Wednesday, February 5, 2020

Colorado Crew : Denvoid Part 2 Book

OUT NOW!
Colorado Crew: Denvoid Part 2
A Collection of Tales & Images from
The Colorado Punk Scene 1988-1996
Authors: Bob Rob Medina & Sonny Kay
Book Cover: Chris Shary
Forward: Jason Heller
ISBN: 978-1-7923-2129-0
Pages: 322
Full-color
Robot Enemy Books 

Order here: https://bobrobart.bigcartel.com. 
If you are in the Denver area, the book is also available at: Wax Trax, Kilgore Books, Twist & Shout, Mutiny Information Cafe, FashioNation, Tattered Cover,  Chain Reaction Records, Black and Read (Arvada) Bart's Records (Boulder), Albums on the Hill (Boulder), Trident Books (Boulder), and Red Letter Books (Boulder). 
Also available through: Amazon, Microcosm Publishing, Lunchbox Records (NC)

A follow-up to Bob Rob Medina's Denvoid and the Cowtown Punks, Colorado Crew : Denvoid Part 2 enlists Sonny Kay's talents to create a visual odyssey of images and interviews featuring bands, record labels, artists, writers, entrepreneurs, academics, photographers, promoters, Grammy nominees, culture jammers, and media influencers.

Inside you’ll find: Warlock Pinchers, Matt Bischoff (Fluid/’57 Lesbian), Tom Headbanger (Temple ov Psychick Youth/promoter), Chris Shary (artist/Pilot Car/Sizewell), Rich Jacobs (artist/Keep In Mind/Atomic Dilemma/Skate Edge fanzine and records), Sonny Kay (The VSS/Angel Hair/GSL Records), Jon Snodgrass (Armchair Martian/Drag the River) Atiba Jefferson (photographer), Scooter James (Pinhead Circus), Jason Heller (Crestfallen/The Blue Ontario/author), Mark Brooks (Warlock Pinchers/Foreskin 500/writer/director), Eric Richter (Christie Front Drive/Lilawatt/Turn*Key), Mike Jourgenson (Abdomen/DU Records/Spinal Jaundice fanzine), Chrissy Piper (Photographer), Julie Peasley (artist/Cavity/entrepreneur), Pete Lyman (Junkdrawer/JUHL/Grammy Award winner), Tim Nakari & Hans Buenning (Small Dog Frenzy), Matt Jacobson (Psychotic Society/Relapse Records), Kurt Ottaway (Twice Wilted), Andy Lefton (Flux of Disorder/Tau Cross/writer/director), Andy Monley (Jux Country/Acid Ranch), Dan Berger (Meanface/Hell’s Half Acre), Chanin Floyd (Twice Wilted/ Spell/’57Lesbian), Bryan Wendzel (Acid Pigs/Hell’s Half Acre/Mudstack/Disobedience fanzine), Ely Morgan (Sadplant/Novice/Manta Ray), Dave Clifford (Again!/The VSS), Jared Poley (Again!/Titanic Records), Andy Falconetti (Sissy Fuzz/Breezy Porticos), Richard Groskopf (Boss 302), Julia McClurg (The Hectics/Diagnosis fanzine), Paul Drake (promoter/photographer/roadie), Brian Hull (Atomic Dilemma), Ian O’Dougherty (Uphollow/Fauxgazi), Jack Suter (Acid Pigs), Paul & Pam Italiano (FashioNation),  Dan Kapelovitz & Dan Kaufman (Grime Priest/Psychick Sooshee), Mike Jacoby (Normal Kids/39 Lies), Johnny Seven (Crestfallen/Seven Lucky Records), Josh & Justin Lent (FIA, Clusterfux/Chain Reaction Records), Keith Curts (Junkdrawer, Llamas NoVa/Echo Beds), Dave Paco (Eleventh Hour/FOUR!/The Messyhairs/Paco Garden Records), Andrew Murphy (Smooch Records), Paul Kane (Freewill Records/Double Entendre Records), Rich Myers (Bunny Genghis), Tony Roffe (Innocent Addiction), Tony Greenberg (Grimace), Kevin Savoy (Wrong Approach, Kingpin, Denver chef), Tim Beckman (Dogbite/Spell), Ted Thacker (Baldo Rex/Veronica), Patricia Kavanaugh (Harriet The Spy/Llamas NoVa/artist), April Soll (Social Joke), Vanessa Merten Holzkncht (Vex/Infinite Onion), Bob Rob Medina (Donut Crew Records/Savalas/Junkdrawer/promoter), Belljar, Choosey Mothers, Dead Silence, Blistering Body Pus, Aberant, Linus, T Tauri, Cold Crank..and just about everyone else who contributed to Colorado’s vibrant music scene from 1988-96. 

