SPECIAL ISSUE ALERT: Maximum Rocknroll #396 is here, the May 2016 issue, the zines special edition! We’ve got over a dozen features on zines from all over planet Earth, each of them revealing a living print culture that is truly killer, absolutely vital and undeniably punk. Emmy Ramone talks about their zines Cretins of Distortion and the Mental Whiff, digging at the roots of human expression through punk in the Midwest and beyond; Alex Ratcharge conducts an interview with NUTS! fanzine: learn all about the long journey from Olympia to New York City and all the ink stains in between; Golnar Nikpour interviews the world’s number one fan of noisy and psychotic hardcore, Tom Mayhugh of General Speech. Getting personal: Fluke fanzine celebrates its 25th anniversary and Burn Collector’s Al Burian talks about his music and his move from New York to Berlin. From the Bay Area we have As You Were, a comic zine anthology based out of San Francisco from label/publisher Silver Sprocket; Not Shit, a skate fanzine dedicated to the punk/DIY approach, and the Enthusiast, a brilliant and ASCII art-laden email newsletter. The folks behind No Shame, a distro that highlights work by people of color, write about eight of their favorite zines. Across the water there’s Another Subculture, an annual audio mag released on cassette in the UK: editor Ben Perkins expounds on the nature of capturing the moment and keeping the thrill of zinemaking alive in audio. Down in Barcelona, Mierda editor Dani Frutos goes head to head with interviewer Paco Mus on everything from Barcelona punk’s tenuous relationship with Europe and the world to anarchism and Catalonian independence. There’s also an interview highlighting the Finnish Fanzine Archive, a project digitizing over 300 Finnish fanzines dating from 1977 to 1982. Rounding it out is a feature collecting almost half a dozen current video zines, your favorite columnists, all the reviews you can possibly bear to read, and a photo spread from Everything Is Not OK Vol. 2. Don’t miss it.
You can also order this issue by mail by sending $4.99 in the US, $7 Canada, $9 Mexico, or $11 worldwide to: MRR • PO Box 460760 • San Francisco, CA 94146 • USA …or just SUBSCRIBE!
Still available: MRR #395 • April 2015 issue…
Fest Mania special edition: Oakland’s Manic Relapse, Washington’s Damaged City, and Oklahoma City’s Everything Is Not OK. Also: NEGATIVE SCANNER from Chicago, Brazil’s the PESSIMISTS, SOUL GLO from Philadelphia, Temecula hardcore from the COLTRANES, Bogotá Punk documentary series, HeartFirst Records interview, and a photo spread by Martin Sorrondeguy.
“New Blood” is our weekly feature spotlighting new bands from around the world! See below for info on how to submit. Now, check out some killer new shit…
Artwork by Francesco Goat
Band name:
POLIS-ÄCKEL
Date & location formed:
We started rehearsing infrequently in late 2014. We live in the Marche region, in Italy.
Reason for forming:
Our aim was to create our own d-beat band, just a few distorted chords without much musical finesse. Loud and noisy to the max, with angry as fuck lyrics and vocals. We were moved by the noisier releases of bands such as Disclose, Electric Funeral, Maquina Muerta, Frigora and so on… We chose a swedish band name for a d-beat
‘tribute,’ it means “disgust for police.”
What are your lyrics about?
Our lyrics address violent reactions to police repression and the fascist state of the system. Utilizing anarchist ideology as a foundation on which to build upon ruins of these rotting world.
How would you describe your sound?
We would like to make our sound the more noisy and as aggressive as possible. No musical skill, just anger and distortion.
What’s in the future for this band?
We have planned a 7″ release with Imminent Destrucion records from UK for next summer. Then, play around a bit and let’s see what will happen next.
Date & location formed:
Before summer solstice 2014. St. Johns Newfoundland.
Reason for forming:
We’ve all known each other and been in bands together for so long. wanted to play music we wanted to play. Started out with a few riffs we had kicking around for a while then went from there.
What are your lyrics about?
Cosmic, spiritual, and emotional warfare. Astral catalepsy. Astral projection. inter-dimensional entities and ancestral demons. Reincarnation.
Space. Time. Life. Change. Instinct.
Basic survival. Dark age trials and tribulations.
How would you describe your sound?
Trotting through desolate barrens in the blinding fog. blackened d-beatish punk.
Dark Era (photo by Ritche Perez)
What’s in the future for this band?
Getting ready to release ” Nightscapes” EP. Recording new full length within the next few months. Also in the process of writing an album of mantras in combination with sigils.
Date & location formed:
April 2015, Nizhny Novgorod, Russia.
