BravEar fanzine – Fanzine Hemorrhage

After the seminal purchase of my first two punk fanzines in 1982, recounted here, the purchase of any and all underground music-related fanzines became a habit, shall we say. The tack-on of one or more fanzines to my Tower Records or Universal Records or Streetlight Records bag for another buck or two, if I had it, became something of a everyday move. It’s why I’m still blabbering about those exact physical copies here. I also was working the counter and/or the drink machine at San Jose’s Wienerschnitzel twenty hours a week at $3.35 an hour, so I absolutely had the extra cash for whatever the fuck I wanted.

BravEar became a regular early buy. It wasn’t really because I loved this particular fanzine all that much, but because it was a visceral connection to San Francisco, a near-mythical, club-packed, punker-filled city located one long hour to my north. I wanted to be there so goddamn much. I’d read about shows at the Sound of Music, the I-Beam, the Mabuhay and elsewhere and curse my birth year and inability to drive. So I’d buy BravEar and Puncture and live it all vicariously instead.

However, and I’m just going to say it – when BravEar sucked, it really sucked, and in 1982, issue #3, it really sucked. I got this issue after the fact – just this year, as it happens. I’d never even cradled it in my hands. These are actual adults reviewing records and live shows from ABC, the Stray Cats, Bananarama and Oingo Boingo as though they’re worth dissecting, people who’ve got a foot in the true underground but instead have already bought into the corporate story of funny-haircutted dandies playing disco being the next link in the new wave. They’re also doing a lot of half-baked shitting on 1982 bands like first-EP Dream Syndicate. I mean, 1982 was an absolutely fantastic year for underground music, maybe the last truly great one in a six-year run, and you’re writing about the majesty of Thomas Dolby? (“I enjoin you to have a listen, preferably while reading the words”).

No wonder nearly everyone’s hiding behind some godawful pseudonym here (“Ohr Well”, “Dogtowne”, “Velvet Thistle”). BravEar did get a lot better in later years, despite some remonstrance here and here from me on issues #10 and #12 respectively. And hey, they give some space to Bill Christman to write about, yes, San Jose’s own hardcore punks Los Olividados! SJ pride all the way. Now I get confused sometimes about the fellas who did the hardcore punk rock shows on KFJC back then, but the one that blew my mind every Monday night was Bob Gibson’s “White Noise”. I listened every week, despite being a little intimidated by ‘81-’82 hardcore. He played Los Olividados for sure. I think he’s a distinct person who’s neither Alex Morgan (“Vinyl Rites”) nor Bill Christman, but maybe Morgan and Christman were the same person? Does anyone know what I’m even talking about? No?? OK. let’s move on.

I’m bummed this issue was so flaccid more out of the sense of them missing an opportunity and blowing it. It’s just music of course, and a fanzine, and both are kinda dumb – but you people don’t pay me for milquetoast takes, right? Lorry Fleming, who was managing editor for this issue, would later go on to write a great fanzine column in the otherwise avoidable BAM. Perhaps she was, like, 18 years old here? And that’s why she greenlit the poetry, the politics and the Wilhelm Reich piece? I mean, you should see the crap that I personally allowed in the KCSB Livewire in 1988, and I was editing at age twenty. So I’m going to stop dumping on BravEar #3 out of immense respect for the process, if not the results.

I didn’t exactly provide the most ringing endorsement of BravEar #12 when I talked about it here, and I’m not going to pretend that BravEar #10 from 1985’s a whole lot better, though remember I’m nitpicky and regrettably still fighting some of my teenage/early twentysomething “scene battles” in my head even now. What’s unique about this nearly forty year-old fanzine is that it’s one of the few that I have that old that I bought when it came out, and that I didn’t lose or damage somehow. You can see from the cover – which is actually a very well-done minimalist cover – that this San Francisco fanzine mixed it up stylistically without fear or favor, and good on ‘em for it.

Rory Lyons was the editor, Michael Miro the publisher and Seymour Glass – yeah, that guy – the star/ace reporter. There’s an opening faux gossip column that I know they carried over multiple issues called “Viv N’ Sandie”. They provide news you can use, such as the hot item that MDC’s rad-anarcho-veggie singer Dave Dictor “has opened a groovy veg-a-mighty snack bar in the midst of SF’s Mission District. Dave whips up millions of dead alfalfa sprouts as well as fro-yo and other delicacies”. Why is this culinary landmark not still around??? Who killed it? Reagan, that’s fucking who. They’re also giving unfortunate ink to the birth of one of San Francisco’s absolute worst trends of the late 80s, the “punk-funk” bands, by talking up “SF’s answer to the Red Hot Chili Peppers, the Three Mouse Guitars”. Thank christ I never saw that band, but I’ll admit that somehow I once caught a set by “The Freaky Executives”.

Frightwig get a post-first LP interview by Terri Sutton. I greatly enjoyed Frightwig interviews through the years, such as the one we discussed here. Here they say “We’re the female equivalent of macho men” and talk about reactions to them when they play live: “From Kansas City to Denver to back here, the consistent reaction I’ve heard – same words too – was these guys goin’, ‘Man, I’ve got a HARD-ON’”. Billy Bragg comes off as a pedantically boring lefty, total P.E.A.C.E. creep all the way. The Three Johns – yeah, Jon Langford from The Mekons was in this band as a part-timer; these Brits also talk about The Tories and the Miners’ Strike for their American underground music audience, raptly paying close attention I’m sure. And Social Unrest are called onto the carpet to defend why they’re still playing hardcore punk in 1985. Why indeed.

For whatever reason – and hey, I’m good with it, it’s definitely breaking the mold, there’s “part one” of a big piece about Richard Wagner’s Ring Cycle. “Der Ring Des Nibelungen”, baby. If you’re like me, you first heard “The Ride of the Valkyries” from this in that badass helicopter gunship scene in Apocalypse Now, and thought that this was some classical music you could get into. Then you learned a bit more about Wagner and his anti-semitism and how Hitler loved the guy and then you maybe thought you weren’t that into him. Then you remembered not to mistakenly conflate art with the artist, and recalled that this is always the best rule to follow, and were cool with Wagner again.

Seymour Glass gets to say his piece and interviews Slovenly. My takeback from this interview and others I saw with the band around this time was that they were ridiculously (and undeservedly, in my eyes) unpopular, and they knew it. Glass asks them, “Do you consider the album successful on any level whatsoever?”. Guitarist/bassist Tom Watson responds “At least we got it out”. Aim high, Slovenly! And in the reviews section, I had to laugh when I read Lyle S.’s review of Alex Chilton’s show at the I-Beam on 6/24/85: “Granted, when a singer/guitarist is 34 years old the voice and fingers don’t do what they used to at age 21 and 22, and it was evident this night, especially when Chilton performed those ‘72-’73 Big Star classics”. Ouch, 34 years old and too old to rock effectively. Keep that in mind if you’re in a band right now and creeping up on 30, okay?