Ache Fanzine
The disconcerting part of this new punk/hardcore zine is the way editor Armen occasionally feels obliged to provide pre-emptive apologies to commence his feature articles and interviews. He needn’t have. Put it down to first issue self-doubts, but the truth is, this is a really first rate fanzine. A long interview with Fugazi’s Ian MacKaye kick starts with a grilling about male pattern baldness, which is certainly something you don’t read every day. And an interview with Catharsis vocalist Brian Dingledine turns into a startlingly revealing and thoughtful debate with a Christian interrogator. There’s a lot of text in Ache, but none of it’s boring, and as much as the content is geared toward a specific music scene, there’s so much of value here it’s worthy of recommendation to anybody who’s inspired by art-for-arts sake. (DF)
zine, no. 1, fall 1999, 32 pgs, $2, editor Armen Svadjian, 167 Cortleigh Blvd., Toronto, ON M5N 1P6