WHAT IS SANDMAN?
 
Sandman Magazine was launched in Sheffield in 2002 as a free A4 black and white magazine covering the local music scene.  Not much has changed, it’s just got bigger and travels further nowadays.

We’d been involved in the local music scene both as musicians and promoters and felt there was very little media supporting an area rich in talent and diversity. So we started the mag. The idea was simply to write about what was going on at local level, giving it the respect it deserved while maintaining a reasonable critical stance. We’re not big fans of hyperbole but we love the music made in the city and all the other creative forms that connect up with music so we celebrate it.

There’s a huge gulf between what goes on at local level and what appears in the national media, and putting lots of different local things under one cover gives a focus to the scene.

The idea worked and Sandman has become an integral part of Sheffield’s musical fabric. So we took it to Leeds, and it worked there too. Currently we run magazines in Hull, York and Nottingham as well.

All the contributors to Sandman are volunteers and as long as their writing is honest Sandman is an open house. There’s no house style and no particular policy on what we cover provided we think it’s decent which could be a Buddhist Punk Poet, a twelve-piece ska band, even, occasionally, bands which get to go on telly. The photographers are wicked and we don’t look like high street magazines which we like.

The magazine is distributed at many different points across each city including venues, studios, student halls of residence, record shops, cafes, and pubs. It hopes to appeal to all bands and musicians, clubbers, gig goers, and all music lovers. Part quality fanzine, part village newspaper, Sandman will try to cover all aspects of music in each city.