The book also comes with a soundtrack: 
Colorado Crew : Denvoid Part 2 Compilation Album
Featuring 76 bands and 78 tracks.
Download by clicking here


Track List:
Abdomen: Gun Club Road 2:01      
Aberant: Song 1  2:36                     
Acid Pigs: Swallow My Pride 2:52  
Acid Ranch: Simon's Halo 2:13       
Again: Wait The Turn 2:26             
Angel Hair: New Rocket 3:00          
Armchair Martian: Breaking Down Again 2:32                            
Atomic Dilemma: Scars 3:05                       
Baldo Rex: I'm OK, I Can Drive 2:08          
Belljar: On Hemophilia 3:43           
Blistering Body Pus Meaning of Life (Live_91) 2:41                    
Boss 302: Whatever Happened to Fun 2:35        
Bunny Genghis: Ham Driver 3:58                          
Choosey Mothers: Magazine 2:32              
Christie Front Drive: Turn 4:06                             
Clusterfux: Letter to the Press 1:23                                  
Cold Crank: Call It What You Want 2:17               
The Creeps: Ticketed 1:41              
Crestfallen: Three Feet Down 3:45                        
Dead Silence: Faith River 1:34                               
Deadstate: Outraged 1:00                           
Distance: Consentrate 2:24                        
Eco Guerrillas: Plodding 3:09                                 
ELAN: Mudsocket 4:06                                
End of Story: The Winter 4:13                               
Expatriate: Sometimes Love Is Fucking Stupid 1:53                    
FIA (Fuck It All): Unite & Fight 1:08                                  
First Class Chokers: Never Go Back 2:17                           
The Fluid: Cold Outside 3:18                      
Flux Of Disorder: NMTB 2:17                     
Four!: Bad Situation 1:09                
Grimace: Burned 3:16                     
Grime Priest: Ian 2:21                     
The Hectics: Bathmat 2:52                          
Hell's Half Acre: Bed 'o Needles 2:15                     
Hobbledehoy: Grommits 3:00                    
Hop'd: Nifty Idea 2:27                     
Human Head Transplant: Land O' Lies 4:54                    
Innocent Addiction: Road Rash 1:35                                 
IZ: Pinball Brain Node 3:30            
Junkdrawer: Knew You (Live at the Ogden 1995) 8:01             
Jux County: Zombie Afterlife 6:24                         
Keep In Mind: Instrumental (Live at the Aztlan 1990) 3:54                           
Llamas NoVa: No Name (Live at the Fox Theater) 3:24                        
Meanface: King of Hell 2:15                                   
New Breed: System 2:05                             
Nine Twenty Nine (9:29): Black is White 2:26                 
Normal Kids: Normal Kid 2:22                               
Old Bull's Needle: Garbage Man 3:11                                
Pilot Car: Mister Manero 2:25                                
Pinhead Circus: So Why Do You Like Me Now 2:36                     
Psychick Sooshee: Hare Fishna 3:54                                  
Psychotic Society: War Machine / Bleeding Contrast 1:37                     
Reform Control: Qs 1:37                 
Rotoflo (pre Savalas): Track 04 3:12                     
The Sauce: Turtle Buzz 4:08                       
Savalas: First  3:27   
Short Fuse: Death Mobile 1:38       
Sissy Fuzz: Don't Fear (The Reverb) 3:02             
Sizewell: Any Other Name 3:01                              
Small Dog Frenzy: Bigtime Sunshine 2:36            
The Snatchers: So Far Away 3:21              
Soak: Foul Child 4:27                                   
Southpaw: Commentary On The Isagoge of Porphyry 4:01                   
Spell: Seems To Me 3:21                             
Spell: I Am A Meteor (unreleased bonus track) 4:26                     
Suede Fruit: Eyes Of A Blue Dog 1:44                     
T Tauri: Ephemeralysis 1:48                                  
Turn*Key: Two 4:03            
Twice Wilted: Twice The Life 4:28             
Uphollow: Evolution 4:09               
Velcro Overdose: Guilty 1:05                      
The VSS: Death Scene 1:53                         
Warlock Pinchers: Introducing Ourselves 5:57                
World Gone Mad: Over My Head 4:57                  
Wrong Approach: Eclipse 2:47       
'57 Lesbian: Keith Black's Mummy 2:23   
'57 Lesbian:Aloha Moose and Squirrel (unreleased bonus track) 3:30  

