Writer, Editor, DJ, SpeakerDeputy Editor and Folk Music Columnist at The Quietus
Author of Bedsit Land: The Strange Worlds Of Soft Cell
Photo by Stu Green
BYLINES
The GuaRDIAN
NME
THE QUIETUS
WEIRD WALK
DIY
YES&NO
SONGLINES
BBC
MARVIN
RALPH
ThE LINE OF BESt FIt
NO DEPRESSION
PRESS CLIEnTS
ROUGH tRADE
4AD
DOMINO
HEAVENLY
MUTE
AD 93
BROADSIDE HACKS
PIAS
SELECTED WORK
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![Nourished By Time sat on a staircase looking upwards]()
“Love, labour and existentialism”: Nourished By Time’s unexpected rise (NME COVER FEATURE)
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![A group of intense looking female morris dancers]()
In Defence of the Progressive Power of Morris Dancing (The Quietus)
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![A blurry photograph in black and white of the band Young Fathers]()
Heavy Is The Heart: Young Fathers (DIY MAGAZINE COVER FEATURE)
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![John Francis Flynn]()
'People’s idea of Irishness is so warped': John Francis Flynn, the folk singer fighting for Dublin’s spirit (The Guardian)
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![The front cover of Dry Cleaning's Secret Love, showing a woman having her eyeball washed]()
Dry Cleaning's Secret Love Reviewed (The Quietus)
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![Nadeem Din-Gabisi in white tracksuit top with a red England hat, holding a rose]()
England is Mine: An Interview with Nadeem Din-Gabisi (The Quietus)
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![The band Caroline posing with empty picture frames and a telephone]()
Artist Biography: Caroline (Rough Trade)
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![Nighttime city street scene with cars, buildings, and streetlights, overlaid with colorful digital abstract waves and a large, stylized profile of a person's face in profile.]()
Why Bowie, Bambaataa, and Belleville Three Bow to Japan (Ralph Magazine)
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![Four men standing in a room with white brick walls and a large window, engaging in conversation.]()
YHWH Nailgun: relentless New York noisemakers in search of something higher (NME COVER FEAture)
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![The band Shack]()
Like Starting Over: An Interview with Shack (The Quietus)
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![Black and white photo of three men standing side by side against a plain background. The man on the left has a beard and mustache, wearing a dark button-up shirt with tattooed arms. The man in the middle has short hair, wearing a dark shirt with an upturned collar, looking directly at the camera. The man on the right has curly hair, wearing sunglasses, a light jacket over a graphic t-shirt, smiling broadly.]()
Opposites Attract: Manic Street Preachers Interviewed (The Quietus)
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![The Pogues performing live]()
The Pogues review – triumphant tribute to energy and poetry of band’s early days (The Guardian)
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![Bill Ryder Jones sat smiling in front of stacks of books]()
Safe As Houses: An Interview With Bill Ryder-Jones (The Quietus)
Bedsit Land
Bedsit Land
My debut book Bedsit Land: The Strange Worlds Of Soft Cell was published by the Manchester University Press in 2024 as the inaugural entry in their British Pop Archive series. Redressing the narrative that Soft Cell were little more than a one hit wonder synth pop band, the book instead presents Marc Almond in all their radical, transgressive, esoteric glory.
Plunging into the archives and interviewing more than sixty contributors, including the band members themselves, I follow Soft Cell through the many strange and sprawling worlds that shaped their extraordinary career. They lead me from the faded camp glamour of the British seaside to the dizzying thrills of the New York club scene. From transgressive student performance art to the sleaze and squalor of pre-gentrified Soho. From the glitz of British showbiz to the drug-addled chaos of post-Franco Spain.
Nominated for the 2025 ARSC Awards for Excellence in Historical Recorded Sound Research
Praise for BEDSIT LAND
“Clarke brings together threads of discourse and aesthetics that feel truly unspoken [...] shows how Soft Cell inherited their own totem of working class glamour, with alchemical results."
— Tribune“A really, really good read"
— BBC 6 Music“A wonderful web of all the sticky threads that give Soft Cell their proper context. Clarke’s writing is full of empathy for what it’s like to be at the mercy of an audience. It positions Soft Cell, rightly in my opinion, as one of the most fearless duos in pop music.”
— Florence Shaw, Dry Cleaning“For those who only know ‘Tainted Love’, Patrick Clarke’s thorough and exciting book repositions Soft Cell as key counter-culturalists, at the very heart of a musical and artistic revolution.”
— Bob Stanley, author of Yeah Yeah Yeah
“Patrick Clarke’s book explores how, more than any other act, Soft Cell came to encapsulate the spirit of eighties libertinism, dirt-smeared glamour and joyous amorality. And, more importantly, how they made artful future pop music and dancefloor classics – music that provided a primer for Pulp, Brit Pop, synth takeover and house music yet to emerge. Detailing a world in transition, Soft Cell were observant and caustic. A perfect combination of British sleaze and exotic cosmopolitanism. A story of muck and glitter in equal measure.”
— Dr Stephen Mallinder, Cabaret Voltaire, Creep Show, Wrangler“Sordid and euphoric"
— TLS
“A must read for all fans of Soft Cell, synth music, art, fashion, fame or anyone interested in being iconic.”
— Blitzed Magazine“A fascinating and energetic dive into the seedy chaos of Soft Cell's short early life.”
— Luke Turner, author of Out of the Woods
“Clarke’s expert sifting of witness testimony captures the soul inside the eighties’ most brilliantly subversive duo.”
— Cathi Unsworth, author of Season of the Witch
RADICAL TRADITIONAL
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RADICAL TRADITIONAL 〰️
Boss Morris in October 2024. Photo by Anete Lapsa, taken from this article on morris dancing
Radical Traditional is the core of my current long-term project, exploring the idea that radicalism and tradition need not be opposites, and that ancient songs and sounds can provide us with a route forwards as we consider issues of identity in an era of societal collapse.
Its current form is a quarterly exploration of boundary-pushing folk projects from around the world. Each season, I write an in-depth feature delving deep into one specific facet of the scene. Previous instalments have included he transgressive power of Morris dancing, cross-temporal communion between the new scene and the old, the collectives rethinking race, gender, queerness and class within folksong and more.
Then, I present 10 essential new releases uncovered from the depths of the internet, from sentient lap steels to a dadaist confluence of dub and folksong, via harsh noise bodhran, extreme Occitan freakouts,
There are big things in development for Radical Traditional in the near future. Watch this space!
Follow Me
Follow Me
I am open to writing commissions, gig bookings, onstage interviewing and much more.