Positive Influence Fanzine

26/01/2024

It's hoody season! Grab a 2-side Positive Influence Fanzine design hoody available in 3 colors. Or check out the other merch on Spring Tee.

24/12/2023

Found two Christmas postcards I made back in the PI day that features photos Buster took of me. I used the same basic techniques I’d learned from making zines to create inexpensive custom cards to mail out to friends and family. Of course I printed these on green cardstock for more holiday vibe! The quality isn’t great but, hey, it’s the thought that counts!
Anyway happy holidays to you and yours! 🎄

13/10/2023

I was digging around in my box of flyers and found this info sheet from urging readers to stop eating at . It’s one of several things I read in High School that convinced me to quit eating meat in 1985. Here’s some of the text:

“It is often argued that vegetarians care more about animals than people. Yet many people decide to become vegetarians precisely because they are concerned about hunger in the world. At least 10 times more people can be sustained on vegetarian food than on a meat-based diet.

McDonald's and Burger King are two of the many U.S. corporations who are using AGENT ORANGE and DIOXONS to destroy central American tropical rain forests. The forests are being turned into grazing pastures for cows that will be sent back to the U.S. as hamburgers. Thousands of rain forest acres are being destroyed daily. Farm animals and wildlife in the forests are both victims of McDonald's.

And people who eat the fast food at McDonald's are also victims of the greed. McDonald's has been named one of the 5 worst sources of sodium and fat by the Center for Science in the Public Interest. Animal feed is laced with antibiotics, chemicals and growth stimulants. Pesticides and radioactive wastes that have been linked to cancer are stored in meat in concentrations thousands of times greater than in plants. The US Secretary of Health officially warns that meat causes cancer and heart disease.

A meat-centered diet is destroying our land and polluting our water. Animal feedlots put 2 billion tons of animal excrement into US water systems every year.

PLEASE STOP AND THINK. IT'S NOT A QUESTION OF ANIMALS VS. PEOPLE. IT IS A QUESTION OF EXTENDING YOUR PHILOSOPHY OF JUSTICE TO INCLUDE THE ANIMALS. IT IS A DECISION TO LIVE YOUR LIFE WITHOUT DEPENDING ON THE PAIN AND DEATH AND ENSLAVEMENT OF OTHER LIVING INHABITANTS OF OUR EARTH.”

Note the plug for as well as their own & 7” in the footnote.

11/09/2023

Rare shot of the old PI headquarters. That’s me kicking back with Wilber the Cat on the blanket covered second hand sofa with our old friends Lianne (wearing what might be a Gumby tee) and Josh (pretending he doesn’t want his pic taken.) Photo by Buster.

26/08/2023

Thanks to Mike Clifton of Refrigerated Nurses for sending in this PI flyer tested by Buster. It looks to be a combination advert for issue two plus “wanted” ad seeking bands wanting to be interviewed and creators looking to be printed in future issues. Buster used a combo of manual typewriter, markers, and transfer letters for this black and white . Please don’t call that phone number btw as lord only knows who owns it now, 36 years later! 😅

25/07/2023

Just dug this out of my archive after texted me to ask if I remembered going to this show together. It was tough getting all the way out to Pomona since neither of us drove! But just look at that lineup: — the only So Cal appearance that tour — plus and Woo wee!!!
❌

13/07/2023

Throwback to that time I took an outdoor class lead by in 2014. The meetups are fairly legendary in Long Beach already but having lead the class as a visiting was very cool. He was also kind enough to autograph my and singles. 🙏🏼

30/06/2023

I’ve got another fun fan art for this Flashback Friday! When first reached out about doing the anthology he shared this drawing by with me. I was like “wait a minute, I know that couple!” 🤓

I cropped in on my original doodle from the flyer/ad for PI #6 so you can really see one to one how faithful a recreation the Shining Life/Demystification duo are. It’s cute how they updated all the little details to personalize it for themselves. 💚

Scroll down to my first post to see the full flyer original.

23/06/2023

Buster and I posing together outside of Positive Influence Headquarters. I’m sporting a classic Operation Ivy tee while he’s got on a Reason To Believe tee. Both very on-brand for our zine! I won’t comment on our headwear. 🙊

#1988

22/06/2023

Was inspired to redraw my “Jumping Man” on my iPad. The old guy looks almost as good as new now! ✖️

21/06/2023

Got a message from of —

“Anji, I just got around to reading the Positive Influence book, and learned you made the classic New Age “Jumping Man”. My band Life Force has one of those sxe hoodie guys on our first 7 inch, and our buddy drew him up like this when we first joined NAR.”

Wow so crazy! I love hearing from folks that have been inspired by my work 3 decades plus later. Blows my mind!
✖️

20/06/2023

Rocking a classic ALL tee and my old fave vintage striped shorts circa 1987.

I judged too quickly
I’ve never been good at trust

22/05/2023

Buster’s band .right.hand.men has a show coming up at with a stacked line up and the return of the mighty
🎸🎶

08/02/2023

Happy birthday to my lil bro Brian!!! Here’s a few pix of him from ehhhh 1987 I think? He was visiting me at my shabby little bachelor apartment in San Pedro. You can just spy a few of my flyers on the walls behind him in these shots.

Dad gave him some money that he planned to spend shopping for records and fanzines. I shared a few stories of these visits in the anthology introduction.