Reason for forming:
We were recording the piano and vocals for our free-jazz project and recorded a punk album in some spare half hour of the booked time. Got our kicks. Were hooked right away.
What are your lyrics about?
We sing of death to pigs, the premature aging of baristas, Television the band, our ninety-year-old friend, and of the tough life that small insects have to plug through in a big city.
How would you describe your sound?
One girl took a car and crashed the drums, the other plugged in her guitar and fell off a cliff into the sea, the third one came afterwards and deeply sighed.
What’s in the future for this band?
Plug through in this huge thing of a World.
Do you have or know of an awesome new band*? It’s easy to submit to be in MRR’s New Blood feature — just email us the following info, and keep keeping’ it real…
1) Band name:
2) Date & location formed:
3) Reason for forming:
4) What are your lyrics about?
5) How would you describe your sound?
6) What’s in the future for this band?
7) Links and contact info:
Along with the answers please send a band photo at least 600px on the longest side (with photo credits), and a logo if you have one, to:
*By “new band” we mean a band that formed within the past year or year and a half.
Thrilling Living
IN SCHOOL – Cement Fucker
LEMONADE – Forced Sterilization
WARM BODIES – Turn Me Into Gel
TAIWAN HOUSING PROJECT – Maintenance of an Application
UROCHROMES – I Don’t Wanna Be Like Me
Perverts Again and Again and Again
PERVERTS AGAIN – Brute in the Bathroom
ANIMAL LOVER – Patience
BIB – No Exist
NOTS – Dust Red
Pure Pop for Now People
THE DISTRIBUTORS – T.V. Me
THE CIGARETTES – You Were So Young
UNDERTONES – Over You
THE TIGHTS – Howard Hughes
THE WASPS – Teenage Treats
Popular Music by Popular Demand
HOME BLITZ – Murder in My Heart
FRUSTRATION – Victoires Prochaines
JOHN SCARY – Shouting Distance
HOMOSTUPIDS – Wearing Sammy
MYSTERY DATE – The One That You Really Want
Outro song:
NEGATIVE SCANNER – Ambitious People
Maximum Rocknroll Radio is a weekly radio show and podcast featuring DIY punk, garage rock, hardcore, and more from around the world. Our rotating cast of DJs picks the best of the best from MRR magazine’s astounding, ever-growing vinyl archive. You can find MRR Radio archives, specials, and more at radio.maximumrocknroll.com. Thanks for listening!
“New Blood” is our weekly feature spotlighting new bands from around the world! See below for info on how to submit. Now, check out some killer new shit…
Band name:
MASSES
Date & location formed:
Sometime around 2014… In Melbourne.
Reason for forming:
Masses started out as our original drummer Ryan and James who now plays guitar and sings. They used to fill in time waiting for their bandmates from their now defunct band Nuclear Flowers to show up… which luckily they never did… so Masses got started haha. It started initially as straight up anarcho-punk 2-piece taking cues from bands like early Rudimentary Peni and The Mob but the sound evolved with the new members and became a 4 piece. A few line up shuffles later and now it’s me (Tessa) on bass, Ashleigh on drums, Nellie on synth, vox & James on guitar, vox.
What are your lyrics about?
James and Nellie share the lyrics writing duties and they both have very distinct styles, I guess themes centering more broadly about an intense culture of apathy in Australia and ensuing human rights violations that continue to be ignored. With specific mentions to the mandatory detention of asylum seekers and persecution of Aboriginal and Torres Strait Islanders. But it’s not all doom and gloom… we do a mean Midnight Oil cover.
How would you describe your sound?
Anarcho & new wave’s shitty divorce.
What’s in the future for this band?
Our first LP “Moloch” will be out sometime in April 2016 on Lost in Fog Records in Australia & Mass Media Records in the US. We’re touring North America in July/August, doing some dates with Pleasure Leftists from Cleveland, which we are super excited about.
Reason for forming:
Ericka told me (Jeff) at one point that no one would start a hardcore band with her where she lives in Richmond, VA. A couple of us in Raleigh had started playing music together just for fun, and I decided to recruit Ericka to make the commute and sing for us. Everything kind of fell into place after that.
What are your lyrics about?
Ericka writes all the lyrics. When I asked her this question she said: “It’s complicated.”
Blackball (photo by Megan Gallagher)
How would you describe your sound?
The finest examples of catchy 80s hardcore punk dubbed way too loud to tape. Also, most of us in this band believe that Out Cold is the greatest band that ever existed.
What’s in the future for this band?
We put out a 3-song tape, which is coming out as a 7” with 3 more tracks on Sorry State Records very soon (hopefully). The plan is to do an East Coast/Midwest tour sometime in the not-too-distant future.
