Prelude to a Lick
by Scott Hefflon
illustration by Eric Johnson
The end of another year is upon us, riding up our cracks like a cheap pair of skivvies. This is the post-Fall time when we all take stock options of our lives, propose wildly unrealistic thingies we’ll never do, and perform the autopsy on what we made of ourselves in the last year.
In this here last issue of 1997 (the one that’ll have to tide you over ’til about March of ’98 when we return refreshed, rejuvenated, and with that new fangled happy chip installed in our Medulla Oblongata [which, insidiously, is a fuck uva Police album]), you may notice something. If so, please let us know and we’ll have it removed immediately. No, seriously, upon designing the magazine, I discovered we almost hit the halfway mark of music vs. entertainment. In other words, we interviewed people that weren’t in bands. And, surprise, surprise, they had relevant things to say about our culture. (Why every ‘zine in existence milks the same sacred cows, yanking the tired teats of indie labels, and generally interviews the same dorkwads as everyone else that month is beyond me.) World big. World diverse. Get?
We talked to Julie Strain. She was cool. We talked to the funny fellows from Mr. Show. They had such a dynamic, an interplay between them, it’s what you and yer friends have when you’re sitting around all wired on coffee (yeah, that’s it) yapping in stream-of-consciousness about Life, the second verse (same as the first), and Everything tax-deductible. We talked to James (last name withheld) of POPsmear . If there’s someone (besides us) that’s trying to push ‘zine culture beyond the hack-writer-interviews-dumb-band mentality, legitimize it in the eyes of mid-Americana (both corporate and consumer, not that there’s really much difference), and not be such small-minded slaves to the three-chords-and-a-codpiece contingent, it’s he. We talked to Wim Wenders and Matthew Harrison, two independent-minded filmmakers from different generations looking to leave their imprints on the projection screens of humanity in their own particular ways. Yeah, and we talked to some bands but at least they had something interesting to say and/or scantily-clad babes in their photos.
In closing, we’re closing. Just for the rest of the year, but we’ll be proposing all sorts of cool shit for next year (see The Culture Bunker for more misinformation). At least, that’s our story and we’re sticking to it like yer dumb cousin Tommy’s tongue did to the monkeybars.