I should mention that Brian went on to do a lot of different bands including Order of the Vulture, L’ Acephale, and his current project Hail, just to name the ones listed in Discogs! Of course there’s also Refrigerated Nurses and Inculcation who were both featured in the zine.

03/01/2023

A few years back New Age Records released some retro merch featuring my original art from 1988. I see they still have the red tees and green embroidered dad hats available on their website. I really should pick up one of these bad ass caps! 🤜

03/01/2023

If you enjoy digital books, like I do, then check out the Apple Books version of the ‘Positive Influence Fanzine Anthology. This digital version of the anthology contains a dozen bonus pages chock full of live band photos from Anji's personal collection. Additionally, many photos are available in color, unlike the black and white print edition.

‎Arts & Entertainment · 2022

10/10/2022

Anyone else remember Peanut Records in Lomita? I talked about a few of our experiences with this small indie record store in the PI Anthology but I didn’t have any photos to go with my stories. Just found this in my archive this weekend. I see it’s a bit past the timeline of our zine though as it seems to be dated 1992 by the artist Scott Archer. Still, all the little references to its location on PCH are very nostalgic. I still get a bit misty eyed when I drive past the old location. 🥜

07/10/2022

Remembering dad on his birthday today. He was a funny guy. Here’s Sid with Brian and our half sisters at PI central. Wish I’d been in the pic instead of taking it, in hindsight, coz what a great family portrait! 🎞️📸

28/08/2022

Thanks to for sending over this photo of Buster and I backstage at Toberman Hall! I posted the flyer for this show a few weeks back and talked about how we had interviewed that day.

Michelle also shared a copy of photo by of performing where you can just make out Buster and I standing against the back wall of the stage wearing these same outfits. She is also on the stage next to Vadim of Half Off.

I poked around KRK's account looking for the original post of this pic (no luck!) and found another shot with Buster & I standing against the wall still.

Honestly I am so thankful for these little mementos from that time! It feels like another lifetime so it's reassuring to see tangible proof of my existence 34 freaking years ago. 😮

#1988

16/08/2022

Dug up some of the original we reviewed in issue two of Positive Influence. There were only 9 reviews total and a few of them were cassettes. Shown here is the ‘Machination’ LP and two 7’’s from - ‘Sleep, What’s That?’, and ‘Bedtime for Isocracy.’ I really thought I still had the Pailhead and Rollins Band vinyl, but I didn’t find them.

I’ve included the reviews page from the with the cool funky pen and ink border art and header from Buster. We didn’t credit the reviews themselves so it’s hard to say who wrote what. I think the writing style of Crimpshine and Ignition look like mine, maybe even the Isocracy one, but I can’t say for sure.

Should I do posts on each record with the inclusions and whatnot like I did before?

#1988

12/08/2022

For here is Buster performing with Face Value in 1989. Dig his Dag Nasty tee! TBH I don’t know anything about this show but maybe Buster will give us some deets? 🤷‍♀️

10/08/2022

Me and my bro puzzling over the map in the theme park parking lot circa 1987. I’m sporting a tee and rhrifted mid-century shorts while Brian is rocking a tee and rad skull print shorts. Looks like we both have gummy bracelets — remember those? I see I’m also wearing one of my old fave tiki necklaces from Disneyland lol. I used to have a small collection of them. Anyhoo it’s a fun one for 😄

Brian was my biggest supporter on the anthology book, checking in with me when it seemed like I’d let the project slip, reminding me of various stories that I ended up sharing in the introduction, and looking through his archives for any photos or documents from that time. He recently came into possession of a few more items I wish I’d had for the book. I’m seriously inspired to release an expanded digital version with all the band photos that didn’t make the print book and a few other bonus items.

08/08/2022

Our own Buster Cates is singing for OG Venice band Neighborhood Watch. 😎

22/07/2022

Stoked to be featured by DIY Conspiracy!

Anji Bee is a Southern California based singer, vlogger, author, podcaster, and zinestress. She is best known as a co-creator of the vegan lifestyle YouTube channel Happy Healthy Vegan and part of the indie-pop group Lovespirals, doing both with her

14/07/2022

Positive Influence hand drawn logo and flyer 2-sided t-shirts available in dark blue, maroon, and army green on teespring. 😄

https://merch.happyhealthyvegan.org/listing/positive-influence-zine

13/07/2022

Posted a video to the YouTube channel about the anthology this week. It’s been fun hearing from some of our viewers who are into and/or either now or back in the day. Some of them had no idea about my past zine work or the connection between veganism and the scene. Anyway welcome to any new followers over here! 👋

I haven’t been posting much lately coz I’ve been making videos, releasing music, and working on new recipes but I do hope to spend a lil more time on this account. I’ll try to get some vid up from this vlog in a day or two!

28/06/2022

Amazing to see our anthology being sold far and wide — even in a German record store! Thank you for all of your interest in this little labor of love project.

19/05/2022

19/05/2022

By request of here are my pix from the Toberman Hall show that I posted the flyer of this week. Shown are 2 photos each of Haywire, Neurosis, and G-Whiz. Sadly I didn’t find any shot of the other bands on the bill. We might not have had a good vantage point for every set or maybe I didn’t have much film in the camera. We really have it made today with smart phones but then again, I’m kinda glad to have grown up in the pre-digital days because we lived more in the moment then.

So hey, what a diverse lineup huh??? Add in Visual Discrimination, Reason to Believe, and Left Insane! And an afternoon start time? Warren Croft was doing things different for sure!