Read classic punk 'zines, without the inky fingers!

May 23, 2007 3:35 AM

Read classic punk 'zines, without the inky fingers! Too young to have read the first issue of Flipside? Need confirmation that Maximum Rock 'N' Roll was just as boring (does/did anyone actually read those MRR Scene Reports?) and elitist back then as it is now? Do you find it hard to believe that Soul Asylum used to be credible enough to be interviewed by Suburban Voice? Or maybe you just want to marvel/feel-sad-for the obviously painstaking effort someone went through to scan every single page of these 'zines (including HeartattaCk) into PDFs? Well here 'ya go.
posted by melorama (25 comments total)

I read MRR until the thing where they refused to sell advertising to Atom and His Package on the grounds that Atom isn't punk rock.
posted by Pope Guilty at 3:41 AM on May 23, 2007

I wish I had known about this guy before I literally threw over 10 years worth of MRR zines in the garbage.
posted by melorama at 3:50 AM on May 23, 2007

Clearly, I'm not punk enough.
posted by MarshallPoe at 4:09 AM on May 23, 2007

Neato, thanks! (And my husband would totally have taken those MRRs off your hands... doh)
posted by AV at 4:10 AM on May 23, 2007

Dear MF,

Kudos on running the piece on ol' punx litter-eh-sure. But melorama (or should I say, melodrama) - my God, you are an asshole. MaxR&R has had its up days and its down days, but there was FAR WORSE shit out there, you fucked-up fucking fuck. Of course, you were probabally too damn lazy (or maybe cheap - or perhaps you were one of those rich kids pretending to be cheap) to read anything else! The MRR SCENE REPORTS were cool - not to mention a useful resource, but I don't expect a piece of shit like you to have enough brain cells to figure it out. (Perhaps you do know that, but are too buzzed from bad pot and cheap booze that you've confused Max with some dumb shitrag like FORCED EXPOSURE, but I digress.)

Except for that one dickwipe who cranked out fake band updates, the SCENE REPORTS were useful in helping punx know about the goings-on of other parts of the world. That's right, I said the world. You were probabally too young to be shitting your diapers to know about Doc Mohawk's life in the Philippines, or of accounts of Russia's rebuilding after the Soviet downfall from the standpoint of bands like J.M.K.E. - or maybe melorama (or should I say motorama?) the abundance of capital letters in MRR's pages were too much for your widdle eyes.

And yeah, I even read the Tape Reviews. Most of those, I'll agree sucked fresh monkey balls big time, but it was a way for bands to reach an audience. Not everybody could afford vinyl press services, ya know. That's all I gots to say on that.

All in all, though your (sic) right on the mark about the coolness of the zines. I can't thank you enough for that, and you're doing a great job in that department. But you shouldn't go off on shit like the SCENE REPORTS without expecting some anger.

Fuck Everything Very Much,
Smart Dalek
Lower Suburbia

P.S. - Yeah, yeah, I know it's the 21st Century an' all that shit, but PDFs are a joke.

P.P.S. - If anybody wants to visit the Upstate NY scene for a gig, or to have a beer, you're too late. It died about 20 years ago.

P.P.P.S. - THEPINKSUPERHERO and a few other MFers got to meet with MYKEL BOARD of ARTLESS and MRR. You were probably just jealous of that, and let slip that part about Max being "boring". That's okay, shit happens.
posted by Smart Dalek at 4:54 AM on May 23, 2007 [3 favorites]

Wow, just looking at MR&R reminds me how much I hated it. We all knew 'real' punk was made in England, anyway, and passed away in 1976. Fuckin' poseurs.
posted by unSane at 5:02 AM on May 23, 2007

Holy Fuck, you're brilliant, Dalek.

And yes, I've had a crush on Mikk-el Board for years. He's a great case for bisexuality. Although I'm probably more jealous of him for getting to meet TPS than I am of TPS getting to meet Mykel.

I'm still more punk than you, though.
posted by melorama at 5:07 AM on May 23, 2007

And shouldn't it be signed "Smart DaleKKK"?
posted by melorama at 5:10 AM on May 23, 2007

We should have you over for one of the NYC meetups, mel - preferably on a night where Board's Eat/Drink Clubs are in session, so you'll enjoy the best of both worlds.

As for the name, it's pronounced Dal-liquor!
posted by Smart Dalek at 5:32 AM on May 23, 2007

This interview was one of the funniest things I had ever read back in the "day." I would re-read it over and over again and cackle like an idiot. I believe the original interview included his phone number, and one night I called him (mentioned in the Sid thread awhile back) and got his answering machine. I was completely shit faced, and mumbled for awhile before I said "GG you fuck, this is D***. Call me back or I'll kill all my friends."

