“Outside these walls, Red, there’s a man that no living soul has ever seen face to face. He has a Social Security card and a Maine driver’s license. He’s got a birth certificate. Name of Peter Stevens. Nice, anonymous name.”
Pg. 74 ~ Stephen King’s Rita Hayworth and Shawshank Redemption.
1979 – 1989.
Writing about my art from the dark closet has been illuminating for me. I enjoy it so much. I see what is going on with festivals, museums, and art events is overwhelming. Not so much going on locally. So, I decided to create my own scene with what is around me from my business cave where cats are the CEO’s and purring advisors of highest degree.
Back in 2004 I was inspired to write about my years as a punk rock journalist. I reached out to publishers and others who seemed interested but were not. It was discouraging to say the least. All those people who I once supported were not as friendly.
So, I decided to Do It Myself with the gift, a culture we help create, at Los Angeles Flipside Fanzine. Yes, we implemented it into a very tight punk scene that was sincerely underground. Do It Yourself. That is what we did then and so I pulled that now well-known ideal forward with all of my optimistic first-hand projects.
Once it was staples, rubber cement and X-Acto knives. Even a stupid-fucking loud headache creating tele-type machine and God-awful wax machine for paste-up. Then the Xerox – Printers helped us and Hallelujah came the Smith Corona typewriter and the Commadore 64 and 128 computers. Later, the HP Laser Printer.
Now I have continued to evolve with the current technology. Using Amazon like we did the Xerox machine. Using top of the line Adobe Premiere Pro to create documentaries.
I learned as I went along… and not worried what the crowd thought. We never did it at Flipside Fanzine.
“No one told us what to do, we just did it and learned as we created.”
As one of the originals, DO It Yourself Punks, I can see so much has changed but reaching back to find that gift from Flipside washed away the need to publish with someone else. It is my just reward for holding my punk integrity proudly. Bringing it forward and creating again.
Here are the first four journals:
My Punkalullaby # 1, 2, 3 and 4. A Punk fanzine editor memoir:
A dedication to the Saints Issue.
Covers of the many Flipsides issue.
The Satire issue. ha ha….
The Tape Recorder Issue of Love!!
I printed these up with my computer and my HP Printer. Going back to a time of stapling and reuniting with the original way of DIY printing.
Since then, in 2019 I created my publishing house The Seminary of Praying Mantis Publishing and combined the four into a nice handheld book.
Sometimes the nicest things are in a nice handheld book. I am not talking Gideons’ International Bible either instead the Stephen King’s Rita Hayworth and Shawshank Redemption handheld book. Which I recently purchased. Man, what a thrill. A sweet little number good with some suds.
Click on image to purchase.
