Dogma – the Brighton publication proving Fanzines are alive and well

Now I am not saying that WAB will publicise anything in exchange for something free or cold hard cash, but we once had a two month long email exchange with a company wanting their beauty products promoted.

They viewed WAB as influencers because of our “Instagram presence“. A little bit of market research would have told them that they had approached an account that was more cans of Stella than Kylie Jenner.

Anyway, they eventually twigged that photos taken on the 8.05am London Kings Cross train bound for Sheffield were unlikely to convince women in their twenties that they should buy this skin cream, foundation and whatever else.

Which was a shame as you never know when you will need a years supply of blusher in exchange for highlighting what a fantastic tone it is.

We are telling you this because unlike when it comes to beauty products and our limited knowledge meaning we would promote quite literally anything, we do know a fair but about football fanzines.

So when we say that the latest publication in Brighton & Hove Albion fanzinedom is good, what we mean is it is really good.

Dogma is onto its fourth issue and it already feels like a worthy successor to the long line of great Albion fanzines who came before it.

Gulls Eye ruffled the feathers of the board and landed those behind it in court before helping to save the club alongside On The Up, which later developed into Seaside Saga.

Scars & Stripes kept Albion fans entertained during the Gillingham and early Withdean years, followed by Keep The Faith named after Micky Adams’ favourite phrase.

If you ever want to read back the fanzines of yesteryear, then the superb Seagulls Programmes website has many copies archived for all time.

They offer a fascinating window into what it was like to be a Brighton fan at various points over the past 30 years, since Gulls Eye first appeared for sale on Old Shoreham Road.

Most recently, The Seagull Love Review covered 58 editions and six years from Withdean to the Amex before going to the printers for the last time in 2014.

In the seven years since TSLR ceased, the Albion have changed enormously, going from a club who thought appointing Sami Hyypia was a good idea to a highly polished, established top flight outfit.

Dogma mirrors that in a way. The first thing you notice is the quality of the fanzine itself. It is printed on proper paper and is more like an actual book or brochure than a set of A4 sheets painstakingly folded and stapled together.

That sort of production has been left in the Championship, with the likes of Hyypia, Gary Gardner and Leon Best. This is a Premier League design for a Premier League club,

Whereas you would happily leave the fanzines of yesteryear on the bathroom floor for a quick read, it would be almost sacrilege to do that to the glossy print of Dogma.

Its quality is so high that it is more deserving of a place on the dinner table, which is exactly where issue number four has been kept at WAB Towers for a cursory after-dinner read.

Just beware when keeping it in an eating environment – the complimentary stickers included can fall into the remains of a roast beef dinner. Yes, you get free stickers.

Even my missus has been caught thumbing through it after she has finished her dessert. For someone whose interest in the Albion is limited to the social side of drinking in different cities on away days, Marc Cucurella’s hair and making up player songs to Sophie Ellis-Bextor tracks like Moder on the Dancefloor, that is quite a recommendation for the actual content inside Dogma.

And what of that content? Well, it is excellent. Issue four contained 50 pages of everything a fanzine should be. Satirical, sometimes controversial and always opinionated.

The best fanzines do not analyse games, they take the thoughts and feelings of what it is like to be a football supporter and put them into words on paper.

You do not pick up a fanzine to read a report about how Brighton won 2-1 Burnley. You pick up a fanzine to read about the sheer, unadulterated horror of a 20 minute queue for beer in the away end at Turf Moor meaning you have to watch the first half sober.

Dogma captures the emotion of what football can mean. Anyone who has lost someone during the pandemic can relate to Tom Hyland’s brilliant piece The Return of Football, especially if that lost one happened to be an Albion fan.

The European Super League takes a rightful bashing. At the other end of the pyramid, difficult questions are asked about the growing popularity of non league football. Clubs like Dulwich Hamlet are being gentrified by hipsters. Is that a good thing?

German football fans are always worth listening to and an interview with Sascha Kruppa about fan culture, Deutsche Bahn and Pascal Gross is fascinating.

And if you were in any doubt about whether Leo Ostigard is going to be a star (with or without the Albion) then Edward Woodhouse has the answer.

Some of the writers penning pieces in Dogma will be familiar from TSLR and its predecessors. There are new names too, whose words are now getting a platform they are very much worthy of. There is something in Dogma for everyone, basically.

For a long time, football supporters have been told that fanzines are dying out along with other forms of print media. But not at Brighton, or at least anymore

As Albion fans, we are lucky to have a dedicated group of supporters who have worked hard over the past five or six years to put out podcasts.

We have one of the biggest club message boards on the internet, which itself hosts some of the ridiculous and outlandish comments and opinions which used to fill the page of fanzines.

Several blogs churn out great content and WAB has been nominated for the Football Content Awards on four occasions, so we must be doing something right in-between trying to secure influencer deals with beauty companies.

The one thing that has been missing in terms of fan-led content since the days of TSLR is a fanzine. Dogma has picked up the baton and is already running away with it after just four issues.

Roll on issue five, which we will be hopefully be reading whilst wearing some fake tan or eye shadow for promotional reasons. We recommend you take a look.

A 2021-22 subscription to Dogma costs just £8.50. For more information or to subscribe, please click here to go to the Dogma website.