Dial M for Merthyr

Rachel Trezise was born in the Rhondda Valley in 1978. Her first collection of short stories, 'Fresh Apples', won the EDS Dylan Thomas Prize, and her novel 'In and Out of the Goldfish Bowl' won the Orange Futures Award.

Rachel Trezise grew up listening to the rock behemoths of the late 1980s and harbouring an ambition to write a warts 'n' all rockumentary. At a rock gig in a Rhondda pub, she discovered Midasuno; a gaggle of Merthyr kids with a ton of conviction and a penchant for neck breaking guitar riffs. In 2005 she stepped onto the tour bus they call Black Betty and tracked the band as they razed the British toilet circuit. Part reportage, social history and memoir, Dial M For Merthyrtells the story of a band from the wrong side of the tracks trying to stay afloat in an ever changing musical and social climate.