< zines >
CRIMEWAVE #15
Content by various contributors including editors/publishers Mark Maynard and Linette Lao.
($4.00 from Crimewave U.S.A. / PO Box 980301 / Ypsilanti, MI / 48198 USA. Web:
www.crimewaveusa.com)
Review by Randy Osborne
“This issue almost killed us,” writes Mark Maynard, in his half of the introduction. Echoes his partner Linette Lao: “Putting this magazine together hurts.” You gotta believe them, but #15 bears the same playful, funny, and altogether intelligent tone of
Crimewave U.S.A. #14 (they took “U.S.A.” off the cover this time around. Who can blame them? We’re all ashamed). My favorite piece here is “Off The Charts,” an article by Linette titled after the PBS documentary about making song poems – a phenomenon Linette explores through an interview with Jamie Meltzer, who’s responsible for the PBS film. Song poems are lyrics made up by some ordinary Joe or Jane (or not so ordinary!), maybe scribbled with a pencil stub on a greasy paper bag, and then sent away to musicians who – for money – put the words to their own melody and mail back the completed record, filling the lyricist with quiet glee. “Essentially, a song poem is the result of a collaboration between two random strangers through the mail,” Linette explains. Lyric writers find song-poem services amongst the classifieds in the back of magazines, headlined “Music Composed To Poems” and such. The result is pretty much what you would imagine, except that in some cases you couldn’t possibly.
What else in
Crimewave? Plenty. Steve Hughes’ “Stupor,” for example, a masterful, serious essay, beautifully laid out in a two-page spread. “Cook on Cold Water: Journal Entries from an Arctic Fishing Trawler” by Dan Danguilan is hilarious. He’s a cook on the boat and the journal entries are letters sent to his sister. Check out the toothy sea lion who gets on board, wreaking havoc. "It lunged and I instantly teleported halfway up the stairs … " The brave confession by former telemarketer Chelsea Lowe, “Dial N for ‘Nasty Little Creature’” is an in-your-face treasure, and … well, there’s too much excellence here to speak of without gibbering. As I sense I have begun to do. Buy it, read, celebrate – and hope Mark and Linette continue to suffer, but no more than is necessary to keep the thing coming.
[ Link to this review ]
