Lyle and Found

Punk rock auteur and zinester legend Erick Lyle focused most of his last book for Microcosm Press, On the Lower Frequencies, on his then-adopted hometown of San Francisco. Part investigative journalism, academic research, first-person narration, and oral history, the slim but thorough volume wove together radical action in San Francisco’s streets, from the cracked pavement up. Before all that, though, he was forming his analytic but poetic writing style around his native South Florida. Known through the ‘90s as Iggy Scam, Lyle liberated photocopies from chain office-supply stores to publish his local zine called, well, Scam. It was part music zine, part memoir, and part practical manual to living under the radar -- fitting, since Lyle booked shows at far-underground venues and squatted in once-impressive buildings like the Mutiny Hotel. Lyle recently decamped from the West Coast to New York, a move that must have him looking south and homeward a bit, because his two latest releases for Microcosm are Miami-centric. One, a recent issue of Scam, juxtaposes the decadence of Art Basel Miami Beach against recollections of violence at the Free Trade Area of the Americas protests here in 2003. The other compiles the early issues of Scam, which yield all kinds of forgotten informational treasures from the Miami punk scene of yesteryear. He’ll read from both for free at TK p.m. on Wednesday at Sweat Records. Get (old-) schooled.
Wed., Dec. 22, 2010