Bananafish 1987–2004

Distinctions between reality and imagination are obscured in Bananafish, a witty and perplexing San Franciscan magazine that covered avant-garde, noise, experimental, and generally obscure music over 18 issues. In each issue’s letters section and elsewhere, fabrication and truth intermingle while aliases proliferate, leaving readers to figure out for themselves who is writing and what can and cannot be taken at face value. At the same time, the magazine covers a wide range of music, from interviews with Lee Ronaldo of Sonic Youth, Australian noise musician Lucas Abela, and Japanese noise rockers Melt-Banana to reviews of The New Blockaders’ Gesamtnichtswerk: 20th antiversary antiology, Tiny Time live! At the Royal Albert Hall, and Blowhole’s Killing noise. The final issue opens with the news that publisher “I. Vern Beezer” has died and ends with a sprawlingly diverse reviews section by Bananafish founder “Seymour Glass”, a conclusion befitting the publication’s musical and fantabulist proclivities alike.