The Single Life

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What happened to the musicians who poured their hopes and savings into a DIY 7" single?

4 Extra Debut. Mark Hodkinson investigates what happened to the musicians who poured their hopes and savings into a DIY 7" single? From 2015.

Second-hand shops are littered with tatty old 7 inch records that were self-made by bands. 

Mark Hodkinson, who was in one of those bands, buys a handful of the singles and tracks down the people involved. 

What happened to the dreams and ideals of people who created a lasting plastic monument to their youth? 

And how is the experience of making and packaging a 7 inch single different from the modern practice of up-loading a file to a website? 

The DIY single took commitment and ingenuity. Hopeful bands would scrape together money to record, press, package and distribute their music in the hope of fame, fortune or at least an appearance on the radio.  

Now, the bargain bins of second-hand shops are full of these records and each one marks a significant milestone in someone's career. But a stepping-stone to where?

Mark Hodkinson, now a journalist,  learns how people coped with the disappointment of failure and how they continue to try and satisfy their creative desires. 

He meets a saxophonist who once supported Adam Ant and now is a designer for a computer gaming company; a bassist who went on to marry a Bond villain; a guitarist who still hopes to make it big; and a singer who did make it big, and is still selling records 30 years  later.

Producer: Ian Bent

First broadcast on BBC Radio 4 in January 2015.

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