He never called back.
posted by tr33hggr at 5:33 AM on May 23, 2007

Well, I used to read the Scene Reports too, and pretty much everything between the covers, in my teenage years. I loved the sense of community and resistance, against the right and against nuclear war. Then just when that spirit was most needed it was gone, leaving Avril Lavigne and Blink 182 to carry the torch.
posted by Flashman at 5:36 AM on May 23, 2007

Then just when that spirit was most needed it was gone, leaving Avril Lavigne and Blink 182 to carry the torch.

You really aren't looking hard enough. You think ten thousand basements and backyard sheds and sleezy bars aren't filled with ten thousand loud obnoxious hardcore/punk bands right this moment, or some time soon?
posted by Jimbob at 5:59 AM on May 23, 2007

In other news, I really, really miss Trouser Press magazine.
posted by willmize at 6:26 AM on May 23, 2007

He never called back.

And...? Did you kill your friends or what? You can't just start the story and not wrap it up.
posted by grubi at 6:56 AM on May 23, 2007

I miss Ben Is Dead.
posted by sourwookie at 7:02 AM on May 23, 2007

Thanks for this melorama. Brings back a lot of memories, both good and bad. Hopefully this'll inspire me to finally start scanning some of my own old zines.

And since tr33hggr brought up the GG Allin interview, I've gotta comment - nobody gets as much hate on MeFi as GG (outside of the Bush administration, I guess). But seriously, read that interview and tell me with a straight face that GG is not a genius. The man was incredible, straight up. Non-stop hilarity.

Best of the web, right here.
posted by stinkycheese at 7:36 AM on May 23, 2007

MRR could be boring, yes, and hard to read due to tiny print, but it was OURS. Remember, those scene reports sorta functioned the way the Interweb does now -- to link people who might've been geographically distant but psychically (philosophically, that is, not ESP or whatever) on the same wavelength. I always liked Flipside better, though, 'cuz all that politics crap in MRR seemed like preaching to the choir. "Peace Punx Unite!" ad nauseam.

I've still got 'em, too, packed away in the keepsakes box with gig flyers and the name & phone number, written on a Camel cigarette pack, of the skinhead from New Jersey to whom I lost my virginity.
posted by scratch at 8:01 AM on May 23, 2007

I didn't know GG got MeFi hate.
posted by SentientAI at 9:13 AM on May 23, 2007

I'm actually amazed nobody's showed up yet to say how much he sucks. Find MeFi hate here, here, and here, just for starters. Also, some joking at GG's expense.

GG gets away with no hate here.

And there's innumerable threads where GG gets namedropped as basically being disgusting, without any real strong emotions being expressed. Which I guess I can't really find fault with.
posted by stinkycheese at 9:35 AM on May 23, 2007

Man, I loved MMR when I was a li'l punk. Read it cover to cover. I gave it up, though, after the third (or thereabouts) year of factional infighting over whether Bad Religion was or was not sellout corporate scum.

I'm a little nervous to see if it's aged as badly as I have.
posted by lekvar at 9:36 AM on May 23, 2007

grubi - I spared my friends, but only because they had bought all the Jack Daniels for that evening.
posted by tr33hggr at 12:14 PM on May 23, 2007

This really takes me back to the days in the late 80s and early 90s when I was religiously running 40-word ads in the back of MRR (for $2 each!), flogging punk rock/noise singles and LPs.

Before the Internets and eBay, the MRR classifieds were the solution for trading and selling punk wax, as well as finding tape traders.

I don't miss MRR or FlipSide at all these days, but oh, what I wouldn't give to have Forced Exposure back in action as a magazine... (they're only a distributor and record label now, haven't published a new issue since 1993)
posted by porn in the woods at 1:31 PM on May 23, 2007

I have all this shit in storage in my attic, waiting for you losers to reach yer midlife crisis and throw money at me for them.

Ha! No way am I selling them. "No Duh", "No Idea", "No Depression", no way man. Ahhh, the zine revolution, those were the days.

Actually, I only have one or two MRR's, didn't care for it much, infighting and juvenilia and all.
posted by intermod at 9:33 PM on May 23, 2007

Hey, No Duh was done by my old housemate -- in fact we met through zines, having traded ours through the mail.

I have a big plastic storage tub full of zines in the garage. A few years ago I sold 15 to 20 pounds (by the pound) of them on eBay -- I didn't make any money on it, obviously, but I wanted to make sure they went to good homes.
posted by The corpse in the library at 4:40 PM on May 24, 2007

GG Allin... I could never take his thrashed out albums and the guy was a douche... but I have a couple of singles of his which are utter genius. "Liquor Slicked Highway", "Sitting in this Room", "When I Die" and so on are tortured, cracked, and strangely moving.

Also they contain probably the most brutally self-aware lyric I've ever heard...

She was no woman
But she's woman enough for me
She's got that cunt between her legs
And that's all I need

In an odd way I think he could have been Johnny Cash if he'd tried.
posted by unSane at 8:39 PM on May 25, 2007