Flyer - Saturday January 24, 1987

The Nils play Hamilton.

Flyer - Saturday January 17, 1987

I put on this show. It put the show on at an anti nuclear organization's organizing space. Money from the rental for the day went to them. they were pretty close to where the El Mocambo was. Hyper as hell were from Kent and headlined the show. They lived in a place called the smurf House because the house was painted blue. They had a song called "ROTC Nazi". False Hope and Youth Inc. were from Cleveland. MSI opened up which meant they also helped out with loaning equipment.

Zine - Mount the Purple Sceptre

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Glenn did many zines and in the end he changed the name of the zine for every issue. This version of his zine was inspired by the Sons of Ishmael song "man and His Penis Sceptre". This helps explain why Sons of Ishmael are on the cover and the picture of Tim is the gesture he would make when he sang the song so Gl;enn has caught him in the moment. I interviewed my friend Jim about his band Half Off, who were a straight edge band from California. Glenn was inspired by horror movies so there are some reviews of those, as well as a piece on Clive Barker. Mike from BSL did an interview with the Stupids who were a skate band from the UK. there are a few pages of rad horror art done by Paul Douglas Jr. There is a page of zien reviews. There is an interview with the Nils and Glenn used a picture I took. There is a collage on Evil Dead 2. Glenn interviewed Chris Jones from Verbal Assault. There is an interview I did with Face First who were a straight edge band from Oklahoma. Glenn did an awesoem job with music reviews and including pictures of the bands with them. It looks amazing. there is an interview with SNFU in Guelph. And Paul from Holland's Larm did a mail interview with Glenn which was amazing. Glenn was the original guitarist in Death of Gods and then left and started up MSI.

Flyer - Friday January 2, 1987

Zine - The Pig Paper #29

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Flyer - January 2, 1987

Zine - Mute Elation

Mute Elation was a punk fanzine from Toronto. This issue looks like it came out at the end of 1986 based on some of the gigs that they covered and when those happened in Toronto. This was not the first issue as content alludes to continuing of features and written pieces in previous issues. There is a significant amount nof content dedicated to writing in the form of poetry and fiction writing and even an interview with a writer. But there is also lots of punk and post punk content. I really like that the issue starts out with a scene update on Toronto, which provides a snapshot of some things happening at the time. This report mentions the Forgotten Rebels, the Dundrells, The Daleks, The Purple Toads, Ameoba Quiche, and Bratty and the Babysitters.

There are extensive multi page reviews on gigs at the time starting out with Iggy Pop who played the Concert Hall on November 9th, 1986. The Rebels opened up that show and the reviewer is quite harsh on them. Iggy Pop's back up band doesn't fair much better, but Iggy gets credit. The review is followed by a review of the "Blah Blah Blah" LP.

DOA played at the RPM on October 2nd, 1986. I actually went to that show and took photos which I posted on the EXD blog. The review complains about the hardcore kids slam dancing and that wasn't such a big part of the show. The RPM was a huge place and there didn't seem to be the scale where kids could slam so it wasn't as bad as the reviewer makes it out to be. But the show was not the best DOA show I had ever seen either.

There is a glowing show review of a Shreikback show which sees a full page photo repeated on the back cover. This is also accompanied by a review of their Big Night Music" LP. Lou Reed played at Kingswood which was the outdoor venue at amusement park known as Wonderland out in Maple. There is also a show review of a Psychic TV show that took place at the Diamond Club (August 11th). The reviewer was disappointed by this show.

The main feature of this issue is an interview with Blair Martin of the Raving Mojos. It was after the Mojos had broken up and Blair had some great insight into a number of things. Blair writes about how the Brits re-interpreated the Ramones version of punk with a little too much theatre and as a result got the speed confused for wanting not to sing. Blair talks about being the original drummer for the Androids and filling on for Teenage Head for one tour on drums. It is an amazing piece. Blair had assembled a band with members of Youth Youth Youth, Living Proof, and Mick Slick, but I don't think they played out.

There is other local content that features a piece on Richard Carstens who I know as the guy who wrote most of the No Mind album. He was the guitarist in Funhouse, Afhaken, and Madhouse and at the time was playing in Sun Zoom Spark, which is the band that Alisdair from No Mind played in. Richard also writes some pieces in this issue. He wrote one of the only interviews I have read about Neon Rome. This is the band that John Borra of the Screwed started out in. The first half of this interview is a made up story by the singer about how the band met. The other interview I read in Nerve about Neon Rome had a similar fiction telling pattern. The interview does disclose that their album ad been recorded by the time and that Comfort Sounds had recorded it.

There is a piece on a new U.I.C. album titled "Our Garage", a review of Fifth Column's "To Sir with Hate", and a funny interview with Erica Ehm, who was a VJ on Much Music at the time. Great time capsule on Toronto.

This piece is courtesy of Dhaibid james archives. Dhaibid hosts Moondog's Ballroom on CIUT.