In my twin capacities as “biographer” of The Face and curator of last year’s British independent magazine exhibition PRINT!, I’ve been asked publicly and privately for my thoughts on the imminent online relaunch of the title (the plan is that the quarterly physical edition will follow in August, carrying a September dateline).

So here they are:

It’s interesting that the greatest anticipation for the magazine’s return is being generated for and by the fashion community. The PRs, writers, stylists and students who kept the flame alive after the publication’s 2004 demise are now busily banging the drum in response to the relaunch’s oddly one-note Instagram branding exercise, filling their feeds with excited content.

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For a fabulous interviewer, Tom Hibbert – who has died aged 59 – was a fabulous interview.

Nary a word needed to be edited, or a phrase untangled, from the thoroughly enjoyable conversation I had with him in 2000 for In Their Own Write.

For obvious reasons, interviewing journalists can be tricky. This was not my experience with Hibbert. Probably because he didn’t care, lacking the vanity which characterises this profession (or craft, or whatever it is that we do). Talking to Hibbert was akin to reading one of his rightly celebrated Who The Hell pieces: he was trenchant, highly entertaining and occasionally and surprisingly enlightening.

Here’s a selection from that chat:

“I had my first letter published in Melody Maker in 1970. It was about Crosby, Stills & Nash and how crap Graham Nash was, which I think still stands up today.”

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Tags: Arthur lee, Cliff Richard, David Crosby, Johnny Rotten, Lynn Barber, Neil Young, Nik Kershaw, Q, Robson & jerome, Roger McGuinn, Smash Hits, Tom Hibbert, Who The Hell