#razorcake

[luckynakazawa]

I contributed an illustration for @sean.carswell ‘s column which included a reference to the band @monstertreasureupyours in the latest issue of @razorcake_zine as well as a few illos in the reviews section. I will be taking part of a panel discussion on RC137 on Friday Jan 12 at @thepophop info below

IMPORTANT – PLEASE NOTE THE VENUE CHANGE.

Just a reminder of this event happening this Friday, Dec. 12!

An Exploration of Razorcake #137 at The POP-HOP

Panel + Discussion + Q and A

Featuring: Melissa Cody, Kiyoshi Nakazawa, Jim Ruland

Hosted by Razorcake co-founder Todd Taylor

Free!

Fri., Jan. 12, 2024

7PM

The POP-HOP

5002 York Blvd, Los Angeles, CA 90042

Melissa Cody is an enrolled member of the Navajo Nation. She was born 1983 in No Water Mesa, Arizona, is a fourth-generation weaver, and a dyed-in-the-wool punk rocker.

Kiyoshi Lucky Nakazawa is a L.A.-based artist in the fields of animation, illustration, comics, and story boards. He graduated from Art Center College of Design in Pasadena with a BFA in Fine Arts. He is a regular comics column contributor to Razorcake magazine.

Jim Ruland is the author of the award-winning novel Make It Stop. He is the author of Corporate Rock Sucks, The Rise and Fall of SST Records. He is also the co-author of Do What You Want: The Story of Bad Religion and My Damage with Keith Morris.

[voodoorhythmrecords]

[theekopper]

Updated version of the guitar tutorial by Jason Willis that I just posted yesterday. This one was for Razorcake fanzine.

[dj-of-the-coven]

Thanks for asking @vivi-mire and @goldensunset! To answer your questions, I'll preface this by saying I don't actively seek out character playlists that often, but I like making them. Unfortunately this leads me down some dismal fucking roads while looking for other people's thoughts on the subject.

Possibly to the surprise of some, offline I am known mostly for 2 things: anarchy and music. Music is my life. I have one million other hobbies, and in online spaces I mostly talk about video games, but my true essence is music--particularly rock and punk. My collection spans over several mediums. I have a 2018 Victrola record player that I've repaired by hand, a 2004 CD-radio player, a 2021 cassette-CD-radio player, and a 2007 Insignia MP3 player. Most people around my age ditched CD players by the time they were in high school (no judgement there), but I used mine this morning. I have two books in my bag on cassettes right now. I play two string instruments and have considered picking up a third! I don't say any of this to brag--it's just what I choose to do with my time and money, same as anybody else. The reason why I bring it up is to emphasize that I both know and care a lot about this particular subject. And let me tell you. What I feel when I see the same 6 artists over and over again in every character playlist is not simple haterism... it's pity with a dose of concern.

What bothers me more than the music being ill-fitting for some fictional character is the tangible evidence that most people do not have the means to discover new artists; also, to some degree, the foreboding conclusion that we are losing a diversity of taste. There used to be magazines and independent radio shows, local performances, older kids in the neighborhood you could talk to to find new bands, but the rise of streaming as the primary distribution method has severely limited the ways through which interested parties can discover music. Ask someone you know how they discovered their favorite artists--for real!! Most of the time, they'll answer, TikTok, Youtube, or Spotify. Algorithms. Mathematical processes designed to funnel people into profitable avenues of advertising. These are the things determining the music taste of today's listeners, and it's powerful fucking stuff, to the point that even radio stations have been affected by the algorithms of these unrelated websites. When I was living in Los Angeles, I had to watch the station 106.7 KROQ slowly go from playing 90s grunge and nu metal to running the Arcane theme song by Imagine Dragons 27 times daily, because it was being played to market the show. Everything is morphing into profit sludge! An equation on somebody's computer somewhere determined that this specific pool of artists would be able to turn a bunch of queer 16-24 year olds into a marketable demographic, and thus Tumblr is overrun by the same 8 or so bands in every poll, every uquiz, every embedded spotify playlist. You guys ever heard of Hozier? I've been listening to a rad new artist lately, yeah! It's Cavetown. You should listen to Mitski! Did you hear about Mitski? I think you should listen to Mitski. What about Mitski guys. What about Mitski.

Again, it really doesn't have anything to do with the quality of any of these artists (except for Imagine Dragons, which I'll never hesitate to shit on). I just think it's... odd, and upsetting, that so many people are trapped inside this tiny little bubble of music that has been algorithmically determined for them as the genre they can be arbitrarily sorted into for marketing appeal reasons. It's like hearing someone say they've never seen it rain before. I discovered many of my current favorite artists by browsing through secondhand stores, talking to older punks in my community, renting CDs from the library, reading magazines (I recommend Razorcake), and going to local $5 cover shows held in the basement of a record shop. It physically pains me that this method of discovery is dying. It hurts to think of how few people are engaging seriously with the music scene in the places they live. It devastates me to see so many people being restricted by their circumstances from finding the music that will speak to them, specifically, not every single young, white, very online gay person living in the United States.

