A couple of months back, I heard Matthew Crowther mentioned in a podcast (or maybe interviewed on one?), went to his site to check out his work, and ended up ordering a couple of zines.* A week or so went by, and I got an email apologizing for shipping delays, and another week or two after that, I got a package with 5 zines in it: Listen… I’ve been drinking vol. 1, Listen… I’ve been drinking vol. 2: When the summer ends.; Nothing can hurt me; All I Ever Wanted 2; and All Night Long Vol. 17, a split zine with Nathan Pearce (of Midwest Dirt fame).
Score!
Listen… I’ve been drinking vol. 1 contains polaroids of stacked empties and stocked refrigerators, bottle caps, bonfires, passed out buddies and fellows with goofy smiles, all the things you might expect from a day and a night where you might need to say something like “Listen… I’ve been drinking…”
Listen… I’ve been drinking vol. 2 starts out with a playlist of mostly late 00s and early teens folksy alt rock (and that I’ll have to check out and see what it might add to the narrative) and appears to be a mix of formats: polaroid scans, square, 2×3, and maybe some others. There is some duplication from vol. 1, and the narrative has been fleshed out a bit more, with more characters and locations, and it’s clear that the apology or proviso prefaces more than one confession.
Nothing can hurt me is the title of an ongoing series, but I’ve not seen any indication of a zine… The cover has a poem or, more likely, some lines from a song about how nothing can hurt me in my big black car, and there are a series of moody black and white images, taken from the driver seat of a car, driving country roads at night. It’s maybe my favorite of the group at first glance.
All I Ever Wanted 2 is a small one page xeroxed zine with photographs of older midwest motels. The printing quality and all is everything you’d expect from a xeroxed zine…
All Night Long Vol. 17 is split in half: 1/2 with color images from Crowther, maybe chronicling a trip to a park or something (seems that way, anyway); and 1/2 with black & white shots from Nathan Pearce, featuring his usual small country town feel. It reminds me of those split 7″ punk records I used to see at friends’ houses and feel a twinge of jealousy about…
The Listen… series was published by Half Moon Projects; All I Ever Wanted 2 and All Night Long 17 were put out by Same Coin Press; Nothing can hurt me has no publisher data on it, and is signed and dated on the back, which adds some mystery and intrigue to it…
These are all great finds, and I’m thrilled to have such a comprehensive collection of Crowther’s recent-ish work. Big thanks to him for hooking me up!
unrated
*I don’t remember which couple… probably the Listen… I’ve been drinking series, but I can’t be sure.