Tuesday, May 21, 2019

The Mighty Warlock Pinchers

You can still order the first Denvoid and the Cowtown Punks book from Amazon by clicking HERE.

From the forthcoming: Denvoid 2: The Colorado Crew due out in Dec. 2019, a short excerpt from our interview with the Warlock Pinchers. 

My introduction to the Warlock Pinchers came by way of the US Post Office. The band must’ve found my address on the first Donut Crew compilation and mailed me a copy of their self-released, This Is The Cobbler And He Hates Your Bellbottoms EP. Once I got past the title and opened the record that’s when I realized that these guys were waging war on the predictability of punk rock and perhaps music in general. An odd assortment of unrelated items spilled out from the off-registered two-color photocopied sleeve. The mess that laid before me was an absolute labor of love and it had my attention.   

I was curious about the music packed inside those grooves and couldn’t wait to set it on my turntable. The song title that initially caught my attention was, James Dean Is An Overrated Asshole. That needed immediate listening. As the record spun I stared at it completely dumbfounded. I looked at the cover then looked at the record then glancing at the pile of coupons, stickers and whatever else the band shoved in the sleeve. After the first side ended. There was still hope for side 2. Nope. It looked punk, but it sounded like bad rap over distorted noise…an instrument for New World Order torture. Aesthetically, it was the best thing to come out of Denver since the Bum Kon or the Frantix EPs. Maybe even better than Tom Headbanger’s handwritten zines and flyers...  

Interview by: Bob Rob (Medina) and Sonny Kay.


Eventually the band became five permanent members. How did the others join?

Andrew: I came in as a percussionist. I would go to the practices and play along with the drum machine. I was into industrial music, stuff like Psychic TV...I can beat on metal. I started doing backing vocals because the band came from seven people where everyone would yell the key words. I would start yelling the key words. Dan was writing, listing to all this rap and he was writing stuff where he could switch-off vocals to a tee. He could write something that was way more complex and play with having two vocalists where you could talk over each other, line to line and overlap. Dan was writing really cool stuff to experiment with vocals.

And Derek?

Derek:  This is kind of out of order, but my first show with WPO was at Penny Lane, and I think we were opening for Again!, Dave Clifford’s band.  Bob, I think you were putting on the show, and wouldn’t let me in without a ticket.  I kept pleading that I was “in the band,” and you finally rolled your eyes, and said, “yeah, sure” and let me in.  That’s the show where we had a squirt bottle filled with acetone for pyrotechnics, and the outside of it caught on fire, and then someone stomped on it, and we basically caught Mark’s drums on fire.  I thought Penny Lane was going to burn down and that I’d be fired.  No more rock n roll fantasy for me.