Basically--this is not okay. Something has to change.

[welovelofi]

Лос-Анджелеський хардкор-панк-гурт Trap Girl був створений у 2014 році. Музика Trap Girls гучна, сувора, імпульсивна та потужна. Він також прекрасний, як золотий шифон, вкритий кров’ю, брудом і склом. Він блищить і ріжеться. Іноді це брудно. Це трахає вас, даруючи вам життя. Trap Girl погрожує вбити ґвалтівників, захищати жінок і добре виглядати, роблячи це. Trap Girl знаходиться в центрі квіркор-музики та живе спадщиною класичних хардкор-панків із Лос-Анджелеса, таких як The Germs і The Bags, водночас вдихаючи нове життя у стару панк-формулу. Вони по-новому уявляють, що таке транс, великий, коричневий, гламурний і розлючений у Лос-Анджелесі. -Кендес Хенсон, журнал Razorcake

[thislovintime]

Spotlight on: Minus 5 - “Song for Peter Tork”

Mike Faloon: “[O]ne song that comes to mind is ‘Song for Peter Tork.’ That chorus really resonates: ‘You just work, and it works, to keep on working.’ It would have been easy to mock his fall from grace. Instead, you chose to focus on his work ethic after the Monkees broke up.” Scott McCaughey: “Yeah, Chuck [Carroll] and I were living in Sonoma County, and we were coming back from seeing somebody at Berkeley Community Theatre or something, maybe the Kinks. I don’t know. [laughs] But we saw this sign in the town he lives in, ‘Tonight Peter Tork.’ And we’re thinking, ‘No way, you’ve got to be kidding me.’ We pull in and it was literally like two in the morning. They’re putting the chairs on the table and Peter was there just winding up his guitar cables, packing up. I was thinking about that when I wrote the Peter Tork song, just about the keep on working thing. There’s something to be said about it.” - Razorcake 091, April-May 2016

[multimediadisorder]

[oleandrsstudio]

This week’s #zine #review is of “Behind the Zines #13: A Zine About Zines” put together by Billy McCall!

I love this series as a kind of journalism focused on the zine community. In this issue, we’ve got comics about food and zines, an interview with minizinester Mer (creator of the Catholic shrine minizines you might remember from March!), backstory about Razorcake, and more! I was especially interested in the pieces about Patreon. (I’m considering opening a Patreon of my own — keep an eye out for that!) Anna Jo Beck talks about the practicalities of setting one up, likes and dislikes, all the interesting parts. I enjoyed reading this zine and I’m looking forward to the next one!

[mild-pain-comics]

My 2020/2021 book, Sid & the Sickos, got its first official review in Razorcake!

[independentartistbuzz]

June Body Goes the Distance with Latest Single “Take Our Time Back”

Swaying between the punchiness of modern rock and the nostalgic tones of '90s alternative, June Body's rawness and forthright lyrical delivery throws back to the likes of Death Cab for Cutie and The Weakerthans. 

“Take Our Time Back” is the latest single from the trio's third album, Last Everythings (June 7, 2024); a snow globe of the scenes before, during, and after a breakup. It is a venture into the subtle, heartbreaking domestic details of an ending.

“I ended a year-long relationship that I realized I wasn’t ready to be in from the start,” lead vocalist/guitarist Connor James elaborates about the new track. “I fell in love with a great person, but a voice in the back of my mind kept telling me it wasn’t meant to be. ‘Take Our Time Back’ is about the guilt of having to break their heart, and wondering if they’re wishing they could take back the time we had together.”

Recently, they performed sold-out shows including an opening slot for The Beaches. “They are poetry backed by insane stage action.” -Razorcake

[idawg]

Guy Picciotto, Razorcake interview

#fugazi

[itsmerickv]

A comic about CD's that upset some snobby audiophiles.

[xshrutix]

S.X.R: Feelings of Expiration: 7”

Nov 27, 2012

I really wanted to like this one because I’ve been through Redding, CA, where these guys are from—and know how much it sucks—but they play some pretty boring straight edge hardcore with dopey lyrics and lots of E chords and slow parts and breakdowns and blast beats. They do have a song called “Macho,” which refutes macho bullshit attitudes. I’ll commend them for that.

–Craven (Mind Melt, mindmelt.com)

[otherpplnation]

840. Jim Ruland

Jim Ruland is the author of the novel Make It Stop, available from Rare Bird Books.

Ruland is the co-author of Do What You Want with Bad Religion, and My Damage with Keith Morris, the founding vocalist of Black Flag, Circle Jerks, and OFF! Ruland has been writing for punk zines such as Flipside and Razorcake for more than twenty-five years and his work has received awards from Reader's Digest and the National Endowment for the Arts.

***

Otherppl with Brad Listi is a weekly literary podcast featuring in-depth interviews with today's leading writers.

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[tannerballengee]

A flattering, ego boosting, glowing review of my book written by Kurt Morris in Razorcake Magazine. Probably the most spot on, nail-on-the-head analysis of my writing that I've ever received. 

But hey, don't take his word for it. Purchase a copy yourself!

[templepriest-motherfucker]