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Bloodsongs Issue 3
The Sex issue? Well, we could just as easily have called this the S. Darnbrook Colson issue, considering the amount of his work we’re printing, but for some reason I don’t believe that S. Darnbrook Colson would sell quite as well as does SEX. Sure we did it to sell more copies, but if it’s cheap thrills you’re looking for, you’re not about to find them here. The thrills we sell come with a price. Don’t worry though, you haven’t been completely ripped off. What Bloodsongs tries to do is enrich your lives, as all art should. The subject matter is strong, confronting, uncomfortable, even (dare we say) scary. This is, after all, a horror magazine and horror, by its very nature, is all these things and more. Bloodsongs is a magazine committed to tackling the hard issues, and that’s exactly what you’ll find on these pages. We’ve got everything, from child pornography (Almost Never by Edward Lee) to Cannibal Bimbos from the Sludgy Dimension (Gary Bowen). Lydia Lunch not only tackles the misogyny that’s supposedly inherent in the horror genre, but expresses her views on everything from castration to menstruation. Poppy Z. Brite talks of what it’s like to be born a gay man in a woman’s body. Edward Lee discusses the sexual terror that is rampant in our society, while Kirstyn McDermott writes of it. Some of you may have heard that we’ve already had a bit of a run in with the Office of Film and Literature Classification (OFLC), headed by the aptly named Mr. John Dickie. Issue 1 of Bloodsongs was slapped with a Category 1 or R Rating, which effectively means that it cannot be sold to minors and that shops can only display the issue in sealed bags. We also understand that this means Bloodsongs #1 is now banned in Queensland. Apparently what caused all of this was the fact that some tight-arsed parent of the Christian variety wasn’t too happy when s/he found a copy of Bloodsongs #1 in the possession of the 14 or 15 year old son. Naughty naughty. Might cause the little devil to start thinking for himself and we can’t have that now can we? What Mr. Dickie and his cohorts found so offensive were some of the scenes, specifically a couple in Autopsy (Robert Hood) and Rawbone (Misha Kumachov), plus Bill Congreve’s column, Out of the Comfort Zone, all of which depicted sex combined with violence. As far as the OFLC is concerned this is a big no no. One or the other is okay, but apparently you can’t even hint at the two together. They must have missed the homosexual necrophiliac vampire in Barbara Welton’s McDiarmid, and the vampire/werewolf lapping up menstrual blood in Sean Williams’ Mary’s Blood. So all of you under 18ers who hold a copy of Issue 1 in your possession –- shame shame shame. And of you who don’t possess a copy of Issue 1 at all, they’re still available from Bambada Press. Issue 2 got the thumbs up from the OFLC and could be sold without any problems. As for this issue who knows! If you bought it in a plastic bag it means that the bid Dick didn’t approve. More power to us. We’re very proud of what we’ve achieved with Issue 3 of Bloodsongs, not least because it’s been such a bastard to get out. Support? Fuck all. We’ve tried getting grants from the government, tax exemptions for printing; we even applied to the CES in the hope of finding some sort of program to help us out (N.E.I.S. also turned us down). So, as usual, it’s all up to us. Subscriptions (and here we would like to thank those who have supported us) have been abysmal overall -– how about some support! We’re keeping our end of the bargain by putting out a quality product. The question is do you want this mag to live or die? Because that’s the way it is. Advertisers don’t want to know us. Printers either stuff the job up conmpletely, or ask for ridiculously high rates per copy. To those of you reading you’re friend’s or relative’s copy of Bloodsongs GO AND BUY TOUR OWN YA CHEAP BASTARDS! It’s either that or we won’t be around much longer for you to read at all. What all this leads to is that we/ve had to change a few things with the magazines in order to stay afloat. The page count has cut from 88 to 64, but to compensate we’ve also dropped the cover price to $4.95. Those of you who have bought subscriptions at the old prices need not worry though, as all four issue subs will be extended to five issues, and all six issue subs will be good for eight. Sure, we may whinge a lot, but we look after those that look after us. Chris A. Masters & Steve Proposch. |
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All material on this site is Copyright 2007 to Chris A. Masters
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