Motörhead on the cover of Flexipop! magazine, June, 1981.
UK music magazine Flexipop! was only around from 1980 to1983, but in that time it managed to put out some pretty cool content within its pages, such as the sweet 7” colored flexi discs that featured music from bands featured in the mag like Motörhead, The Cure and The Jam. One flexi-disc from the February 1981 issue was a recording of Adam and the Ants riffing on the Village People anthem “Y.M.C.A.” called “A.N.T.S,” which you can listen to in all its early 80s glory (as I can’t embed it), here.
Adam Ant on the cover of Flexipop! #4.
Adam and the Ants Flexipop! flexi disc from Flexipop! #4.
Another thing that Flexipop! featured were cool “live-action” storyboards as well illustrated strips that detailed the the fictional exploits of various bands and musicians. Starting with the September 1981 issue, there was a three-part-series about the career to date of Adam Ant drawn by Mark Manning. Manning—who would go on to assume the cool-as-fuck moniker “Zodiac Mindwarp” and form the biker sleaze band Zodiac Mindwarp and the Love Reaction in the mid-80s—was Flexipop!‘s acid-dropping art editor at the time. I’ve included Manning’s “Adam and the Ants” comic strip in its entirety, as well as some scans from the magazine’s inner-pages.
Surprisingly, given its short existence, you can find lots of issues of Flexipop! out there as well as flexi discs from the magazine’s colorful discography on auction sites like eBay and Etsy. Cooler still is the fact that you can look through even more pages from Flexipop! that have been scanned and uploaded at the blog Music Mags 1970s-1980s.
Siouxsie Sioux and Budgie (The Creatures) on the cover of Flexipop! March, 1983.
Siouxsie Sioux and Budgie inside the March, 1983 issue of Flexipop!
The “Adam Ant Story” from the September, 1981 issue of Flexipop! (illustrated by Mark Manning).
The Adam Ant Story, part two from the October, 1981 issue of Flexipop!.
The Adam Ant Story, part three from the November, 1981 issue of Flexipop!.
Robert Smith of The Cure on the cover of Flexipop!.
Gary Numan “smiling” inside the May, 1981 issue of Flexipop!
Debbie Harry inside the July, 1981 issue of Flexipop!
April, 1982 cover of Flexipop!
The Jam flexi disc from the January, 1981 issue of Flexipop!
“A Day in the Life of Motörhead” from the April 1981 issue of Flexipop! part two is below).
Motörhead flexi disc from the June, 1981 issue of Flexipop!
Phil Lynott of Thin Lizzy on the cover of the September, 1981 issue of Flexipop!
“Saturday Night Weaver” the first panel of a three-page story from the June, 1982 issue of Flexipop! featuring members of the The Damned. Pages two and three can be seen below.
A Bauhaus flexi disc from Flexipop! magazine, October, 1982.
Previously on Dangerous Minds:
‘Like Punk Never Happened’: Remembering Smash Hits, the ‘totally 80s’ pop magazine