Scissors and Glue: Punk Fanzines and the Creation of the DIY Aesthetic- Teal Triggs

Teal Triggs. (2006). Scissors and Glue: Punk fanzines and the Creation of the DIY Aesthetic. Journal of Design History. 19 (1), p69-70,72,76,78.

p69, "The fanzine producer Chris Wheelchair (sic) remarked in the editorial of Ruptured Ambitions (1992) that his Plymouth-based fanzine is 'all about helping promote the DIY punk/alternative/underground movement, which is at present, extremely healthy in many areas, and certainly improving.' From the early 1930s, fan magazines or 'fanzines' have been integral to the creation of a thriving communication network of underground culture, disseminating information and personal views to like-minded individuals on subjects from music and football to anti-capitalism and thrift store shopping."

p69, "It remains within the subculture of punk music where the homemade, A4, stapled and photocopied fanzines of the late 1970s formed the 'do-it-yourself' (DIY) production techniques of a cut-n-paste letterforms, photocopied and collaged images, hand-scrawled and typewritten text."

p69, "'privalege the ethic of DIY, do-it-yourself: make your own culture and stop consuming that which is made for you'." - S. Duncombe, Notes from the Underground: Zines and the Politics of Alternative Culture, Verso, 1997, pp. 1-2.

p70, " 'falling somewhere between a personal letter and a magazine'." - Duncombe Notes From the Underground: Zines and the Politics of Alternative Culture, 1997, p. 11. The relationship between the amateur and fanzines extended beyond punk and formalized through the range of ‘how to’ fanzine books that were published in the 1990s including: B. Brent, Make a Zine!: A Guide to Self-publishing Disguised as a Book on How to Produce a Zine, Black Books, 1997; and F. Lia Block and H. Carlip, Zine Scene: The Do It Yourself Guide to Zines, Girl Press, 1998.

p70, "'Punk Rock is a live experience: it has to be seen and heard live. Playing a record at  home just doesn't communicate the sheer energy, excitement and enthusiasm which are the hallmarks of the music'. Punk fanzines attempted to recreate the same buzz visually - an ethos encapsulated by the Sex Pistols who famously remarked in the New Musical Express 'We're not into music... we're into chaos.'"

p72, "Like punk itself, fanzines moved from positions of independence to rapid co-option into the mainstream."

p76, "In the process of drawing upon low-value production techniques, such as photocopying and Letraset, employing the graphic elements including ransom note cut-outs, handwritten, stencilled, scrawled or typewritten texts, or collage images, a specific graphic language began to emerge which shared similar visual characteristics from fanzine to fanzine. This approach went some way to establish a set of commonly used principles and a way of creating a distinctive graphic language, which ultimately mirrored the particular aesthetic of punk music."

p78, "‘The whole idea of politics is enough to put anyone off it, and therefore the closest most of us get to it is either signing on once a week, or filling in a tax return form once a year. But that’s the way the government wants it, so they can get on with their business of running us the way they think we should be run’." - T. Drayton, Dayglow, Issue 5 May, 1977, n.p. As if to emphasize the point of government control, Tony D. at the bottom of the rant, circles the designated space where the page number should be and writes ‘Number? I’m not a number!’.