BANANAFISH Dead C GATE Sonic Youth BOREDOMS Hanatarash

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Bananafish Magazine issue #6 -- Bullets Wrapped In Sugar 7"EP

August 1991 -- 72 pages -- 1,000 copies printed, OOP -- comes with 7"EP:

Because of Mr. Beezer’s connections, the tempest in a teapot caused by the vast vulgarity of issue number five, and Glass’s relocation to a huge Mission district warehouse called the Starlight Furniture Company with Bob McDonald and Harvey Bennett Stafford, the number of contributors to Bananafish grew exponentially. The staff now included Montana Swisher, writer Debbi Shane, Kitty Flicker, comics legend Dame Darcy, writer Nigel Berger, illustrator Richard “Dick” Sincere, collage artist Rougeux, and numerous others. Assembling an issue became a three-ring circus, with virtually every editorial, graphic, and production-related task being performed by a committee high on something. To borrow a phrase from the marketing department of Reese’s candy, everyone had their peanut butter in someone else’s chocolate. In the autumn 1991 issue of Crank magazine, Marc Masters published an article about Bananafish that reflects the general tone of the working environment fairly accurately. Determining exactly who had done what became impossible, so it was decided to start including an accurate masthead and a true table of contents in each issue (up to this point, they’d been stolen from places such as veterinary journals from the 1930s). However, given that the pages in the rest of the magazine would not be paginated until issue 11, the accurate table of contents was of limited utility.

Mr. Beezer also made another change at this time -- he switched the manufacturing of the seven-inch away from RRRecords to Stomach Ache, a label run by an old friend in New Hampshire named Charlie Ward.

Many of the photos reproduced rather dark in this issue, most notably: the cover; a picture of Raymond Huffman of Shut Up Little Man fame; and a portrait of the Dead C. If any back issue deserves to be redesigned and reprinted, it is this one.

Cover stolen from a news magazine article about terrorism.

“Come Near Me and I’ll Kill You,” a letter from the publisher. Mr. Beezer unleashes his wrath in a full-blown diatribe aimed at Glass and the rest of the Bananafish staff’s lack of discipline; the masturbatory home-taping scene; RRRon Lessard as a business partner; and systemic corruption and incompetence of print distribution. Clearly, the honeymoon between Bananafish and its new publisher is over. It’s a rather difficult read, eerily similar to watching a groom get yelled at by his mom on his wedding day.

“We Don’t Bleed in Your Pool; Please Don’t Swim in Our Blood,” a pair of guest editorials (a teenager’s music essay and Dave Schall’s “Karen Carpenter -- Dead or Alive?”).

Interview with Mad V. Dog of The Merchants of The New Bizarre, “Play Far, Far Away and Other Favorite Requests.” Band history about this sprawling, unruly group of street musicians with no fixed line-up, instrumentation, or melodies. Anyone is permitted to play whenever, whatever and however he or she wants to.

Royal Trux interview, “Allegro Moderato, Motherf*cker.” Neil and Jennifer on the making of the Twin Infinitives double-LP.

Eddie Lee Sausage interview, “Anxiety Montage.” All about Raymond and Peter, the relentlessly bickering, bellowing and brawling drunk roommates immortalized on tape, compact disc, stage, film, the front of T-shirts, and in comic books by the phrase “Shut Up, Little Man.” Sausage discusses life next door to these nuts and how he came to tape record their endless shouting matches. Includes transcribed excerpts selected by Brandan Kearney, and complete seven-volume tape catalog. This was the beginning of a underground cultural phenomenon with which the name Bananafish is still linked, years after all involvement has ceased.

“In My Mind I Save It,” fiction by Lee Ranaldo. Journal excerpts and poetry converted to prose by the Sonic Youth guitarist. Illustrated by Dame Darcy.

The Hanatarash, “The Ground Is Littered With Discarded Penises,” an assemblage of texts translated and edited by David Hopkins about Yamatsuka Eye’s building-destroying performance-noise band. Includes Satoru Higashiseto’s “Oral History of the Hanatarashi;” a few words by Yamastuka himself and Jojo Hiroshige of Japanese noise band Hijo Kaidan; and excerpts from articles originally published in Japanese magazines Fool’s Mate and POW.

The Boredoms, “Wish You Were Hideous,” interview by Mykel Board. A brief, off-the-cuff Q-and-A by Maximum Rock’n’Roll writer, submitted at the last minute.

The Dead C., “The Noise of the Food Falling From the Beaks of the Sacred Chickens,” interview by Greg Freeman. Questions were mailed to New Zealand, where the band turned them over to celebrity guest interviewer Bruce Blucher. A tape of the interview was then mailed back to San Francisco for transcription. Freeman and Glass had a devil of a time figuring out what The Dead C. were talking about because the New Zealand accent requires its speakers to pronounce almost all vowels like the ‘i’ in “mix.” For example, “loud heavy guitar through a Marshall amp” becomes “lid, hivvy g’tih thriwih Mishill imp.” The occasion of Bruce Russell’s visit to San Francisco a few month later allowed Freeman and Glass a chance to get things clarified (handwriting was frequently required) and to throw in follow-up questions. The interview includes the band history, the musical climate of New Zealand, and Mr. Russell’s and Michael Morley’s experiences as educators. With discography and woodcut illustrations by Mr. Morley.

Interview with Gregg Turkington of The Easy Goings, “Rectum? Nearly Killed ’Em.” Details about the band’s recordings and raison d’être, some dream analysis, but mostly just random miscellany.

“Great Moments in R&B: The World of Sound,” by The Enablers. This is a transcription of a recording by a Thinking Fellers Union Local 282 alter ego. The actual recording appears on a compilation 7-inch released by Nuf Sed Cuticle Sheath called Not All That Terrifies Harms.

“Thank You for Not Discussing the Outside World,” reviews by Nigel Berger. The title was first seen hanging on the wall in Grandpa’s rest home on The Simpsons.

This is the first issue of Bananafish in which the record reviews were not written entirely by S. Glass.

Because of Mr. Beezer’s roots in Italian socialist poetry journals, he decided that the reviews should be written collectively and spontaneously, with one person acting as moderator or secretary for each issue. Only the name of that person would appear on the byline for the column (which was supposed to maintain Glass’s convention of presenting the reviews authorless but, in fact, did no such thing, as it was never indicated that that person was merely coordinating text supplied by numerous people). The matter would come to a head down the road. “Great Moments in R&B: Gardening My Way,” fiction by Montana Swisher. About blowin’ sh!t up with firecrackers.

Bullets Wrapped in Sugar seven-inch (Stomach Ache, SA03), 1,000 copies

Cover design by Toni Smith

The Easy Goings medley combines an original tune with the hit instrumental by Hot Butter. Mr. Freeman’s Pink Underwear is an excerpt from the tape of the Dead C. interview spotlight Mr. Russell’s unique laugh.

EP Tracks:

A1 Eye Yamatsuka - Untitled A2 Merchants Of The New Bizarre, The - Jimmy Carter A3 Lee Ranaldo - Deva, Spain Fragments Engineer - Wharton Tiers B1 Easy Goings, The - Bigfoot / Popcorn Medley B2 Dead C. - Puberty B3 Gate - That's Gate B4 Dead C. - This Map B5 Mr. Freeman's Pink Underwear - Untitled

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