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A Magazine for Sheffield

Issue 69 December 2013

My, my. Our final magazine of the year. And we had so much more to say…

We’re really pleased to include the art of Scottish illustrator Robbie Porter this month, alongside some fantastic articles on benefits reforms, the economic recovery and social enterprise, plus an exclusive snapshot of our online poetry resource for this year’s Lyric Festival in the Word Life section and an interview with the phenomenal folk musician Sam Amidon. Online you will find an interview with local violin loop extraordinaire Sieben, a review of Chuck Palahniuk at Off The Shelf Festival, additional music reviews and more.

I know it’s easy to order all of your Christmas presents on Amazon, but aside from their shamelessly unethical tax dodging antics, you will be better able to find unique gifts for friends and family in the shops of local traders. Small businesses are selling some of the best products you can get your hands on and they really rely on your support at this time of the year. Use this month as an opportunity to check out the things that are right under your nose and you will be pleasantly surprised by what you find.

We’ll be online only next month, so keep an eye out, and then back in print in February.

Sam Walby avatar
by Sam Walby (he/him)
69

This month's articles

Localcheck Welfare State of Collapse.

This month I write about someone you may have met. Clearly intelligent, his first career was in management and later he had a lucrative…

Green Belt: We need more room

There's a baby boom and we need more room. It's time to build more houses. Parents and grandparents and kids all in one house again. It's…

Recovery: Turning The Corner

Our economy is not “turning the corner”. We are not on the “road to recovery”. We are certainly not on a “path to prosperity”. After three…

Christmas Meats.

Serves 4. Recipe by Craig Bell. 50g butter 1tbsp rapeseed oil 1 medium onion, peeled & chopped 250g chestnut mushrooms, sliced 400g…

Lyric Festival / Northern Writers’ Awards.

Lavinia Greenlaw. What started you writing and who were the first writers who really grabbed your attention? I think the most important…

Lavinia Greenlaw.

What started you writing and who were the first writers who really grabbed your attention? 

I think the most important

Robbie Porter: A Dab Hand

Robbie Porter is a Scottish illustrator currently based in London. After studying visual communication in Leeds and working for a…

Sound DIY in Sheffield.

With perennial talk of falling record sales and the death of guitar music, you would be forgiven for thinking that the UK music scene is in…

Sam Amidon: Bright Sunny South

In recent years, ‘folk’ music has begun to gain more attention in mainstream media, but with every new, chart-friendly iteration it seems…

Headsup Sieben.

Recording artist and violin looping extraordinaire Sieben, otherwise known as Matt Howden, has been impressing audiences with his…

Filmreel THE BEST OF 2013.

DIR. GIUSEPPE TORNATORE. REVIEWER – RAJ KESAV. Italian auteur Giuseppe Tornatore (of Cinema Paradiso fame) makes his foray into English…