Sparks - Song by Song, Volume 1

A new book on Sparks!

Available from December 1, 2025

Click on the picture below to read more.

An information site about

Hello and welcome to FanMael, a website dedicated to the career of brothers Ron and Russell Mael, better known as Sparks. FanMael was a Dutch-based information centre and fan club for Sparks, which started as early as 1975. With the growing interest in Sparks, thanks to their most recent albums, The Sparks Brothers documentary by Edgar Wright, and the film Annette, directed by Leos Carax, I felt it was time to revive the site, as many new fans would like to learn more about the history of Sparks.

Origin of FanMael

FanMael was originally founded by Bart van de Hoogen in 1975. At that time, the magazine was called Propaganda. I took over in 1979 and, until 1990, when I moved to Denmark, I regularly published a Sparks fanzine in both Dutch and English. After returning to the Netherlands in 1993, I joined Peter de Wit to help him with his new fanzine. When Peter passed away in 1996, I continued the fanzine, now called FanMael, together with long-time Sparks fan and fellow collector Stef Streur.

In 1998, Carl van Breukelen joined us and, with his knowledge of websites, we launched one of the first websites dedicated to Sparks. When Sparks launched their official website a few years later, we discontinued our activities.

Carl passed away in 2017, and in the years that followed I continued to collect everything related to Sparks, converting my knowledge into lists and documents. I wanted to share the information I had gathered over the years with other fans.

In memory of Peter and Carl, and the good old days, I have also named this website FanMael, although it looks nothing like the original site. I will try to update it regularly. If you have any questions or comments, you can contact me at info@fanmael.nl.