Dan: Our crew was Smedley's Van and the Warlock Pinchers. We'd try to play shows together whenever we could. They had a goofy sense of humor like we did, but they were doing something different musically.

Derek: I think the thing we all had in common was a combination of openness to - and interest in - everything, but at the same time an initial and total lack of respect for everything.  Things sucked unless proven otherwise.  Smedley’s Van wanted to make a whole album that sounded like Led Zeppelin just to show how unnecessary Led Zeppelin was.  It turns out we didn’t have the skills, and somehow ended up writing “Psycho Santa” which is even more sad because we were trying to recreate “Ghetto Defendant” with the Allen Ginsberg voice-over stuff (which we loved!).  So yeah, a long way of saying we had the same ethos.

Eric: I was a few years ahead of them at CU. A friend told me that this band the Warlock Pinchers were playing a party at my old house and that I should go check them out. It was amazing. Around the same time, I was helping Michelle Clifford out at the Program Council at CU booking bands at Quigley's. I was up at in the office of Program Council when Mark came around when the 7" was finished. Mark gave me a copy. I was always into the punk rock do it yourself thing. I was booking a show for Steel Pole Bathtub at Quigley's. At the show I told Mark it would cool to have a band with two bass players. Mark was like, "Well maybe, yeah."

Dan: I wasn't around for that conversation, but I definitely heard about it after the fact. Mark said, "We have a show at Quigley's” and the day of the show I got diagnosed with mono so I couldn't do the show. I couldn't sing. I think that's the day Eric was talking to Mark about that, because after that Mark goes, "I was talking to this guy Eric and he wants there to be two bass players in the band" I went, "Ok"

Eric: After that we practiced in the basement Dan's parents’ house in Louisville. I drove up, joined in at practice and that was it.

Andrew: There was the tour that there was the six of us.

Derek:  Yes, we did overlap for one show!  Salt Lake at whatever that awesome place was.  We were naked except for Brian and his dog food wrap… I think that’s the trip where I remembered that I forgot my guitar when we were north of Fort Collins.  I’m still sorry about that…



I think a lot of people underestimate the influence of the book, Pranks at the time. It was literally a how-to guide for culture jamming. 

Andrew: It sort of gives you permission to lie and do whatever. Also, trying to get shows on tour, you had to have a manager. But, of course we can't afford a manager. No club wants to talk to the guy in the band. So we had a fake manager. His name was Wil Wheaton. It was ridiculous because no one ever realized that Wil Wheaton was a child actor.

Dan: That came about by playing with the Butthole Surfers. They had the teen magazine in their dressing room. They were looking through them and there's all these pages with Wil Wheaton and their drummer Teresa said Mark looked like Wil.

Mark: I did!

Andrew: Since we didn't get sued by Tiffany, we weren't going to stop there, let's just say we got sued by Tiffany. So we made a press release and Wil Wheaton sent it out to all Denver’s media. We made a fake logo from Tiffany’s manager and put it on letterheads and everybody called. The Denver Post, Rocky Mountain News, Campus Press Westword, Colorado Daily...They all called, wanting to interview us. I had this wall of Tiffany posters and flyers and magazine clippings and I had Tiffany shoe, which I totally made up. It wasn't her shoe. Yes, I did meet her, yes, I did interview her. So we fuck-up the interview and it sounds totally fake and I say I got her shoes which I got on clearance somewhere and I have this Tiffany stamp from a Columbia House mailer which I licked and put on the shoe. So I said Tiffany gave me her shoes when I interviewed her because she didn't want them anymore. It's all true, I'm a Tiffany fan but then I lied about the shoes for no reason. Lied about things that don't matter. The press is interviewing us and Wil Wheaton is not around...

Derek: Before Eric interrupts, I’ll just point out at that this point I’m still not in the band, but I’m living with Mark and Andrew and “Wil”.  You can’t imagine how much fun it was to answer the phone, trying to figure out as fast you could who was trying to call for whom and what to say/do in those split seconds.  Some kind of crazy chess game where we got to make up the rules as went along.  I’m still not quite sure how pulling a prank differs from just being an asshole, but it was a blast.

