24 Mar 2025 8 min read punk

Rag Mag 8

Hey punks, welcome to issue 8 of Rag Magazine. Interesting ideas being floated at the coffee drinking spots these days. Keep up the fight and support your local communities. Get in touch if you want to contribute and keep sending in flyers and columns. This week we have Creature’s Double Feature, Wasteland Chick takes on The Comes “No Side”, a live review from an old fashioned Saturday hardcore matinee, and Creature on the Road Part 3 by Mr. Mittens.

Center label for Stiff (Canada) Records goes hard - photo by Creature

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Rag Mag correspondent CB was in Providence this weekend and swung by AS220 for a hardcore matinee. Check out this sick shirt he got.

CB: I had the great opportunity to catch a rare Saturday matinee at AS220 this past Saturday. I only saw Impulse who were great and BIG (on tour from the Bay area). BIG was very tight and energetic. It's always great seeing the kids mosh. Too often things are stagnant and energy is low but going to a Hardcore show often remedies that, for awhile anyway.

I am a BIG fan.

This is my reaction to literally any Trump/Musk news article. Fuck those guys. Salutations, fellow Wasteland Chicks. How’re you guys so far? I’m pretty good. Had a banger party with Mr. Mittens, Creature, and some of the coolest members of Ragmag, so I’m happy but a little burnt out. Anyway, top story tonight: I saw a Reddit Post where a cool person was throwing Kraft Singles at their asshole neighbor’s Tesla, so this Wasteland Chick might be making an interesting trip to the grocery store. Watch out, Elon! Anyway, for today’s review, Creature has selected “No Side” by the Comes. This song goes pretty damn hard if I do say so myself, which I do. The rhythm and melody are a 8 out of ten; Very vibe-able and the guitar riffs rule. This Wasteland chick loves a guitar solo! Anyway, the rhythm and melody are very vibe-able and cool, and add a partying theme to it. The lyrics are a 5 out of ten, but ONLY because I don’t know what they’re saying. Don't worry, this Wasteland Chick would never give a bad review without a reason. The lyrics kind of sound like a person shouting about something cool, but they are very cool themselves and add to the vibey, party feel to the song, boosting the song’s score quite nicely. It kind of reminds me of the song “Discharge”, which was actually my first review. Ah, memories. Anyway, overall review: I give this song a 8 out of ten, a very vibe-able rhythm and melody, confusing lyrics, but a good, rave-esque song overall. This is a perfect song to play during a cool party, or just to drive to a pizza place or bookstore. Use Kraft singles as your anti-seed to kill a Tesla, fellow Wasteland Chicks. BYe! Also, Happy Birthday, Mr. Mittens (I love you!!!)!

Sincerely, WASTELAND CHICK (Don’t forget to join the club!)

“Creature on the road” -part 3 by Mr. Mittens

I dimmed my headlights as the Piney’s snuck out ahead of me onto the road. Too much light and they would be thrown off by the brightness, hell any of us would. No one these days spends much time in the sun, even those fuckers that guard the main roads spend most of their days cooling their red booted heels inside an air conditioned monitoring station, and as a consequence of our collective nocturnal transition, our eyes get more and more sensitive. There were four Pineys, a slight and gangly bald headed man with sunken eyes and a chest that had been carved from the inside out. He was joined by three much shorter members of the group covered head to toe in green hazmat suits.

It was rare to see a Piney tower over the others, and even rarer to see one in just a pair of jeans. It could only mean that this was an old timer, they didn’t cater to the hazmat suits like the youngest crop did, and they hadn’t been as cut down by the chemicals and lack of sunlight that seemed to stunt every new generation that didn’t live in the protected zones. Those fuckers got sun lamps and vitamin shots, hell even us regular folks in the accessible zones got filtered water and tinted windows. I myself was saving up for a little uv lamp to place in the back of the van for my off hours.

I rolled down my window just a small slit and stuck my hand out waving them on. The man nodded, his eyes met mine through the windshield and as he stepped back from the van into the full glow of the headlights I could finally see his face. He was definitely an elder, he had deep wrinkles that curved around his face and indented into the back of his naked skull. Hell, he might possibly be the oldest motherfucker I’ve ever encountered on any of my rides through the empty zones, but it was never safe to guess, life in the toxic areas made hard lines in even the softest of faces.

The group turned and began to walk as I slowly ambled behind them. The taller Piney trailed behind the rest calling out debris that they could scavenge or toss into the murky water. We bobbled along bouncing up and down until after a few minutes the man raised his hand in the air. It was my signal to brake and so I sat and watched in awe as two of the younger members of the party waded into the bog and shimmied up the closest streetlights as though they were made of nothing but feathers inside their yellow green suits.

The traps themselves were made of woven strips of stretchy fabric painted black. The idea was simple, stretch the nets between the lights and catch as many as possible while the bats flew through the dark. Eventually the nets would fill and the weight of flustered and confused wings would cause the net to fold in on itself trapping them inside. I could never quite figure out fully how they made the nets close on their own, Squid our mechanic said it had something to do with pressure sensors or weight distribution and the rest of the crew chalked it down to Piney magic. Me, I didn’t care one way or the other, I just thought it was cool.

The kids at the top of the lights carefully untethered each end of the net and secured the ropes around their waists. Slowly, they slithered back down the lamps until the net and the Pineys arrived about a foot above the water. The two other members in suits waded out to them and untied the ropes from their waists. The group pulled the ropes taut and waded back to the road, a full net hovering above the bog as they walked. Finally, they reached the road and dropped the net, handing it to the old man. He hoisted the net over his shoulders and I could see a slight flutter of wings scratch his back. Those were probably the freshest, the rest having been out since last evening or even the night before that meaning that the fumes and the panic had already taken care of them. He swung the net onto the ground and paused as the rest of the group headed towards the next set of streetlights.

His face crumpled under the headlights as he studied the bats, he gave the net another swing and then raised it back over his shoulders, and I could see a slight flutter of wings scratch his back. Those were probably the freshest, the rest having been out since last evening or even the night before that meaning that the fumes and the panic had already taken care of them. He swung the net onto the ground and paused as the rest of the group headed towards the next set of streetlights. His face crumpled under the headlights as he studied the bats, he gave the net another swing and then raised it back over his shoulders, content that any movement from those trapped inside had ceased...

FEELERS VS. FEELERS

Yr ol’ pal Creature here hoping everyone is hanging in there. Inspiring to see the crowds coming out for protests and rallies around the country. Anyway this week’s double feature is from one of my favorite past times, discovering a cool record because it has the same name as another record you were looking for. This week. Feelers (Ohio) vs. Feelers (California).

The Feelers (Ohio) were a trashy garage punk band from the early 2000’s who had a few cool records including the one up above, Fuhrer’s new miniskirt. I believe this was their first record and I could never locate a copy back when it came out. Well a few months ago I found it at a local record store along with another record by a band called the Feelers. Thought I found another early record I must have missed, but my hopes were dashed when I saw the California address and 90s recording date. Then I pulled the record out of the sleeve and saw the inner label, skulls are punk and punk sells, so both of them came home with me. The Feelers (OH) is exactly what I remembered, trashy juvenile garage punk, with a great blown out recording. The California band is more melodic Clash style punk with some surprisingly fancy guitar work and lyrics about drug addiction and committing crime. Punk! Record collecting is my favorite unimportant thing.

Records of the day for me are a newish one from Japan’s noise punks Ferocious X - Krigs fanatiker and a great 90s garage punker - Los Huevos - Kiss My Cruiser. The poster included with the Ferocious X flexi is so sick! Punk rules. I can’t find these records online, so here’s links to some other cool shit they did.