Here’s the story behind these next four items. Well, not necessarily the story, but how I know James and why I write for his zine (because as for as I’m concerned, me sending him these stories all the time probably get pretty annoying, but who cares? I’m not printing the zine).

Two and a half years ago when my band first started we recorded a little demo at Cromely Music. Shortly after that, I was over at our drummer’s house—Brock Ailes—when we decided to take a trip to Subway. When he got there we found a dirty, goofy looking kid named James McQuiston talking about local punk bands. We told him about our demo and we ran back to Brock’s—which is only a block away—and grabbed a tape. He listened to it, reviewed it, interviewed us and put it on his website (www.neufutur.com). But that was all we heard from him for a couple years.

The a few months ago he set up a punk show in town with our band invited to play and he started reviewing our shows, newer recordings and he did a second interview. One of the shows took place downtown Lancaster at the gazebo during the Lancaster Festival. Afterwards we were talking and came up with the idea of having a story of the Lancaster punk scene as it were to me and how my band—The Freedom Fries—fit into it. So I wrote a small 800 word two page story of the punk scene starting when I was in 6th grade until now. The other three I wrote out of boredom or something was upsetting me and I did some bitching. I sent them to James and he decided to use them, so now I have a nice little collection in his zine.

You may find my writings a bit different then James’s. He seems to spend more time thinking out the structure and word choice to make the reading seem more professional. This style would be much more enjoyable if it were a bit more poetic. I think if we were to use more alliteration and watch his commas his writing would flow much easier and wouldn’t be as difficult to follow. Whereas mine lacks the vocabulary and structure, it has a more personal feel. I like to write what I think, rather than think-out what I write. I also feel his zine needs more authors to help it become more diverse and less bias. I’m not saying it is bias, but more voices always help.

-Jared Allen

August, 31st, 2003