Eric: This is a good place to interrupt! I had an awkward encounter with Gil Asakawa form Westword because I was working at Wax Trax then. He came in asking about the Warlock Pinchers because they just got the press release and he was all hot to write this story about sticking up for the little guy. He was asking me and I was trying not to let him know I was in the band. It was actually Mike Serviolo who told him to talk to me. He asked me about Wil. So I had to face-to-face lie to him about Wil Wheaton. I told him "I don't know where he is." I guess I lied well enough because Gil's Westword story was one of the few to go to press before the lid came off our scam.

Thursday, May 16, 2019

Denvoid 2: Keith Curts (Echo Beds, Fauxgazi, Junkdrawer, Subpoena The Past, Glass Hits)

Denvoid and the Cowtown Punks Volume 2: The Colorado Crew is coming out this year. Really it is. Sonny Kay and I have been slowly chipping away at it over the past 3-4 years. The problem is that this is a hobby and often takes a backseat to our jobs and families. On my end, living in Alexandria, Egypt makes calling folks across the pond tricky. Additionally, I'm in the process of relocating to Abu Dhabi for work; there are plenty of balls in motion. 

I'm obsessed with this project and feel lucky when I'm able to set aside chunks of time towards completing it even if it entails transcribing interviews in the front seat of a car on the way to Cairo. My bigger problem is that I want to include everyone and don't know when to stop. Typically, I interview one person and usually go, "Ohh, I should also interview this other person" and it avalanches from there. So here we are. forty plus interviews later and we're STILL hunting down the last couple of folks. As the project has expanded beyond the initial vision, it will easily overshadow the first Denvoid book in its massiveness (and star power) not to mention tons of artwork, photographs, flyers, etc. Unfortunately, not every band from that period (1988-1996) will be interviewed, but we are being conscious to include them in one form or another.

Q: When will Denvoid 2 be reseased?
A: Mid-December 2019. Not the ideal time, but it's the time I can get away from Abu Dhabi. We are contacting people to try and make this a special release. Ideally, we like to devote a weekend to this event with bands playing at different venues around Denver. My goal will be to release excerpts of interviews each week until the book release.

This first installment features Keith Curts. I've had the pleasure to play music with Keith from 1994-96 with both Junkdrawer and Llamas NoVa. When I met Keith in 1992 he was just starting out, I had seen his first band, So Far Gone play. The band was young, but everyone involved had an intense energy to them...although their set was technically sloppy, it was played with passion and sincerity and that's what mattered. They were heavily influenced by the DC sound that had pretty much infected every corner of the country - even in Longmont where So Far Gone was hatched from.

Keith's next band, Junkdrawer made room for me after I returned from living a year in Birmingham, Alabama. We played out often and even survived a three-week summer tour of the southwest and west coast. After Junkdrawer called it quits: Keith, along with Patricia Kavanaugh (Harriet The Spy), Sean Watson (Savalas drummer #3), Mark Bradin (Savalas drummer #2) and I  didn't waste any time in forming Llama NoVa. It should be noted that Tim Nakari (Small Dog Frenzy) played in the second incarnation of Llamas NoVa.

In 1996 Keith left Colorado for the bay area and played in a few band there including Subpoena The Past with Sonny. Upon his return a decade later he played in: Glass Hits, Fauxgazi (A Fugazi cover band that went on tour - check out the documentary here and of course his latest project Echo Beds.

Keith caught the playing music bug early and never stopped. He had always pushed himself to learn and grow in his endeavors. Always humble, approachable, and easy to strike-up a conversation with. Enjoy the excerpts of the interview.

Interviewed by Bob Rob (Medina)

Brush and ink drawing after a photograph from Jeff Davis

What did that whole Longmont scene look like to you?

