It caught me by surprise. I wasn’t looking for it. It kind of just snuck up on me. As the saying goes: true love comes when you least expect it. In the summer of 1994, I embarked upon one of the greatest love affairs of my life. It struck like a lightning bolt in the form of a girl as I waited for the bus home after a fruitful day of record rummaging and op shopping in the city centre.
I sat on a bench listening to my walkman starring at my feet to pass time. Over the buzz of crunchy, distorted guitars and inaudible vocals, I could hear the sound of wheels on the pavement coming my way. As force of habit, whenever I hear the sound I can’t help but stop what I’m doing and look in its direction. I grew up surround by skateboard culture—my family has owned skate shops since the ‘80s—and have always been fascinated by skateboarders. In my eyes they were the coolest of the cool: they can fly (pulling off amazing gravity defying feats), they make movement an art form, do what they want, don’t care what you think about them and listen to punk rock. I looked up from my Doc Marten boots and saw a lady rolling towards me. I’d met her through mutual friends that frequented indie rock shows. I was—and often still am—in awe of her. Whatever was ‘happening’ she always seemed to be at the centre of it. I knew her by the name ‘Maggie’. Enter the lightning…
I waved; she saw me, smiled and sat down beside me to chat. I can’t quite remember what it was we spoke about but I do remember the moment she pulled out a little crumpled photocopied booklet kind of thing from her backpack and handed it to me—it hit me… KAPOW! She told me it was her ‘zine’ Mz. Obscure. At this time I had no idea what a zine really was. I flicked through its pages filled with her words, drawings, photography and articles on local bands. It was one of the coolest things I had ever seen! Sensing my cluelessness M enlightened me about the world of zines. Just as I was getting swept up in it all—to me it all seemed so magical—my bus pulled up. M and I hugged, said our goodbyes and I spent the next forty minute bus ride home pouring over each and every page. By the time I’d reached my suburban bedroom I’d decided that whatever this awesomeness was in my hand I wanted in.
The concept of making my own publication blew my mind! I’d grown up with a definite magazine addiction—I loved everything about them right down to the new magazine smell. I’ve always been obsessed with magazines and I love writing, and sharing my thoughts and observations with others. I had it figured out that when I finished school and started working I wanted to work at one. Having discovered that you could make your own [maga]zine open up a whole new word of possibilities for me.
Over the next few weeks I made it my mission to find out as much as I could about zines. I wanted to know everything! I started frequenting Rocking Horse Records and Skinnys Records snapping up any zine I could find and reading it from cover to cover. During this time I found Maximum Rock N Roll and Punk Planet. These two publications opened up a direct life line to the worldwide punk community for me. Punk Planet (as well as Slug & Lettuce) in particular brought the world to my doorstep with its take on progressive issues such as politics and feminism; Maximum Rock N Roll quenched my thirst for new music—all three provided me with a path to more zines which I ordered through the mail. Along with the music I was listening to (mostly punk and hip hop), zines helped educate me about the world and turned me on to new ideas and ways of thinking.
My best friend around this period was a girl called Ms. Lizard. I’d met her at an all ages punk show at the Crash n Burn (a legendary live music venue among Brisbane locals). We’d go to every show we possibly could—punk, hardcore, ska, rockabilly, rock—it didn’t matter to us what label, to us it was all equally exciting and allowed us a chance to get out of the house and fend off boredom. Lizard and I grew together and did most things together. We were pretty inseparable so when I fell down the hole to zine land Mz. Lizard came too.
One afternoon sitting on my bedroom floor listening to Green Day, we started putting together our very first zine. We named it Social Stupidity. The name came from a drunken discussion I had one night with an older punk dude from the scene named Ben about the ‘evils’ of our society and how most people just go along with what they’re told to and do what is meant to be done. Both of these things never appealed to me so the name seemed fitting. It makes me cringe to think of it now, but at the time I also liked the name simply ‘cause it seemed pretty punk rock—against society and all that.
Before the issue was even a quarter done, Ms. Lizard bailed on me to go do her own things and I decided to continue onwards solo—by now I was hooked on cutting, pasting, writing, venting my thoughts and reorganising other print media to make my own. The first issue was a mere 16 pages long (which I thought was a grand achievement!) and featured three of my favourite Australian bands Blister, Gilgamesh & Godnose, two (really bad) live reviews of local shows and some demo reviews of cassettes a couple of local bands had given me. I charged $2 for it.
I remember being out one night (and sneaking into) the old Treasury bar in Brisbane (that Blowhard seemed to have a residency at forever!) with my friend James. We ran into Mike Palm from Agent Orange! His band was in town playing Crash n Burn and he decided to seek out some locals before the show for hangs. I’ll never forget showing him my zine and him buying a copy. I tried to give it to him but he was like, ‘It’s important that you support people that put in effort and that are trying to do positive stuff.’ He did add that for $2 I may want to add a few more pages next time… ha! It was nice that he was kind enough to buy it though, and that he was honest enough to call me on the lean content and that he offered me advice in a constructive way—I’ve definitely had more than my far share of haters over the years; people offering their opinions and thoughts in a not-so-nice way about my work (I’ve been threatened with violence on more than one occasion and I’ve even had someone say they wanted to kill me if they ever saw me in the street). Meeting Mike will always stick in my mind and be a fond memory.
Today his advice is as right on as ever—support those that are out there doing something positive and make sure you give folks quality (and value).
Zines;I was totally and utterly in love.
to be continued…
