Issue 4

The fourth print issue of The Counterforce is here, featuring all the year-end lists from our contributors, plus a few extra reviews and A Punk's Guide to Printing Zines (relevant!). Grab the printable PDF of this issue, previous issues, and more on the Zines page....

Here we present the more concise 2024 Top Ten lists from new and old Contributors To The Counterforce....

Countdown 10-to-1 of her favorite sets of the year!...

After wanting and being offered to collaborate for several times I am finally pulling my weight to do this list. I’m Boris, I live in Montreal, I play in a band called TOTAL NADA and I’m part of the Noise Not Borders collective....

2024 Top Ten as told by Tay (of TAZ) (in no particular order)...

I think 2024 was an overwhelmingly great year for new music; it was exhausting trying to keep up with all the cool stuff that came out....

My favourite releases of this year trended crustier with earnest and anarchist lyrics, railing against the capitalist war machine and the capture of corporate technology... consider me re-enlisted for the crust war. Here’s what stuck with me this year, and what I want more of in 2025. ...

(technically 11 artists but c'mon)...

Whatever the occasion, we are pleased to bring you the CrimethInc. Ex-Worker Podcast’s year-end top 10 punk films we watched in 2024....

Absurdism is not always a friend of the gig. Sometimes it is. I will be allotting CHAOS ratings to each of my selections....

With 2024 coming to a close and with a vast majority of my overwhelmingly positive punk experiences of this past year having a strong Canadian connection, it seemed to me that there would be no better time to write my inaugural column for The Counterforce......

STRAW MAN ARMY's first release was extremely hyped in my circles, probably due to some second-order social proximity between myself and the duo behind this recording-only project. The 2021 cassette Her Majesty's Ship OST was released on Stucco alongside egg-punk sounding bands with names like FROGMAN'S STICK OPERA and PILGRIM SCREW. It's—I don't know—a soundtrack for an apparently non-existent movie, complete with a backstory about the movie's production hell and fake reviews from a film magazin...

We have a problem in Montreal Hardcore: too many tough guy beatdown bands. WILL TO SPEAK was the solitary standout for awhile, bringing more of a posi/youth-crew influenced sound to the scene. So I'm happy they finally have a record coming out. The production is excellent and the riffs are great. Ample dive-bombs! WILL TO SPEAK's lineup is basically local shoe-gaze band SPITE HOUSE + Big Karl on vocals and XVX Dany on bass. It's kind of funny that the single biggest meathead-looking dude in Mont...

Do you like MIND ERASER? Do you like MIND ERASER's high-concept 2008 final LP Conscious/Unconscious? If you've never heard it I would say go give it a listen before continuing. Conscious/Unconscious was the point at which MIND ERASER fully embraced their broader metal influences, in line with the trend of late 2000s powerviolence/hardcore bands breaking up so the members could start metal bands (see LIFELESS DARK who just dropped their long-awaited metalpunk thrash LP this week). This debut LP...

So you want to print some zines (like the ones in The Counterforce digital distro) to distribute at a punk show or other event, or to just give out to your friends. Sick! If you are new to printing or copying zines or just need a refresher, and want to avoid frustration and wasted paper, this guide is for you. This guide will mostly cover standard, Letter-sized-paper-folded-in-half-and-stapled style zines aka "saddle stitch" (like the Counterforce zines pictured in the header image). This is th...

Thomas Pynchon's 1973 novel Gravity's Rainbow (GR) is infamously really long and difficult to read, but also highly regarded (for some reason). There is a good chance that if you have already heard about this book, it's because you got punished by some dude about it. I love Thomas Pynchon's books; Pynchon is an author that a lot of punks and anarchists love, and Gravity's Rainbow is widely considered his best book. There's good reasons people in our worlds like his books: he writes about anarch...

STREET GLOVES is back with another demo that gets right to the point. Punishing electronic d-beats, an oscillating siren(?), ripping power cords that punch the opening track "THE NEXT GENOCIDE" into full gear. A call to arms as the increasingly claustrophobic reality that the wars in Palestine, Sudan, Ethiopia and around the world are on display for us all to see, and will be on our doorstep if we don't act soon. "GOSPEL" keeps up the momentum and addresses the devastating and dehumanizing use o...

Behold the new dawn of stench... It's not often a band that places itself so firmly in a well established subgenre of punk outshines it's predecessors. But the monolithic weight of the 3 tracks from PORTAL TOMB's first release might just be the best stenchcore this side of the pond has ever seen. Crusty, rumbling bass tones, sweeping guitar riffs and pummelling drums all accompanied by the guttural war cries of guitarist/vocalist Aíne. Opening track "SELF" is a rallying cry against individualis...

Contributed by Greg The Builder There's something weird about walking down a side street in Manhattan and seeing a gallery window filled with a one of your favorite logos of all time. It feels both out of place and exciting at the same time. Truthfully, I am always conflicted when art and academic institutions and "authorities" try to legitimize punk and the art made within it. As if we need their approval to know that what has come from our subculture has meaning and worth. These shows often f...