of the reason it resonates so much with me is because Alan was, and indeed IS, a legendary figure on the East Midlands music scene, playing in loads of different bands, releasing amazing indie records, and running his own studio in Leicester for a while too. I particularly remember him as somebody my housemate and bandmate DOCTOR KNEEL used to quote all the time, and so really I guess I am an example of someone whose entire life in Pop Groups has been based on the information contained within. INDEED I think if I had sat down to write my book about it then it would have been EERILY SIMILAR to this one because I basically absorbed all of its teachings while playing in the band VOON in the early to mid nineties.

It was thus BLOODY WONDERFUL to be able to buy an actual copy of it for myself, and one day after receiving it I have DEVOURED over half of it already. It really is a very funny and very lovely book which I HIGHLY recommend to anyone who has any memories of being in those sort of bands in the twentieth century and, hopefully, for anyone who wants to do the same now. As Alan says multiple times in the book, you're unlikely to make any money but if you follow his guidelines you will have a lot of fun, and I can certainly attest to with that!

posted 8/8/2025 by MJ Hibbett

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