New magazine to revitalise Preston's youth culture

Preston’s evolving music scene is set to be recieve a further boost in the coming weeks with the release of a new culture magazine aimed youths and students in the area.

The new publication will provide readers with news about what’s on in and around the town centre, to help youngsters realise that there is more to do in Preston than hanging around on street corners or sitting at home every night.

The driving force behind View Preston Magazine (VP Mag) is 19-year-old Alicia Cartwright, a Secretary and part-time literature student from Preston, she believes there is potentially a good market for such a venture in the area, speaking to Listen Up she explained:

“There are loads of people, like me, who see adverts for gigs, but don’t know what to expect, or wish there was a wider variety of things to do. There’s nothing out there that informs about what’s going on, or provides news, or makes anyone feel part of it all.”

Internet message-boards

There are numerous aspects that have recently donated towards a rapidly growing youth and music movement in the city. Internet message-boards have proved an ideal way of uniting people with common interests.

Local websites Soul of the North.co.uk and Prestone.co.uk currently provide somewhere for local students to go and express their views and talk about their passions, but Miss Cartwright feels there is still more scope for youngsters than just being restricted to the internet:

“Not everyone has easy Internet access, and those sites tends to be only about music. It’s also a bit inaccessible to the ‘kid-on-the-street’, because if you do not already know all the bands in question, and go out with them at night, it’s hard to follow what’s going on [in the message boards]”

First issue

After months of research, the first issue of the magazine is currently under development. Although research has not gone without problems, the size, name and target audience of the magazine have all come into question at some point.

“We are currently in the process of producing our first issue. We are calling it The Preview as we might change all sorts depending on how it is received.

“The main obstacle we have faced is that different people have had different ideas about how it should be run. A few of us had very big ambitions for the magazine, but we’ve decided to keep it small and easy to manage, for now at least.”

Poster campaigns and a fundraising gig are all planned in the way of future advertising, but until then, the first issue will be available for free around the City centre from May 1st.

Written by Dan Jeoffroy

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