RE/Search profile picture

RE/Search

For enlightenment www.researchpubs.com

About Me


RE/Search Publications
Pranks Film Festival My Space Page Link: Please Add Us!
When punk rock hit San Francisco (c.1977), I started publishing in angry reaction to mass media articles that reduced punk to spitting and safety pins. Allen Ginsberg and Lawrence Ferlinghetti each gave me $100, and through 1979 I published, edited and distributed 11 issues of Search & Destroy. My editorial policy was one of empowerment: "Do It Yourself/ Anyone Can Do It/ Always ask, Is it against the status quo?"--the punk credo.
In 1980 I started RE/Search with initial funding from Geoff Travis of Rough Trade Records and actress/film director Betty Thomas. At the same time, an old friend loaned me enough money to start a typesetting business. This enabled me to realize my dream: putting out slick, large format books with uncompromising, high-quality "underground" content. The '80s saw the release of RE/Search books on William S. Burroughs, Brion Gysin, J.G. Ballard, Incredibly Strange Films, Pranks,and my best-selling, trend-starting Modern Primitives. During the '80s typesetting was my day job, publishing my labor of love.
By 1991, having put out two underground bestsellers, the support of independent bookstores and small regional distributors made it possible for me to live on book publishing, and I sold the typesetting business.
Now, corporations control book distribution and they chew up and spit out independent books (literally returning hundreds of shop-worn, ruined books every month for credit towards brand new ones). Independent publishers like us are rapidly going belly-up (e.g. Henry Rollins' 2.13.61, and the Gates of Heck). If you don't want corporations deciding what you are able to buy and read, please support us by ordering directly from us - NOT Amazon - at our online store .
And we will continue to publish new material without compromise.
If you order several items, please call for a special quantity discount. Chances are, I'll answer the phone! Thank you for your understanding and support.

My Interests

avant-garde culture, history, anthropology, linguistics, art, music, Surrealist culture, Pre-Surrealism including The Occult Tradition & Egyptology, Situationism, J.G. Ballard, William S. Burroughs, game theory, Fantastic Imaginative literature, Art Brut, Industrial Culture, Future Noir Theory

I'd like to meet:

J.G. Ballard and William S. Burroughs fans; seekers; skeptics; visionaries; Surrealists...

Music:

Incredibly Strange Music: "garage sale" records (mostly from the '50s-'70s), spotlighting include: "easy listening," "exotica," and "celebrity" (massive categories in themselves) as well as more recordings by (singing) cops and (polka playing) priests, undertakers, religious ventriloquists, astronauts, opera-singing parrots, beatnik and hippie records, and gospel by blind teenage girls with bouffant hairdos. Virtually every musical/lyrical boundary in the history of recorded sound has been breached; every sacred cow upturned. Also: avant-garde music/non-music/noise music, Jihad Jerry,

Movies:

Incredibly Strange Films of the past and future, homemade films, anything "Surrealist" or "Black Humor" - especially Luis Bunuel. Also Chris Marker, Nelly Kaplan, Hitchcock, Franju, Dario Argento, David Lynch, David Cronenberg, John Waters. Mad Max 2.

Books:

Pranks, Volumes 1 & 2 Incredibly Strange Music, Volumes 1 & 2 Modern Primitives J.G. Ballard Industrial Culture Handbook The Atrocity Exhibition Incredibly Strange Films Punk '77 Zines! Volumes 1 & 2 The Temple of Man And more!

Heroes:

William S. Burroughs, Jello Biafra, J.G. Ballard, Henry Rollins, Lydia Lunch, DJ Spooky, Charles Gatewood, Graeme Revell, Mark Pauline, Monte Cazazza, Jean Jacques Perrey, Timothy Leary, