RIP Filip Fuchs

This photo was taken by Murray Bowles at a show See You In Hell played in Oakland at a now defunct cafe. Definitely not one of our (UGZ) shows, which is what happens sometimes when you lose touch over the years.  The show before that was in SF at a cool, basement style venue around the block from the old CW, but it’s not where I would've imagined SYIH playing after waiting so many years to to tour and play the Bay Area. Filip and I talked about a bunch of stuff (an attempt to quickly catch up) that night, but the one thing I definitely took away from our conversation was that his enthusiasm for that tour was waning, to say the least. As a booker/promoter I wasn't too stoked on the Oakland gig (although the bands were solid), but at least it was packed for that venue. I didn't recognize as many people as I would've even 5 years earlier, but that doesn't necessarily mean anything. At the end of See You In Hell's set, someone associated with the cafe got in Filip's face for who knows what reason.  I didn’t know or recognize the kid that did that, but already knowing how Filip felt about the tour prior to the Oakland show just added to the frustration I felt when I saw that.  To make matters worse I found out later that someone stole the band's tour money at that show.  Oakland, a city that Filip was genuinely excited about playing when we discussed it in the early two thousands at one of the Super Sabado Gigante shows had turned out to be nothing like the way I’d described it to him thirteen years earlier.  

Like I said, I lost touch with Filip and a bunch of my pre-social networking pen pals from back when Urban Guerrilla Zine was bigger, and a momentarily a record label, so it was cool to discover things I missed in the last 24 hours, like a video of See You In Hell playing a breakfast show in Austin at Chaos In Tejas, as well as videos of the band playing shows in BRNO, Czech Republic, including one where they dressed up like Discharge, charge hair and all.  I was writing and trading with Filip over a decade ago, but he was only in his mid-thirties when he lost his battle with cancer this past weekend.  I think his young age speaks to how active and committed he was to the spirit and ideal of hardcore D.I.Y. punk.  He accomplished a lot (more than I know actually) in his relatively short time here on this plane of existence, and his passing is our loss.  RIP Filip Fuchs.

Thursday Blog 1.7.16

Here is my first blog of the new year, and even though I’m looking forward to 2016, this is going to be a look back at Urban Guerrilla Zine in 2015.  I attempted to post a new blog every Monday towards the end of last year, which pretty quickly turned into every other Monday, but even so I’ve decided to commit to posting a couple a blogs a week in 2016.  Now, let’s take it back to time not so long ago.

In 2015, I managed to put out two zines, which isn’t that impressive.  On the other hand, when you’ve been putting out a zero zines per year for the last seven or eight years, two’s pretty good.  Urban Guerrilla Zine has never really gone away or stopped being active.  When there wasn’t a new issue of Urban Guerrilla Zine there were over a hundred UGZ Presents shows that I booked and promoted, like the UGZ Speed Trials for example, and when I stopped booking shows there was the internet.  When the internet started to feel a bit too isolating and detached, I decided to make zines again.  For most folks Urban Guerrilla Zine existed from 1997-2006, and that was pretty much it until 2015.

Urban Guerrilla Zine #17 was made to accompany a UGZ themed art show that took place in early 2015 at 1-2-3-4 Go! Records in Oakland, at the urging of Pat Libby for which I am grateful.  Urban Guerrilla Zine #17.5 was a half issue entitled “Summer Of No Love”, which was supposed to be out by late summer, but didn’t actually see the light of day until the fall due to issues with the printer.  In fact both zines had printer issues, and in both cases I found myself at Inkworks Press (a worker owned collective) in Berkeley, having to photocopy what were intended to be offset printed zines.  Inkworks doesn’t have the best copy machines, but they are well maintained, so the zines looked pretty good.  The biggest drop off from offset to photocopy would be the photo quality.  In the case of #17 I had to have it done in time for the art show, which we’d also advertised as a zine release party.  As far as the “Summer Of No Love” half issue went, I wanted that out as quickly as possible because I know me, and if I’d waited any longer then it would’ve ended up with all of the other unfinished projects cluttering my work area.

Urban Guerrilla Zine #17.5 is a very personal issue, but not a “personal zine”.  Maybe I should’ve made that distinction a bit more clear when describing it in previous posts.  I wasn’t that concerned with how much the graphics or stories resonated with the reader as much as I wanted to recreate this one summer in Emeryville, standing at a bus stop next to a casino that was in the process of being torn down, surrounded by elderly Asian gambling addicts and crack addicted prostitutes from the stroll a few blocks away on San Pablo Ave.  The vibe I felt while waiting to transfer to the bus I rode to my summer job at a bookstore, where I spent all day indoors when all I wanted was to hang out on Telegraph Ave with my friends.  I didn’t actually write any of that in the zine, but it’s there.

Looking ahead, I plan on doing more zines in 2016, one or two of those will be newer issues of UGZ for what has admittedly become a somewhat limited audience.  On the other hand, I don’t miss printing a thousand zines at a time, and distributing them, then trying to collect the money I’m owed from all the various distributors around the country.  I’m making zines at this point because I enjoy the process, and so I’ll see where that approach takes things from here on out.

If you didn’t get a copy of Urban Guerrilla Zine #17, the only remaining copies I know of are at Needles and Pens, 1173 Valencia St, San Francisco, CA

If you want a copy of Urban Guerrilla Zine #17.5 aka “Summer Of No Love”, then you can still purchase a copy at:

1-2-3-4 Go! Records, 420 40th Street #5, Oakland, CA

Issues Magazine + More, 20 Glen Ave, Oakland, CA

Pegasus Books, 2349 Shattuck Ave, Berkeley, CA

Bound Together Books, 1369 Haight St, San Francisco, CA

East Bay Alternative Book & Zine Fest

Task Switching

This photo was taken about half way through a very caffeinated hang out session with Pat Libby.  Pat is the manager and head booker at 1-2-3-4 Go! Records in Oakland on 40th Street, about two blocks from the old UGZ headquarters.

"Summer Of No Love" aka Urban Guerrilla Zine #17.5 is currently available at both the Oakland and SF store locations.

Summer Of No Love

There’s a new UGZ half issue out now entitled Summer Of No Love, which is just a little something that I wanted to get out there before tackling anything bigger.  It’s a theme issue and a personal zine that I worked on alone that contains photos (35mm), a story or two pulled from old notebooks that I used to take with me to cafes back in the day, as well as random observations that I jot down, usually after I’ve had a large cup of coffee and wandered around a bit.  Most importantly, every zine comes with stickers.

As you probably guessed, this was supposed to be a summer issue, but I hit some snags with the offset printer we were going to use.  So as the summer passed, then my fallback plan of an Indian Summer issue began to dissolve, I had to bounce over to a print shop in Berkeley to get a 100 or so photocopied (the same as the last issue).  They turned it around very quickly, and a little over a week later I had a box of zines finally, only they got the print run wrong and the number of zines was half of what I ordered.  I guess what I’m trying to say is, the Summer Of No Love is real.

If you’re in the Bay Area, you can purchase a copy of UGZ #17.5, Summer Of No Love at:

Issues, 20 Glen Ave, Oakland, CA

1-2-3-4 Go! Records, 420 40th St, Ste 5, Oakland, CA

Pegasus Books, 2349 Shattuck Avenue, Berkeley, CA

Bound Together Books, 1369 Haight St, San Francisco, CA

Or you can send $5 (well concealed cash) to: UGZ ℅ Jay Unidos, 1442A Walnut Street #419, Berkeley, CA 94709.  Email me: jayunidos@gmail.com.

Thanks, Jay

Murray Bowles photos of SEE YOU IN HELL & LOTUS FUCKER in Oakland

Murray Bowles photos from the See You In Hell (Czech Republic), Lotus Fucker (DC, Baltimore), Negative Standards, Permanent Ruin, Face The Rail show last Saturday in Oakland, CA.  To see more photos from this show - click here!

SEE YOU IN HELL

If you missed See You In Hell (Czech Republic) last Friday at the Fortress in San Francisco, they’re playing again this Saturday in Oakland.

The Punk Singer

I Had a chance to see a showing of "The Punk Singer" last night at the kickoff to this year's Oakland Underground Film Festival at the Grand Lake Theater, and I have to say that it was really well done. So much better than I was expecting after watching the Kickstarter video several months ago. It's amazing how far we've come that budget limitations in 2013 doesn't automatically mean a low budget looking film the way many of us remember low budget films (B-movies) back in the day.

 "The Punk Singer" is Sini Anderson's documentary about Kathleen Hanna (Bikini Kill, Let Tigre, The Julie Ruin), which is already enough information for most of the folks who follow this blog, but it also delves into subjects like her recent battle with late term lyme disease, feminism, the riot grrrl movement, her marriage to the King AD Rock (Beastie Boys), getting punched in the face by Courtney Love (who hasn't?), and of course the chronology of events leading up to the formation of Bikini Kill. Nuff said.

LOS CRUDOS

Check out this crazy Los Crudos video from their show last night at 924 Gilman.  Filmed on day two of This is Not A Step fest, it was sweaty, chaotic, and awesome!  Actually I'm still sweating a day later, uh oh.

This Is Not A Step

Amy and Rich from 1984 Printing made a new batch of posters for 'This Is Not A Step' fest, which is less than two weeks away.  Posters will be available at the shows, and telephone poles around the East Bay.

Beyond The Screams

Beyond The Screams: A U.S. Latino Hardcore Punk Documentary

Directed by Martin Sorrondeguy (Los Crudos, Limpwrist)

Dystrophy

A couple of photos from Libertatia 2002, which took place at Warm Water Cove in San Francisco, CA.

If the turnout looks small, that's because it was. 2002 was a busy year for the Ear2TheGround Punx, which was basically UGZ Presents & friends holding down the fort at places like Burnt Ramen, and also doing our best to support the Pyrate Punx crew by including them on bigger events like the Rampaging Insane Depravity Fests. 2002 was not such a busy year for the Pyrate Punx, and by the end of the year the only active members of the crew were (to the best of my memory) Russ, Marcus, Jeremiah, and eventually myself when I was voted in as head booker (Marcus' old position). That caused a riff in the Pyrate Punx, and long story short, Marcus and I kind of broke off and did our own thing for a couple of years after that. Pyrate Punx remained a relatively small operation until the fateful day that I convinced Marcus Da Anarchist to sign up for a Myspace account, and the rest is history. Now the Pyrate Punx thing is international, or so I've been told by newer members of 'da crew'.

Our staff photographer Sam Bortnick snapped these photos of DYSTROPHY, along with some others that I'll post at a later time. DYSTROPHY were one of the best young Bay Area hardcore bands at the time, and they played a bunch of shows for us, including the Rampaging Insane Depravity Fest and the first ever UGZ Speed Trials.