There was our band and New Breed who was Andy Lefton on Bass, Jared Allen on guitar, Matt Sandau sang, and Mike McNaughton on drums. Mike eventually ended up in Linus. There was also a crossover metal band kinda like DRI, called Salacious Crumb. This guy Nick played with them and Jason Barlowe. Jason ended up playing bass in Linus. So there was this thread throughout the Longmont scene. There was another band with Mark Risius and Andy Brazycki and a couple of other people, they would go through different names changes, Fahrenheit 451 was one of their names at one point. There was also Caste who was Will Welty, Dan Parris, Pete Lyman along with Mike McNaughton. Mike and I went to high school together and he was the first one who turned me on to things like Godflesh and Nitzer Ebb. You know, I remember in 9th grade I was getting turned on to so many different things and it kind of kept going. Then you have this moment trying to figure out your music identity; Am I a new waver? Am I a punk rocker? You don't realize it's all under the same umbrella. Then you start putting it all together, like Godflesh is kind of a punk band, kind of an industrial band, kind of a metal band...

The few of us would take a bus into Boulder to catch a Savalas shows. We'd see people from Dead Silence walking around and that was weird because we were from this little podunk town and Boulder seemed like it was so much more grown-up because it had more of a scene. We looked-up to that. Seeing some of those bands were life changing, to get to experience Savalas, Belljar, Dig, Small Dog Frenzy… That was out big city experience. (laughs)

What was So Far Gone's first show? When did you guys actually start playing?

We would play in Jeb's dad's garage or like my parent’s basement when they went out of town and my step brother wasn't home. We’d play in other people's living rooms. I remember playing a show at a grange hall in Lafayette. The Offspring and G’rups played there at one point. We had local shows there too. We weren't a good band. At least I felt like I wasn't a good part of that band. (laughs). It was the thought that counted.

I remember Brian Gathy and I liking So Far Gone at the ballet studio show in Boulder.

Oh yeah! We did play that show because it was recorded! We played with Belljar and Dig. It was Dig's last show because their guitarist, Ken Smallwood was moving back to the East Coast. I vividly remember Brian Gathy smashing his bass into pieces, like splinters because he was so distraught that the band was ending. Later, I got to know Brian and understood that was how he was... I had never experienced anything like that before. I had never witnessed that kind of emotion that connected with music. I didn't get to see bands like Rites of Spring. I know Brian did since he was from DC. Watching Brian that night, I just connected with that. And Belljar’s set - Grant Gutherie just fucking wailing. That was an amazing time.

Like with So Far Gone, we didn't know what we were doing. We didn't do it long enough to actually get good at it. It wasn't like you listen to a bunch of records and then try to figure out how to play like that. We just played. There was no artifice and no roadmap. Dan turned me on to a lot of the Dischord stuff, “emo stuff” that just rang a bell with me. I immediately became inspired by all that stuff, but I couldn't play like that. We just all started playing. Andy Rothbard and Jeb had been friends forever, there were like fifteen when we started the band, I was 17, and Dan was 19. It really was a collaboration, a sum of its parts where everyone came in with something different. It was like creation for creation sake. That was it, it was really liberating to just play. The beauty of youth, not yet looking through the microscope.

Reflecting back on the on that show at the ballet studio, it's funny how some people had that “holy shit” moment seeing Brian smash his bass. I saw the appeal of witnessing someone shattering an instrument because they were consumed by the moment. I can tell you for certain that Sonny and I had a different “holy shit” moment as in, "Fuck, Savalas is about to head out on a three-week tour AND fucking Brian just smashed his bass. You know, we were like, “What an asshole.” (laughs)

Savalas was really good, you guys were older and knew how to play your instruments. You played shows, toured, had shirts with Chris Shary's artwork! If Chris Shary is doing you artwork that really meant something...Take this as a compliment, because it is, I never met anyone with tattoos before (laughs). Seriously, we looked up to you guys. We were like, "These guys know what's up." We're just fumbling around in the dark over here and that's fine because I'm seventeen and I'm allowed to do that. So I get it that you and Sonny were being practical while we were looking at Brian in awe. 

