New Zine: Brainscan #30 – 30 issues in 15 years!

Brainscan Zine #30!

Growing (literally and figuratively) taking on adventurous tasks year by year from travel to zine tours to event organizing, teaching (or not teaching), and opening and transitioning Portland Button Works zine distro and button shop in Portland, Oregon.

40 pages, 1/4 sized, 5 color Risograph printed on recycled paper

available in my Etsy shop and Portland Button Works distro and brick and mortar shop in Portland, Oregon

Or stick $4 US ($5 rest of the world) postage paid and send it to:

Alex Wrekk

c/o Portland Button Works

1322 North Killingsworth

Portland, Oregon 97217 USA

Or PayPal $4 to brainscanzineATgmailDOTcom

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31 Days of International Zine Month – The poster!

Want to download a PDF page with two of these so you can make some yourself? Go here.

30day Photo meme- day 24 and my new zine

Day 24- Something important to you

Portland Button Works

Clearly Portland Button Works  is important to me, so important that I have been ignoring this blog. It’s been 3 months since I worked on this meme. Normally this time of year I would be posting photos of my garden. The irises have come and gone and the borage is on its way out. Paul presented me with the first strawberry of the season and the cats are happily hanging out with me during the small amount of time I have actually spent  in the yard working.

I have a new zine! It is two tiny mini zines about my experiences at Coachella! I’m only selling them through the Portland Button Works brick and mortar and the online shop.

2 day of Alex Wrekk’s adventures at Coachella helping Zine Works teach the glory of zines to the masses and sleep in the desert. This is two short mini zines about about meeting new friends, getting yelled at for climing lemon trees, seeing awesome music, and amusing observations about the sights and sounds of Coachella.

$1 and only available at Portland Buttons Works. See, that’s the trick. I’m hoping that you’ll go to the site and see other rad stuff you want to get and them too!

I swear I will finish this meme!

Day 25- Graffiti you have seen
Day 26- Something you do everyday
Day 27- Your favorite place
Day 28- A favorite piece of clothing
Day 29- Something you like
Day 30- A photo of you today

Brainscan zine release party and open mic!

zine reading!

I have a new issue of Brainscan and I’m doing a zine release accompanied by and open mic in Portland, Oregon.

Thursday, December 3, 2009 7pm at the Independent Publishing Resource Center (IPRC)

For more information about Brainscan #24 &25 go here.

Brainscan zine #24 & #25 out now!

BRAINSCAN 25-This zine has been five start and stop years in the making. I finally finished it in October of 2009 at the Anchor Archive zine residency in Halifax, Nova Scotia.

Brainscan 25 Chronicles my Saturn return as a love story, an ending, and a new beginning with someone from my past. The Saturn Return is the time between ages 27 and 30 when the planet Saturn is in the same place it was at your birth. It is usually seen as a harbinger of change and a test of character where individuals are forced to evaluate their life in relation to their values. Brainscan 25 documents my life between 2004 and 2006 which was full of upheaval and questioning my path and choices in life. The linear story is spliced with narrative flashbacks from 1996-1999 full of punk shows, travel stories and the difficulty of dealing with emotions and the insecurities of growing up. Text heavy with high contrast cut and paste layout and photocopier art.

Brainscan 25 is 80 pages, legal sized (8.5″x7″) transparency acetate and cardstock covers, and an envelope containing a 16 page epilogue.

BRAINSCAN 24 is a mini zine with answers to questions I’m frequently asked and random facts like how I was made in Canada, am left handed, and was the very first Aquacadet. 32 pages and 1/8th legal (3.5″ x 4.25″)

Both of these zines, actually, there are three zines together weighing 6 ounces and are available in these ways:
put $6 US in and envelope and send it to:
alex wrekk
p.o. box 17230
Portland, Oregon
97217

paypal $7 in the US or $8 Canada or $9 rest of the world to alex@smallworldbuttons.com

or from My Etsy shop here along with lots of other ziney things.
or My Artfire shop here.

If you already carry Brainscan in your distro I’ll be sending you a sample copy. If you do not carry Brainscan please get in touch for a sample copy.

Last days in Richmond and the working zine description

Greetings from Richmond! Nicole has a spare room for me. With a bed! With sheets! I haven’t slept with sheets since I left! The Richmond zine fair was Friday night and all day yesterday. I’ll write more about it later. Last night we played and awesome game of Apples to Apples and had a lot of fun. nicole took me to a bottle shop and I geeked out over all the beers I had never tried.

I head home tomorrow. I was feeling really homesick at the zine fair yesterday and wondering if I could get a sooner ticket home since my plane ticket is for Monday. I decided to stick it out. Here’s the working description for brainscan 24 and 25. I’ll post more when I’m home and they are available.

Brainscan 24 & 25

This zine has been five start and stop years in the making. I finally finished it in October of 2009 at the Anchor Archive zine residency in Halifax, Nova Scotia.

Brainscan 25 Chronicles my Saturn return as a love story, an ending, and a new beginning with someone from my past. The Saturn Return is the time between ages 27 and 30 when the planet Saturn is in the same place it was at your birth. It is usually seen as a harbinger of change and a test of character where individuals are forced to evaluate their life in relation to their values. Brainscan 25 documents my life between 2004 and 2006 which was full of upheaval and questioning my path and choices in life. The linear story is spliced with narrative flashbacks from 1996-1999 full of punk shows, travel stories and the difficulty of dealing with emotions and the insecurities of growing up. Text heavy with high contrast cut and paste layout and photocopier art.

