Elevate Difference

Reviews of Joe Biel

Bipedal, By Pedal! #2: Confidential Mad Libs

Because it’s been about ten years, I forgot how funny mad libs could be, and the ones in Bipedal, By Pedal! #2 have proven to be a fun distraction during lunch breaks and in long grocery store lines. Take, for example, my mad lib from this morning: “On Wednesday, September 29th at 17:30 hours, the so-called 'bananas' are planning a bicycle rally in downtown Portland. From information supplied by C.I.D., their plans...were to gather coffees in the South Park Blocks, group into formations of twelve riders...and gyrate along a predetermined path.” Okay, it’s not the most mature form of entertainment, but that’s a large part of its appeal.

If It Ain’t Cheap, It Ain’t Punk: Fifteen Years Of Plan-It X Records

If It Ain’t Cheap, It Ain’t Punk is a sweet, well put together documentary film that captures the spirit and feel of the do-it-yourself, underground punk scene that has grown up around Plan-it X Records in Bloomington, Indiana. The film began as part of a filmmaking workshop at Plan-it X’s weeklong festival in Bloomington in 2006.

Make A Zine!: When Words and Graphics Collide!

Remember when self-publishing didn't mean having a blog? Remember when you spent time proofreading your random scraps of writing and rearranging clips, when you felt like you had time with your work instead of longing for the compulsive, furtive click of the "publish" button? In a time when ubiquitous technology is rapidly replacing print media as we’ve known it, spending six months on a themed booklet of your own musings might seem odd.

100 Dollars and a T-Shirt: A Documentary about Zines in the Northwest US

This is a documentation of Portland, Oregon’s zine scene between 2002 and 2004. While it’s kind of basic, it’s worth it to see what Portland’s Reading Frenzy and Independent Publishing Resource Center are doing. Reading Frenzy is amazing – a whole store full of zines. The IPRC, right upstairs, is a nonprofit art space dedicated to do-it-yourself publishing – mostly zines, but also letter press, desktop publishing and other crafty things.

Cantankerous Titles and Obscure Ephemera, Volume 1

This DVD of short documentaries by Joe Biel was probably the best thing that’s come in the mail for me this month. I mean that; I don’t even get a lot of bills! Maybe, as someone who enjoys interviewing people, I am a bit biased, but I really enjoy the subjects Biel presents, as well as the way personal commentary figures in, yet is not contrived.
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