MRR Column #307

I Don’t Care If I’m A Loser In A Game I Never Played

This is my final column as a coordinator of Maximum Rocknroll. Starting next month, this column will be strictly about music. What a novel idea, right? If you’ve been keeping up (yeah right, do people actually read my column? Big up to my fanz!), you most likely already knew that. It’d be dishonest if I said I wasn’t pretty excited. I’m ready to move on to whatever it is that the next part of my life will bring. I’m tired. Working here and working full time at another job has taken a massive toll on me, mentally and physically. I knew right away that it was an impossibility to do both but I tried anyway. Can’t fault for that. As my dad said in his high-school yearbook entry, “Try as hard as you can and no man can ask for more.” I’ve always lived my life my way by my rules, respectfully of course, even when something inside me expressed better judgment. Live and learn. It’s the only way. 

I moved out of the Maxipad three weeks ago and I already miss the bouts of the Judas Priest blasting from Scott’s room going toe to toe with Roehrs’ all-day Victim In Pain sessions. I’m sure in a month I’ll even miss sitting in that captain’s chair intently trying to figure out which one of Quark’s quarks I’m currently contending with to fix some problem in a layout, while Hubbs rocks the newest Down By Law record or the Violent World: Tribute to the Misfits at 3am too. Instead, I’ll be twenty blocks away listening to something equally horrid, like my “best of Alkaline Trio” mixtape, in my room while trying to get Lucy to stop eating out of the trash. To everyone that has wished me luck, given advice, said “What the fuck are you doing?” and every Shitworker, contributor or advertiser that I encountered in the last fourteen months, thank you. For everything!

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Similar sentiment appears other places in this issue but I really feel the need to voice my personal sorrow regarding the unfortunate end of Sound Idea/Burrito Records. I only ordered from Bob a couple times since my initial awakening towards the wonderful world that is mailorder and, in fact, Bob refunded my money for the first order cause I didn’t order the minimum of $10 worth of merchandise (if I had read the whole ad, I’d have known better), and I never made it to the store—I haven’t been to Florida since I was ten—but Sound Idea was one of the most honest, dedicated, affordable and hardworking distribution spots in the world that we know as punk. Not that there aren’t many other distros out there that also embody these same qualities… It also shows a great deal of respect on Bob’s part for what it is that we all love by bowing out gracefully before having to compromise any of his ethics. Mr. Suren, I curtsey to you for all you’ve done for the punxes of the world, and wish you nothing but the best of luck. Your efforts will be sorely missed in these pages and our record collections. 

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By the time this issue hits news stands the world over, the U. S. of motherfuckin’ A will have elected one of two incompetent menaces that are left in the race as the mouthpiece of it’s biggest assholes. It’s like a big fucking joke that they forget to let us in on. I’m not gonna pretend that I understand politics beyond knowing right from wrong, never mind the quantum physics that is presidential politics and “the electoral college,” but either way, we’ve already screwed the pooch. This country cannot be fixed beyond a nuclear winter and just plain old starting over. Besides, I’m too busy dealing with the identity politics of figuring out if I’m a “Joe The Plumber” or a “Joe Six Pack.”

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And with that, I bid adieu. This month’s playlist: Dillinger Four Civil War, Latin Dogs 7", Olho Seco/Brigada Do Odio split LP, Leuzemia LP, Deathreat Consider It War LP, Rain 12", Insomnio’s second LP, Diplo’s “Dutty Six Pack”—a mind-blowing mash-up of Black Flag and Cutty Ranks, and I finally like the Rites Of Spring LP.

Thanks for listening.

“My life my choice, my life my choice, my life my choice, my life my choice, my life my choice, my life my choice, my life my choice, my life my choice…”