Four Classic Bay Area Punk Zines

Punk rockers have been making fanzines (or just zines for short) for as long as they have been playing music. Long before the Internet, kids would use typewriters, pens and markers to create some content they wanted to share. They would photocopy what they made and distribute it to their friends.

It was one of the essential aspects of the punk rock Do It Yourself (DIY) culture. These ziens would be written about any topic you could think of, from band interviews to travel adventure stories to political ramblings. They would include comics, poetry, art and anything else that could be represented on a black and white photocopy.

Zines were a way in which kids could share their creativity with one another, beyond just the music that punk centered around. Zines were a source of influence.

Zines remain popular today as a form of independent self publishing. These are a few of the classic zines put out by Bay Area punks.

Maximum Rock And Roll

Maximum Rock and Roll (MRR) is still being put out to this day. It is a thick, black and white magazine based in San Francisco. The content is largely centered around the punk rock music scene, but includes a healthy number of columns about many topics; politics, interviews, personal, punk rock, etc.

This is one of the longest running zines in America and was always a great source for discovering new bands. There is a long section for music and zine reviews.

This volunteer-produced zine is widely distributed and can be found throughout the world.

Cometbus

This hand-written zine began in 1981, a year before the first issue of MRR. Created and distributed by Arron Cometbus, it captured a slice of life from the 1980s and 90s Bay Area punk rock scenes.

The zine is hand written by Arron and has taken on a wide range of themes since its inception. Whole issues have been dedicated to interviews or the history of a specific institution. Other issues focus on Arron's travels and adventures.

The talented writing stands out from most other zines. Cometbus has inspired countless others to pick up a pen or typewriter and to publish their own stories.

Absolutely Zippo!

Absolutely Zippo! was a zine made by Robert Eggplant. If MRR is an established and respected magazine, and Cometbus is a well written autobiography, Absolutely Zippo! is a representation of the chaos that is punk rock. Robert and Arron were friends and grew up in the same scene, however, their zines are very different from one another.

Absolutely Zippo! is raw, chaotic and funny. I always considered it to be more punk than most other zines. It included contributions from others, scene reports, artwork, shit-talking about the West Bay, and rants. No matter the content, there was almost always a fair amount of humor and sarcasm thrown in. This zine had the kind of "fuck you" attitude that I always expected from a punk rock zine.

Scam

Iggy Scam's zine only have nine and a half issues ever published. However, this was one of the most well known and respected zines in the Bay Area. Scam focused on protests, politics, scamming the system and living on the edges of society.

To me it was always a mix of punk politics and punk lifestyle; stories of dumpster diving and gentrification. This zine is the most focused on resistance and counter culture.