------
 
I don't remember if we played after the Shudder To Think show. I didn't know if the recording was before or after the Shudder show, but I think that was it for the band.

So we have to talk a little bit about that too. At least just touch on it. There was a weird backlash between what was punk and what wasn't. That was a strain for our band, it wasn't like we were careering or on the fast track. It was around that time that some punk bands were getting picked up by bigger labels like Shudder To Think, Samiam...

And that Shudder To Think show was being boycotted by some of our friends because it wasn't punk enough!? It wasn't a punk show?  Huh, that really like confused me. I thought what we were doing was a punk band. The fact that we did it ourselves and didn't rely on anyone else. We wrote everything ourselves. You booked everything pretty much. It was all us, but that somehow wasn't punk enough. It kind of was a kick in the nuts, you know.

It was disheartening and reflecting back on it, it was petty. The whole DIY thing got really out of control, it was like the absurdity in the DIY culture that the TV show, Portlandia lampoons. When did punk start having rules, that's kind of an oxymoron. Who gives a shit if we played a $7 show?  

It became a very dogmatic thing.



Llamas NoVa 
Photo: Jeff Davis

Thursday, September 14, 2017

Colorado Krew 2 update and more!

Sorry for the long absence, here's an update on our new project(s): 

Denvoid 2-The Colorado Krew: Tales From the Colorado Punk Scene 1988-96. Longtime friend/former bandmate/roommate, Sonny Kay will co-author and bring in his insights and role in the scene. We've been feverishly slaving away collecting materials, interviewing people, and making the artwork for it. We will be releasing bits and pieces every week. Also, we've been working with History Colorado Center about having our book release event there (with live music?) in late 2018 as they gear up for their awesome Colorado Music History exhibit in 2019. Exciting times are on the horizon.

In the meantime, I will be traveling to Denver to talk to a class at DU on Colorado Punk and hosting a panel discussion at Mutiny Information Cafe, 2 South Broadway, Denver on October 26 at 7:30 pm with: 
Jill “Razer” Mustoffa (promoter) 
Arnie Beckman (Choosey Mothers) 
Andrew Novick (Warlock Pinchers)
Jason Heller (Crestfallen/music writer)
Tom Murphy (former Westword music columnist)

Speaking of books. Robot Enemy shows no signs of slowing down. You can still order Denvoid and the Cowtown Punks and Sonny's book, Headspaces by clicking here.
Sonny Kay is a graphic artist and illustrator, punk rock vocalist (Angel Hair, The VSS, Year Future), record label founder (Gold Standard Laboratories), and underground music icon. Beginning in the early nineties, his cut-and-paste flyer making gradually evolved into designing album covers, and by 2007 he was mastering a graphic technique all his own, crafting seamless, painting-like collages, often on behalf of some of the most colorful names in rock music, such as: THE MARS VOLTA, THE LOCUST, RX BANDITS, THE GLITCH MOB, AND SO I WATCH YOU FROM AFAR and 311, to name a few. Ranging from the provocative to the surreal to the incomprehensible, Kay's work is true to his anti-authoritarian nature while often exploring themes of higher consciousness, multi-dimensionality, and so on. HEADSPACES is the first book of his work. Packed with nearly 200 images, it's an exhaustive collection of high-definition, mind-bending collage art new and old, featuring many previously unpublished works, and of course, covers to a lot of albums.  

In October, Robot Enemy will be releasing Patterns of Reconciliation by Matt Mauldin.
Matt Mauldin is a poet living in Santa Barbara, CA, originally from Atlanta, GA. He was involved for many years in Atlanta’s underground rock scene as singer and lyricist for the bands Car vs Driver, Chocolate Kiss and Sonn Av Krusher. His first anthology, Patterns of Reconciliation, is comprised of select poems written between 1993 and 2017, and is organized around themes such as coming-of-age, trauma, love, mourning, depression, anxiety, relationships, enlightenment, social commentary and spirituality.