Links and contact info:
Keep peepin’ sorrystaterecords.com for the 7” to drop.
Should be out mid-April 2016!
Band name:
DIORETIX
Date & location formed:
San Francisco, 2015.
Reason for forming:
The underground music scene in SF is in pretty bad shape right now. Rather than move somewhere that’s more hip, like lots of people are doing, we’re still here trying to create something special for ourselves and what’s left of our community.
What are your lyrics about?
Dave steals all his lyrics and ideas from ELTON JOHN and DOUGLAS ADAMS.
How would you describe your sound?
A close friend once said we sound like a less pretentious TRAGEDY, haha!
What’s in the future for this band?
Recording, writing, making friends.
Date & location formed:
a while back (sometime in 2015) in a damp dark room of Karate Club during a drunken BLOWINS practice Andrzej grabbed a mic and proved to know what he is doing…
Reason for forming:
to destroy ourselves as we cannot destroy this fucked up world.
What are your lyrics about?
scumbags in the streets, dumbing down of society, depression and frustration, regression and stagnation, patridiotism, no future no hope…
ZONA ZLA (photo by Adam Brzostek)
How would you describe your sound?
punk. 80s hardcore mixed with UK82 plus a bit more of 80s Polish hardcore.
What’s in the future for this band?
we put out a demo tape – which is almost gone, a few people want to help us with a 7″.
Links and contact info:
Band name:
TRASH KNIFE
Date & location formed:
Fall of 2015 / Philadelphia PA.
Reason for forming:
We all wanted to be in band that was different from our other still active bands.
What are your lyrics about?
Having a good time, dancing at shows, skate boarding, being true to yourself, female empowerment.
How would you describe your sound?
Garage hardcore punk.
What’s in the future for this band?
Tape on endless daze this sping, 7” on P-Trash this summer. 5 week European Tour Fall 21016. Long term – LP Hopefully in Spring, and to continue this pace of releases.
Do you have or know of an awesome new band*? It’s easy to submit to be in MRR’s New Blood feature — just email us the following info, and keep keeping’ it real…
1) Band name:
2) Date & location formed:
3) Reason for forming:
4) What are your lyrics about?
5) How would you describe your sound?
6) What’s in the future for this band?
7) Links and contact info:
Along with the answers please send a band photo at least 600px on the longest side (with photo credits), and a logo if you have one, to:
*By “new band” we mean a band that formed within the past year or year and a half.
We didn’t play this, but look at that cover! So great.
Read the news to stay current.
NAKED LIGHTS – New Carrion
WHATEVER BRAINS – An Object
SNOB – Death Erection
GLASSBOOTS – I Want to Wear You
FATE VS FREE WILLY – Bitches
Take the train to work.
DRIVE LIKE JEHU – Bullet Train to Vegas
THE NATION OF ULYSSES – Last train to Cool
MISSION OF BURMA – Train
THE VAN PELT- The Speeding Train
FRENCH TOAST – Train’s Leavin’
BATON ROUGE – Voyages en Train la Nuit
Daydream about the sea.
BEEF JERK – Move into the Ocean
WAVELESS – Yellowknife Bay
THE BANANAS – The Sundering Sea
THE DICKS – Off-duty Sailor
Hum a song on your way home.
MARRÓN – Capital
ORATIONS – Circus of Currents
Maximum Rocknroll Radio is a weekly radio show and podcast featuring DIY punk, garage rock, hardcore, and more from around the world. Our rotating cast of DJs picks the best of the best from MRR magazine’s astounding, ever-growing vinyl archive. You can find MRR Radio archives, specials, and more at radio.maximumrocknroll.com. Thanks for listening!
You can SUBSCRIBE to Maximum Rocknroll for as little as $26.00 and have over 120 pages of punk sent to you every month! Hundreds of record reviews, exclusive features and interviews, all your favorite columnists and much, much more. Get it all right here.
Out now! MRR #396 • May 2016
SPECIAL EDITION: The Zines Issue. Featuring: Ohio’s Cretins of Distortion, New York City’s NUTS! fanzine, comix anthology As You Were, Not Shit skate fanzine, Tom Mayhugh of noisy hardcore mag General Speech, Fluke fanzine (on their 25th anniversary!), No Shame Distro out of New Jersey, NYC/Berlin’s Burn Collector, email newsletter/zine the Enthusiast, London audio-mag Another Subculture, Barcelona punk and anarchist zine Mierda, Finnish Fanzine Archive,current Video Zine roundup, Everything is Not OK Vol. 2 photo spread.
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