Drawing was my first love and writing came second, designing my own little magazines through most of grade school. Stuffing library photocopies in the desks and lockers of fellow students for years before being introduced to “zines” at the age of 17. For my senior year vocational project I insisted that I’d be making zines the rest of my life and so far, I’ve stuck with it. Text heavy and preferring the traditional cut and paste method over digital, as graphic design is not a passion of mine. All of the zines below are available for purchase in the shop.
Ornery Cuss is a dark humored perzine published in the spring of 2023. A collection of short stories about working class life in the pandemic, drug addiction, unmedicated mental illness, the beauty of grief, and living with the consequences of our actions.
The Greasy Spoon’s Weirdo Du Jour was published in 2010 as a perzine, after 3 years of working in a dive. Partially inspired by Tom Waits’ Nighthawks at the Diner, it served up several short stories of unusual customers from the perspective of a short order cook. Bunny Ears Distro released 3 spoken word tracks the same year on Bandcamp.
Cathode Ray Mission #1 is the first fanzine I’ve ever written, published in June of 2023. A text-heavy quarter size, it contains 14 essays regarding the horror and science fiction genres from film, television, literature, music, and retro gaming. The title is a reference to David Cronenberg’s Videodrome.
Cathode Ray Mission #2 was published at the same time as the first issue. It features another 14 essays of horror and sci-fi as seen in film, comics, true crime, television, retro gaming, ancient history, music, and revolutionary filmmakers.
A third issue of the thick pocket-sized fanzine for every flavor of horror and sci-fi! Cathode Ray Mission #3 was released in September of 2024. Featuring a collection of articles from various writers like Tim Murr of St. Rooster Books and Bobby Zier of Lugosi Theater. From film and television to gaming, literature, and music. #3 has it all!
Written and assembled in under 5 days, this quarter sized zine is 40 pages long. A bitter and darkly humored stream-of-consciousness-like rant about the foibles of moving to Milwaukee from Chicago and back again. Highlighting memories of jobs, apartments, and neighborhoods with a slowly imploding marriage in the background.
Another quarter sized zine about a record store. From goofy coworkers to silly customers and weirdo vinyl collectors, this zine stays true to the cynical working class flavor I like to tint my writing with. 88 pages long and comes with it’s own playlist available on YouTube or Spotify.
Copies of these titles are turning up in Zine Libraries across the States and beyond. Here’s a few locations where you can find my zines:
University of Chicago Zine Library
School of the Art Institute of Chicago Joan Flasch Artists’ Book Collection
Sherwood Forest Zine Library of Austin, TX
Gleeson Library/Geschke Center of San Francisco, CA
Pacific Palisades Library of Los Angeles, CA
8-Ball Community Zine Library of NYC
Indianapolis Public Library-East 38th Street Branch
Ely Library at Westfield University
Zine Catalog at Michigan State University Libraries
Thomas Jefferson Library of University of Missouri-St. Louis
Let me know where you find them!