My first copy of Splosh! magazine

[snake]

When and where did you buy your first Splosh! magazine?

I bought a copy of issue 16 - "Flanderella" - way back in 1992 in a Falkirk newsagent.



My girlfirend and I used to flick through soft-porn mags for fun in bed. She sent me out one day to buy one from the local newsagent where I discovered Splosh nestling amongst the more regular titles...I had always had a thing for messy scenes... but these were limited to the occasional Razzle Romps (remember them?) and photo sets from mags like Fiesta and Cheap Thrills (this was before the days of the internet.)

I was delighted to find a magazine entirely devoted to girls getting messy. So I shelled out the £6 (how much!?!?) and went back to my girlfriend to show her what I'd found.... We had fun reading the magazine and it was only a few days before we had our own sploshing session.

Here's a scan of the letter I sent to Splosh! which appeared in Issue 21 describing our session.



I only ever saw the magazine for sale in the Falkirk newsagent and a shop in Edinburgh which had an advert in the magazine.... just wondering how much circulation it had and how far it travelled from Tenby!

Anyway, thanks Bill and co. for an excellent magazine (and now a great website and forum) and for starting the whole thing off!

snakescotland (a.k.a. Tom from Striling!)

[Philis]

I got mine from a shop in derby
It was like nothing I'd ever seen before
they had back copys so I went back the next day and bought another

[BillShipton]

Ah those heady days when we had a distributor and kept the local sub post office going (2nd biggest customer after the Dr Who bookshop!).

Our magazine distribution was always a nightmare. We had a guy who dealt with the distribution of lots of small press magazines who initially told us that we could get us into every small newsagents in the country so long as we did six mags a year. So for a year we did. Unfortunately all the mags came back unsold! This was because those shops sell so many magazines you only get about a quarter inch of your cover showing so you have to be really determined to find it - especially if its your local corner shop.

As a result, we settled instead for serving the 12 or so shops listed in the magazine including the Edinburgh one and the delightdful Debbie in Derby ourselves (hence the post office trips). Plus one or two minor distributors here and abroad who took batches of them now and again (like Viz, WIWA in Germany and ABS in Poole). These were specialist bookshops (ie mucky books!) and gave you space to show the whole cover, so finding copies was a lot easier.

Largely because of these chains, we never knew exactly where the mags ended up! I remember getting a letter saying one customer had bought one in Finland - somewhere we'd certainly never supplied. And, nearer to home, I did once see one for sale in a St Leonards newsagent.

We were also on sale for a while in Tower Records in Piccadily. Why? Cos the manager had heard that a certain well known ambient-music-writing former Roxy Music performer read it, so it must be cool! So there we were next to Rolling Stone!

So yes I'd be fascinated to know where people got their copies from.

I am semi-delighted to say we have now got all our back issues in one place. So if anybody wants some now, it is simply a case of walking half a mile up the seafront. Buy them before they're pulped!!

[andy250]

I bought my first copy no 18 in a shop nr the Arndale in Manchester got the next one from their, all was going well until the ira blew up, the city centre along with the shop how unthinking of them to reck me local porn shop.

So I went to Bill direct and the rest was cool until the mag stopped then i went into sploshing despression, it lasted about five mins, long time that.

regards

Andy

[wamram]

I got issue 37 in a newsagent kiosk in the Broadmarsh Centre in Nottingham (newsagent gone for years now coffee shop No 186) after that they never had anymore so had mail order issues from a supplier who advertised in the Sunday Sport.

wamram

[NX]

I got my first issue, think it was the one with Gilly in a bath of Chocolate, in Tower Records London and smuggled it back across the border to spookily enough a town near Falkirk!

NX

[Philis]

I got my first issue, think it was the one with Gilly in a bath of Chocolate, in Tower Records London and smuggled it back across the border to spookily enough a town near Falkirk!

NX

what was your method of smuggling was it the deep inside jacket pocket or the classic down the trousers causing the heir flick limp or just inside todays paper

[welshcakes]

I seem to remember my first issue was number 18, which is still my favourite. I happened upon it quite by chance in a squalid newsagents in Swansea High Street, and with my hands all of a quiver I purchased it, hurried off home and proceeded to dehydrate myself alarmingly. It was a defining moment of my life.

