Roger Kean

Roger Kean, the co-founder of Newsfield magazines and editor of CRASH and ZZAP!64 died on 3rd January this year, barely five months after the death of his partner Oliver Frey.  This isn't an obituary as such, it's more a way to try and get down my thoughts on someone who I never met but who had a huge impact on my life. I wouldn't be sitting here in front of my computer on a sunny January morning if I hadn't picked up issue 13 of CRASH from the Hempstead Valley WH Smith's*. What's surprising about that issue of CRASH is how opaque it is to the first time reader. The first page of the magazine talks about the failure of a Great Space Race, what? Then references "a piece of PR from Hutchinson Computer Publishing", what's PR? Oh, and someone called Angus Ryall has upset John Merry of Scorpio Gamesworld; is that bad?

I'd flirted with other computer magazines since being given a ZX Spectrum earlier in 1984, mainly COMPUTER & VIDEOGAMES and SINCLAIR USER, but none of them hit the spot in the way that issue of CRASH did. I can't explain why but the references to Mark Butler, John Gilbert, Brian Bloodaxe, and something called Jet Set Willy (oo-er, sounds a bit rude) weren't alienating they were hints to a bigger world and CRASH was the map (illustrated by Oliver Frey, of course). I became a regular reader immediately and February 28th 1985, the date of the next issue, couldn't come round quickly enough. I've read, and re-read, that issue of CRASH so many times since but I can still see echoes of what appealed the first time round.

The irreverence in the opening paragraph of the Son of Blagger review: "Quite who the hero Blagger may be is not detailed in this game or why the son of Mr. Blagger should be called Slippery Sid who's real dad would appear to be another person called Roger the Dodger, It's all most confusing. What isn't so muddling is that Slippery Sid, attempting to out-emulate his famous dad, is working as an espionage agent deep inside Spectrum Security HQ on a task to collect all the golden keys dotted around the large scrolling complex. Quite why he should be doing this is not explained either and gives the feeling you've just walked into an exciting TV serial in the middle of episode three."

The dirty laundry airing editorial about ex-Imagine director Mark Butler, who had moved on to Thor Software, and contacted CRASH to say the company would not be paying for their advert in the Christmas issue. The piece rebutted a comment from another Thor director that, "the ad was badly placed on a left- hand page, when it is their policy to book only right- hand pages," by pointing out: "Our paperwork, confirmations of which they were sent, shows that no special conditions were placed on the booking," and ended with a slightly soap opera-ish spoiling for a fight: "Considering how much advertising Imagine placed with computer magazines and never paid for over many, many months, it just goes to show that you can't teach an old dog new tricks -like behaving decently for instance."

Letters Editor Lloyd Mangram (really Roger Kean writing under a nom de plume to make the list of contributors a little longer) taking the time to explain the mechanics of magazine production to a reader who wanted to know why CRASH didn't use more colour photographs. And the breath-taking reply to another reader who complains of being ripped off after trying to swap copies of games by post: "Well, at the risk of offending, you know what they say -there's no honour among thieves!"

CRASH
October 1985 page 64

CRASH was never better than when it was edited directly by Roger Kean. It was a disappointment, in issue 19, to read that he was moving on, although Graeme Kidd was an acceptable substitute. What clearly wasn't acceptable was that Roger Kean was moving on to edit ZZAP!64. He was defecting to the Commie64! A few, hopefully mostly good natured, reader references to "traitor Kean" slipped into the issues following his move to the dark side but the nickname appears to have stung because it became a reference he applied to himself. First in a ZZAP!64 editorial when he announced he was moving on again, then again in CRASH 39 when he returned, writing: "So ‘Traitor’ Kean returns... I earned the appellation ‘Traitor’ from CRASH readers! Somewhat unfairly, as I have always kept well in touch with CRASH, have always been its publisher, and many of the pages you have read over the past year may well have been ‘laid out’ by my hands". Look at it this way, did the readers of SMASH HITS care this much when the editor changed?  

I always kept a nostalgia for CRASH but I never had the chance to meet either Roger Kean or Oliver Frey. I would have loved to meet them but I worry I would either have been the stereotypical fan or struck dumb by the sense of occasion.

Except one day I got an email from Roger Kean**. 

What could it mean? Why was Roger Kean emailing me? What was a RIP file? Why was Roger Kean emailing me? No, the better question was, how was Roger Kean emailing me?  I knew about the forthcoming 2019 ZZAP annual from Fusion Retro Books but what did that have to do with me? I remember feeling utterly confounded. Black was white. Ceilings were floors. What was happening?

I'd been cc'd in on a message to someone called Borja. The email didn't provide any clues.

Hi Borja,

PLC and selfends pages all OK

For the interior pages, a few single-page pdf corrections I will send immediately, otherwise everything is fine to print:

Page 22: new pdf to replace (column rule over blue-green picture)

Page 48: new pdf to replace (column rule runs off bottom)

Page 49: new pdf to replace (2 column rules not quite aligned)

Page 90 PLEASE NOTE – my fault! – Page 90 is repeated, please delete the FIRST one (it has a column rule running through the dark blue picture – the second version is correct)

Page 122 new pdf to replace (column rules in front)

There was an attachment as well. It didn't provide enlightenment. Finally I realised what had happened. I'd ordered a print from Oliver Frey Art in 2017 and received a confirmation of my order from Roger Kean; my address had been added into the ZZAP email in place of someone working on the annual. My next worry was, do I reply? I received Roger's email at 12.30pm. It took me until 3.41pm to summon up the courage to send a nervous message back.

Hello Roger,

This email came to me by mistake, but thank you for the Zzap Annual preview.

You got my email address when I ordered one of Oliver's art prints last year.

Roger's response was much quicker. Three minutes later:

Thanks for letting me know. Damned Mac Apple Mail!

The CC was supposed to be to Chris Wilkins. :)

Naturally, I’d be grateful you keep the pages to yourself until after the annual is released!

Best,
Roger

I was getting cocky and overconfident now. It took me barely two hours to message back:

Hello Roger,

No problem. I won't do anything with the pages.

As an old Crash reader, thanks brightening a dull afternoon at work. For a moment I was able to exist in an odd emotional flux of "Roger Kean is emailing me about Zzap!" / "Roger Kean is emailing me about Zzap?"

And I got one final reply:

Glad to be of service ! 😆

ZZAP!64
Issue 17 page 7

*although you'd think at some point in the intervening years I'd have learned apostrophe use. I'm sitting here worrying whether that should be WH Smith's or WH Smith but I'm also too lazy to look it up. I'm going to pretend it's a tribute to those little speeling and grammer bugs which used to creep into magazines in the days before spellcheckers were a thing.
** Yes. I've kept those emails for five years. I will keep them forever.