Geoff Barton

British music journalist and editor (b. July 1955). Geoff Barton is best known as the founder of Kerrang! Magazine and the deputy editor of England's leading music newspaper, Sounds, who first used and popularized the term "New Wave of British Heavy Metal" (NWOBHM) in the press. According to Bruce Dickinson of Iron Maiden, quoted in Esquire's April 2014 article: "NWOBHM was a fiction, really, an invention of Geoff Barton and Sounds [...] cunning ruse to boost circulation [but it did] represent a lot of bands that were utterly ignored by the mainstream media." Barton has been working as Classic Rock "editor-at-large" since 2004. Geoff Barton began his career in 1974, joining Sounds newspaper after completing the London College Of Printing journalism course. Soon promoted to deputy editor, Geoff specialized in rock and metal. On 8 May 1979, he visited a concert at The Music Machine organized by Neal Kay, a resident DJ at Bandwagon club, with Angel Witch, Iron Maiden and Samson (3) performing. Barton's review came out in the 19 May '79 issue of Sounds in a centerfold article, "If You Want Blood (and Flashbombs and Dry Ice and Confetti) You Got It." It also had a historical subtitle, The New Wave Of British Heavy Metal: first in an occasional series by Deaf Barton, suggested by his boss and Sounds editor-in-chief, Alan Lewis (2). Geoff further propagated the catchy term and NWOBHM abbreviature, soon picked by other periodicals, such as Beat Instrumental, Spin Magazine, Musician, Billboard, Modern Drummer and others. In June 1981, Alan Lewis offered Barton to edit a one-off issue focused on heavy metal and NWOBHM, printed in color on glossy paper (unlike regular Sounds "black&white" newspaper issues). It was titled Kerrang! — onomatopoeia for the power chord on distorted electric guitar; Barton authored the entire first issue with AC/DC's Angus Young on the cover, with a few contributions from Pete Makowski and Pete Frame. It proved so popular that Kerrang! Magazine continued as an independent monthly publication, with some of its early contributors including Tony Mitchell (5), Sylvie Simmons, Sandy Robertson, Phil Bell and Robbi Millar. In February '82, after eight monthly issues, Kerrang! became a fortnight (bi-weekly) magazine; it went weekly after 1987. Geoff Barton quit Kerrang! in 1995, describing his departure as "kind of forced" in the subsequent interview with RockCritics.com. The magazine's publisher EMAP was struggling with declining sales, forced to shut down Kerrang! German and Spanish editions and a short-lived "extreme metal" magazine Ultrakill! after a handful of issues. Barton's felt discouraged by EMAP's attempts to stir both Kerrang! and its second flagship magazine, RAW, towards different demographics and genres, such as Britpop, Grunge and Alt-Rock, and was pushed out of the publishing house shortly after.