[andy250]

ahh this is the one with Sammy in it, in a business suit with Gilly if my knackered memory serves me at all. This was bought from said shop before the ira took a disliking to my porn shop. Now I have to say I wonder if this why have a thing for satin blouses cos i'm sure sam had a blue blouse on for that.

You have a lot too answer for Bill, I think I've worn the pages out.
Not suprised Bill has taken to the speckled hen, its all the work with Sam and Gill its worn the poor sod out.

regards

Andy
p.s. Bill don't ask why I remembered this but I did, whatever happend to farmer Fred!!!!!! now their was a mad charcater, thats another story!!!!

[mudbath]

Hi all due to certain circumstances changing at home (my wife of twelve years walked out on friday leaving me with two young kids) i am really heartbroken but a small wave of hope and happiness has given me something to look towards i can wipe out the entire back catalogue of splosh mags and vids... cheque book at the ready here i come.

[TottyMcGee]

My first Splosh purchase was in a "specialist" bookshop in Wolverhampton, when I first went to meet Princess Mandy there many moons ago. Wolverhampton is a funny place - on the surface it is spectacularly dull and mediocre (once, stranded there of a Sunday night, I ended up driving to Birmingham in search of something to do), but possibly because of this the people there develop all kinds of strange, fun and kinky ways of making their own entertainment. It was there that Mand, Mand's cousin and I did a chaotic street gunging for Comic Relief that ended with a near riot - great days!

Anyway, the two issues I bought were #25 and issue one of the short lived "Simply Wet".

[andy250]

Next time you visit Helen remind and I'll break open the splosh mags, I think I have em all from 17 upwards (how sad is that!!! or how cool is that depends how you look at it.)

regards

Andy
(no money due to i spent it all on splosh mags, hey ho!!!)

[Hayley]

Berry Street Books in Wolverhampton! Near the station.

God know how many parcels I posted there in those far-off days. The guys who ran it was really nice too!

Shocked you only have a couple though Helen. Stock up at once. Simply Wet was a David Wilkey production when he though that if we were doing a mag there must be money in it. Then he realised there wasn't. Never has been money in magazines, Bill just enojyed doing them.

As for Newtown Paperbacks in Edinburgh ("I'll just have the three, missy."). We could never get him to have more than that. "I don't want to be stuck with them," he'd moan and so I'd send him two mags every week!

Hayley

[Phantom]

My first 2 copies came by post simulataneously .. numbers 6 and 7 - after seeing Bill on James Whale, then finding an article on Splosh in ...Fiesta(?) entitled 'Happy Goo Year'.

I've never awaited a package with such anticipation. I was practically in a fever by the time it arrived - delivered to a good mate's house because I was scared my mum would intercept it.

I got a lot of my early Sploshes by post ... and quite a few messy videos too. Man - the thrill when they finally arrived!!

Eventually, I discovered Collins Book Exchange in Caroline Street, Cardiff ... and for a few years he seemed to always have a small corner of his shop devoted to messy videos and Splosh.

Those were great days, before the internet spoilt us rotten. (not that I'm complaining, but those earlier, innocent, underground WAM days were great indeed).

Bill - you should record a song (with very messy video) to celebrate Splosh's heydey. Call it... 'Internet killed the Splosh Magazine' (to the tune of 'video killed the radio star'

Phantom

[snake]

Those were great days, before the internet spoilt us rotten. (not that I'm complaining, but those earlier, innocent, underground WAM days were great indeed).

Bill - you should record a song (with very messy video) to celebrate Splosh's heydey. Call it... 'Internet killed the Splosh Magazine' (to the tune of 'video killed the radio star'

Phantom

looks like Bill started a (nearly) global phenomenon! Well, as far as Finland anyway...

fascinating to see all these replies. I agree that the web did kill the 'underground' feel of waiting for videos to arrive by mail order, but its also true to say that nothing I've come accross on the web is as good as some of the old Buff Film titles - some of the content on Silly Gilly's House comes closest

so let's hear it for the return of Bill Shipton's mess-making expertise! I can almost hear the song playing now...
[hums 'Internet killed the Splosh Magazine'...]