The idea for this cartoon, which is in the current Private Eye, came while reading an article by Simon Reynolds about his new book Retromania, which is about how 21st century pop culture is endlessly revisiting the past.
I really enjoyed Reynolds' Rip It Up and Start Again, a study of post-punk and new wave music, so I may well read the new one, but I can't help thinking that the argument is a little spurious. After all, the first music I really got into as a kid was 2-Tone, which was itself a revival of an earlier wave of ska.
So I started to think, "I've heard this argument more than a few times before", which sparked the idea for the cartoon. The cartoon doesn't refer to Reynolds, and that's not supposed to be him, as it's more about the way newspapers and magazines are just as happy to revisit past glories.
Click here to buy Royston's cartoon book