RIP Paul Rambali

 

I was really saddened to learn last week of the death of Paul Rambali, one of the main writers at New Musical Express during its postpunk heyday, and later an editor at The Face. 

I met Paul some years ago in Paris, where he'd moved and continued to work in the media. I was there to promote Retromania, I think - at any rate after whatever it was we were doing together (a radio thing?) we had a lovely chat over lunch, during which he told me interesting stuff about how the music press worked back in those days and just how widely read the papers were, thanks to their phenomenal pass-on rate (many eyes looking at each copy). Some years later, I quoted him from memory in this tribute to the music papers I did for Pitchfork (have a look here, but hurry before it disappears behind a paywall,)

When I was a boy reading the NME every week, I used to have a handful of heroes whose by-lines I'd look out for and who I'd read virtually every single thing by. And then there were the other writers, the bedrock of the paper, who I'd read when they wrote about something I liked or was intrigued by. But when I returned to the music papers for Rip It Up and read through years and years of NME, Sounds, Melody Maker, and some of the monthly magazines too, I found myself more impressed by the work of the writers who weren't attention-seeking show-offs. At NME, writers like Angus Mackinnon, Paul Du Noyer, Dave Hill, Lynn Hanna, Andy Gill, Paul Tickell, Cynthia Rose, Graham Lock, Richard Grabel, many others....  and Paul Rambali. I appreciated the intelligence, clarity, and directness of what they did. It's not that they lacked for passion or incisive opinions or ideas - not at all. But they tended to also do the journalistic work of finding out the facts, telling the story. Which I probably took for granted at the time, but now - as someone undertaking the second draft of history as it were -  I found incredibly valuable. (The same went for their equivalents on Melody Maker and Sounds). 

Rambali in particular did some fantastic work on groups like Pere Ubu and The Pop Group, amongst many other key bands of that time. 

You can find the motherlode of Rambali's punk and postpunk era writing here at Rock's Back Pages

An interview with Joy Division 

Text of that interview here

Here's his review of The Pop Group's Y. 

And here is a famous cover story he did with Captain Beefheart (with famous shots by Anton Corbijn)

When I have a bit more time I will try to dig up some other pieces by Paul.