Brainscan 25 is 80 pages, legal sized (8.5″x7″) transparency and cardstock covers, and an envelope containing a 16 page epilogue.

Brainscan 24 is a mini zine with answers to questions I’m frequently asked and random facts like how I was made in Canada, am left handed, and was the very first Aquacadet. 32 pages and 1/8th legal (3.5″ x 4.25″)

These two zines together will be $5 plus $2 shipping for a total of $7. I feel sort of bad for the price but the zine is 80 pages and the copies I have now cost over $3 each to make.

Stolen Sharpie Revolution 2! Preorder NOW!

Stolen Sharpie Revolution 2!

Since 2002 Stolen Sharpie Revolution has been the ultimate guidebook to all things zine related. This little red book is stuffed with information about zines. Things you may know, stuff you don’t know and even stuff you didn’t know you knew for the beginner to the experienced zinester. Stolen Sharpie Revolution consists of how-to guides on a variety of topics from layout to book binding to paper making, resources online and off, where to find zines, information about zine libraries, how and where to get your zine distributed, reviewed and more!

For 2009 Stolen Sharpie Revolution has been completely rewritten and expanded to 144 pages with new a layout and includes the previous information, updated resource listings for stores, distros, zine events and zine libraries. It will also contain all new sections on zines in academics and education, a guide to the US postal system, what to do at a zinefest, how to start a zine fest, lots of internet resources, and more!

This book has everything you need to get started creating your own zine or to figure out what to do with the zine you already made. Stolen Sharpie Revolution 2 can serve both as an introduction into the wide world of zine culture, and the next step to being a part of it.

Stolen Sharpie Revolution 2: A DIY Guide to zines and zine cultures is now ready for PRE-ORDER! Orders will be shipped in Mid April.

Here’s how to get your own copy:

*At at book store or library request the book by title or by this ISBN: 978-0-9817941-0-5

*by mail n the U.S.A:

Put $7 in an envelope and send it here:

Stolen Sharpie Revolution
c/o Lunchroom Publishing
P.O box 17230
Portland, Oregon
97217 USA

*In Canada: $8US postage paid

*Rest of the world: $10US postage paid

*If you use Paypal send to this address: brainscanzineATgmailDOTcom
In the US: $7.50
In Canada: $8.50
rest of the world: $11

*Order from my web site Small World Buttons

*Order from my Etsy Shop

Copies will be sent to distros and libraries in late April. Get in touch for wholesale rates if you would like to PREORDER copies for your store or distro: brainscanzineATgmailDOTcom

Stolen Sharpie Revolution is printed with vegetable based inks on 100% recycled paper and bound with animal free glue.

Nobody Cares About Your Stupid Zine Podcast #1

My housemate and zine librarian extraordinaire, Mark Parker and I put together our first zine podcast! We even got Androo Robinson to write us a silly theme song that is guaranteed to get stuck in your head.

The podcast is about a half hour long and consists of zine news and events and the easiest interview idea ever, we interviewed each other about zines! Check out the blog here and the actual libsyn podcast account here.

Zinewiki, wake up time, tickets and lolcats

did you know that ZineWiki is back up? It is true! I spent a little time last night egotistically editing my page. I’m not sure how some of the stuff got there. I always tend to forget some of the things I have done so it is good for other people to fill it out to remind me. So, even if you don’t want to edit zinewiki you should check it out and see what’s there.

Everyday I get up and look at the clock and frequently it is exactly 9:00am. If it is not 9 is is within 10 minutes of 9. It has been happening for months and sort of weirds me out. This morning I bought my train ticket from London to Poirtiers. it sort of makes me fell official about my trip.

Here’s a photo where I made one of Marc’s cats into a lolcat. I couldn’t help it! We were trying to do a crossword puzzle and Jackie kept trying to steal our pen!

Sorry jackie. You asked for it!

I’m not a cat person but I do enjoy these cats. I’ll write more about them sometime but right now I have coffee to roast and orders to pack.

Nobody Cares About Your Stupid Zine Podcast coming soon!

I have  been doing a bit of work on the Nobody Cares About Your Stupid Zine Podcast today! I have been registering stuff online, talking to Paul and Androo about the theme song that Androo wrote and writing interview questions for Marc, and set up Saturday as our first day to record!

I guess Androo wrote a hilarious theme song on a Ukulele and bongo drums that is filled with lots of silly ziney cliches.  I haven’t heard it yet but Paul says it is hilarious and ends with “nobody cares about your stupid zine”. They are going to record it soon so I’m stoked!.

Our first episode is basically going to be updates from zine land and Marc and I Interviewing eachother. We don’t want it to be too long and drawn out and are hoping for about 15 minute shows. I got a cool little digital recorder for interviews and stuff too and have been playing around with an audio program teaching myself to edit. It should be good times! More details to come.

Last night Jess came over and brought wines as per usual. We made a lentil garbanzo pine nut  pilaf that was really good and well spiced, it went well with the wine. We also worked on planning our fancy vegan wine pairing dinner party and decided to do it at my house, watched the cats go nuts with catnip and listened to Dan and Paul Play DJ in the dining room. tonight Paul has a band practice and I think I might just curl up in bed with a book and some tea and get myself out of the office!

Here’s a photo of one of Jess’s tattoos. They are the chemical makeup for Alcohol and Caffeine

These are jess's tattoo on her forearms...