Vice v6n9 Literary Reviews

Don’t Cry Tonight
Dana Lauren Goldstein
ML Project

Hmm, it’s always scary when someone the same age as you is doing stuff so good it makes you want to never sleep again until you’ve resolved some way to start even trying to get within touching distance of that good. We featured Dana’s work in our annual Photo Issue a couple of months back and if you liked those shots you are sure to like this tidy ‘zine. A collection of snapshots that capture and reflect the day to day that Dana surrounds herself with. The shots never seem forced or intrusive; they simply mirror. Blood spattered pavements, beautiful boys, beautiful-er girls and a black and white spread of the best collection of punk patches I’ve ever seen.

mlproject.com

Modern Hate Vibe no. 2

Bryony Beynon used to play in a band called Back Stabbath. I saw them support Whitehouse once and they sounded a bit like Man Is The Bastard sondtracking a brutally bloody period. A girl called Maya used to be in that band too. I haven’t seen her for ages but she once gave me a really nice DIY Infest shirt out of the blue. It was a really nice gift and I treasure it to this day. Modern Hate Vibe is a bit like that: a shot out of the blue you’re really glad you got. Bryony sings in The Sceptres these days (you should really check them out) and she certainly seems no less angry than in the Back Stabbath days. Cut and paste bile and spit on various topical ills as well as an interview with possibly the best hardcore band in the country right now: Mob Rules. You should check them out too.

bryonyismyname@hotmail.com

Chimps no. 10

Chimp is a ‘zine put out by Layla Gibbon. You might know Layla from her pretty ferocious columns in Maximum Rock & Roll. They are one of the things in there that I still really enjoy reading. Anyhoo, Chimp is a far more DIY affair than MRR. In fact it doesn’t even have any staples. It is however a very useful outlet for extended interviews cut and pasted onto grainy black and white live shots and cool fliers. This issue is particularly worth seeking out as it features interviews with Sex Vid (remember them from v6n3?), Sharon Cheslow (y’know from Chalk Circle) and Kendara Gaeta fro Big Brother back from when that was a hoot a page too.

layla.gibbon@gmail.com

Feral Debris no.3

Feral Debris is a thoughtfully put together black and white ‘zine that comes out of the Midlands fairly irregularly. Its irregularity can be forgiven a) because ‘zines aren’t meant to be regular (d’uh) and b) it’s always really really good. Like the Sound Projector without the constant wiff of roll neck sweater and elbow patches. I hadn’t even heard of Simply Saucer until I tucked into this and now I feel like a gigantic ignoramus who badly needs to start playing ‘keep up with stuff’ again. You also get a free CDR featuring a bunch of bands and guys making strange noises (probably on the floor of a pub behind lots of cables, wires and delay pedals in front of about three other people) that you are equally unlikely to have heard of, some Stuart Crutchfield poems and a Lambsbread interview. What more do you want for £3?

myspace.com/feraldebris

Safecrackers no. 6

Wondering around one rainy Sunday afternoon I bumped into my friends Stuart and Matthias ‘Wolfboy’ Connor. We’ve mentioned Wolfboy and his writings in here a bunch and Stuart often helps us out with shoots and stuff. A kinder, more well read pair of people you couldn’t hope to meet. They kind of make you feel bad for spending all day staring at computer screens and want to delete yourself from all social networking sites immediately. They informed me that they had been helping man a stall at a ‘zine fair round the corner so I popped down and picked up Wolfboy’s latest work on the excellent Safecrackers series. Past issues of Safecrackers have featured things like The Wire and Growing but this time around Matt edits a retrospective of shadowy Salford beat maverick The Black Lodge who briefly burned bright after the release of the ‘Horse With No Name’ 12” on ‘Mo Wax. If you know his real name you know lots about techno music. Go on Google it. See. Nothing.

Oogaboogastore.com

Radio Silence (A Selected Visual History Of American Hardcore Music)
Nathan Nedorostek and Anthony Papalardo
Powerhouse

There have been plenty of books about Hardcore but this one might be worth getting for two reasons. One: it mainly lets up on the incessant quotes that usually just consist of Rollins complaining in endless variants on the same whinges he’s had since ‘Get In The Van’ whilst leaving the sleeves, fliers and T Shirts to do the talking. Two: where most of the books on the topic trail off after 1984 like it all ended with ‘revolution summer’ when everyone wimped out and started singing about girls and feelings this one keeps going and powers on straight through to loads of good stuff like Lifesblood, Citizen’s Arrest and Chain Of Strength.

Powerhousebooks.com