Outside Left review Descenes and Discords

Howard Wuelfing's anthology of his fanzines is a time capsule of the 80's US underground music scene. Alan Rider cracks it open...

"This is a real reminder of the heroic efforts dedicated enthusiasts went to back in pre-internet times to write about their local and national underground scenes."

Published by writer and musician Howard Wuelfing, now a publicist (see our recent article here), Descenes and Discords: An Anthology reproduces in full and in an impressive folio sized edition (that’s the biggest size a book is usually published in) two influential Washington, DC fanzines produced by Howard during the late 1970s and early 1980s. Descenes covered the local scene, Discords, the national, with a 7 month gap between Descenes finishing in July 1980 and Discords starting in March 1981. Having produced my own UK fanzine (Adventures in Reality) at the same time, I do have a good feeling for what Howard was going through at the time.  There were similarities between UK and US fanzines, mainly in attitude, but distinct differences existed too.  US fanzines tended to be altogether more professional affairs, often typeset and printed in larger format on newsprint. Some like Flipside in LA spawned a whole scene.  Others, like Maximum Rock and Roll were practically the regular music press and are still around today.  They had staff, distribution, and took advertising.  Some even had offices.  All in stark contrast to the kitchen tables and squats that were home to the majority of UK fanzines aside from the likes of Jamming and Sniffin’ Glue.  Descenes and Discords both sat somewhere in the middle, with regular writers (sporting fancy titles like ‘Art Director’) and advertising (mainly local record stores and venues), yet still with a DIY attitude and approach. 

The first of the two, Descenes, has the most fanzine-y feel, with a typewritten cut and paste style and local focus, with DC band Nurses and others previously forgotten (like The Lost Turds and Insect Surfers!) popping up alongside now well-known acts like Bad Brains, Slickee Boys, and Half Japanese. You get scene reports, interviews, live and record reviews, all crammed in.  Some pages are typeset, others not.  That mixed bag approach gives Descenes its appeal and it has a distinctly fanzine look about it.  Fast forward to March 1981 and the first issue of Discords appears, with many of the same names appearing as contributors, Art Directors and so on. Adopting a more national reach, covering bands like Black Flag, Pylon, Circle Jerks, Mission of Burma etc, it had a more professional look, with columns of typeset text replacing the typewritten prose of Descenes.   That meant it lost a little of its scrappy appeal, as most fanzines did when they stepped up to the next level.  In the UK, Jamming was the prime example of this, losing its way in the transition from selling fanzines at gigs to newsstand distribution, corporate advertising and jumping into bed with a national publishing house. Dischords didn’t do that, and there is some fine writing on display, with continued support for smaller bands and scenes alongside U2 album reviews and features on REM and Adam and the Ants.  The scene reports are actually the most interesting, offering a window into grass roots music scenes across the States. 

The quality that comes across most strongly, though, in both publications is the unbridled passion and enthusiasm for the scene, their scene.  I actually love the adverts for local record stores too, as they give a real flavour of what was influencing the US scene at the time, which was imported UK punk and post punk, basically. With an introduction to both punk and fanzines in the form of a conversation between Howard and Ian MacKaye (Fugazi), a Foreword by contributor to both ‘zines, Mark Jenkins setting the historical stage, a lavish large format that means you can actually read the reviews and articles without a microscope (by no means common in many fanzine repro books), and a pull out hand drawn family tree of the DC music underground, this is a real reminder of the heroic efforts dedicated enthusiasts went to back in pre-internet times to write about their local and national underground scenes.  Let’s face it, a Podcast or Blog just ‘aint the same.

I will leave the last words to Howard himself. "Now more than ever, people are looking back at how music scenes formed without algorithms, managers, or marketing budgets. Descenes and Discords were created in that spirit — to connect, to amplify voices, to celebrate what was happening right in front of us. Revisiting these zines is a reminder of what’s possible when people care more about passion than polish."  And amen to that!

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‘Descenes and Discords: An Anthology’ is now available from the Earth Island Books online store.