FOLK (2025)
FOLK (2025)
Velocity Press, UK / worldwide
"A timeless portrait of the bittersweet growing pains of youth. I absolutely loved it."
– Justin Robertson
Buy it now via Velocity Press︎︎︎ or at your local bookshop
London launch at Farsight Gallery, Soho, with Emma Warren (Faber) and photographer Yushy as part of the exhibition Section 63: Underground & Unmasted - Documenting Underground London Raves
Upcoming Events
Sound Metaphors, Berlin
Thurs 18 Sept 2025
Weichselstraße 22, 12045, Berlin
5pm - 7pm
I will be in conversation with Paul Hanford for the Berlin Launch of my novel FOLK at the new Sound Metaphors record store in Neukölln.
We'll be playing some records related to the book (almost none of them are on Spotify....) and talking a bit about the novel's themes. You don't need to have read the book first but if you want to know more about it I've written this piece for the publisher's website.
About Paul Hanford:
Paul is a writer, podcaster, broadcaster and teacher originally from the UK, now based in Berlin. His work lives at the intersection of music, culture, and storytelling — creating spaces where ideas, creativity, and people connect.
His book, Coming To Berlin (also on Velocity Press), received recognition from BBC 6Music, Mixmag, DJMag, The Wire, Deutschlandfunk and more. He hosts the Arts Council England-awarded and Audio-Technica sponsored podcast Lost and Sound, where he's spoken with artists shaping the future of music, from Peaches and Laurent Garnier to Kali Malone and Bradley Zero.
Alongside this, he teaches Music Culture and Music Business at BIMM University Berlin and has designed and delivered workshops for organisations including Apple's Creative Studios, Refuge Worldwide, and the University of East London.
As a cultural consultant and workshop leader, he has collaborated with brands, festivals, museums, and institutions to develop experiences around creativity, collaboration, and cultural understanding. He has also curated music for events at Tate Modern, Victoria & Albert Museum, TED, Cannes Film Festival, LOST and Somerset House.
Previously, Paul was Head of Music at Secret Cinema, presented for Hoxton Radio and London Live TV, and released records as part of Brothers In Sound (Parlophone) and Sancho (Seed Records).
A story of friendship, fidelity and finding your path
For Mark, Folk was always more than a youth club. It was home. A space to grow up, mess up, and stand by his tribe. Then the mysterious ‘Jason’ turns up and Mark’s world goes into freefall. A summer of heartbreak and hedonism culminates in a wild camping trip, where it’s not just ideals that get abandoned.
What emerges in the aftermath of that summer is an unflinching portrait of teenhood, masculinity and memory as underground culture collided with establishment control, and a generation fought to define itself.
Set against a backdrop of DIY sound systems and tectonic shifts in society, FOLK captures the moment when analogue met digital, rave met resistance, and youth culture found both freedom and fallout.
The release of the novel comes at a time when youth clubs are closing, civil unrest is growing and society feels more polarised than ever. FOLK combines the cultural detail of Andrew O'Hagan's Mayflies with the urgency of Ali Smith. This is historical fiction that speaks to today's debates around identity and what it means to belong.
What emerges in the aftermath of that summer is an unflinching portrait of teenhood, masculinity and memory as underground culture collided with establishment control, and a generation fought to define itself.
Set against a backdrop of DIY sound systems and tectonic shifts in society, FOLK captures the moment when analogue met digital, rave met resistance, and youth culture found both freedom and fallout.
The release of the novel comes at a time when youth clubs are closing, civil unrest is growing and society feels more polarised than ever. FOLK combines the cultural detail of Andrew O'Hagan's Mayflies with the urgency of Ali Smith. This is historical fiction that speaks to today's debates around identity and what it means to belong.
Acclaim for FOLK
"Persuasive and powerful... offering new insights into the freedoms offered by illegal raves and radical youth clubs, told through the lens of an overthinking teenage boy and his friends."
– Emma Warren, author of Up The Youth Club (Faber)
“Evocative, funny and bittersweet…a rave folk tale brimming with Shane Meadows levels of small-town Englishness. Full of dodgy situations, crumbling ideals, first love and finding magic in the mundane, all set to the rising pulse of free rave culture drawing ever closer.”
– Paul Hanford, author of Coming To Berlin (Velocity Press)
"A captivating coming of age tale, that though set in the heady excitement of 90s rave culture, is a timeless portrait of the bitter sweet growing pains of youth. I absolutely loved it."
– Justin Robertson, author of The Trial of Jonah (Velocity Press)
Longlisted for the McKitterick Prize in 2023, awarded annually by the Society of Authors to a first novel by a writer aged 40 or over.
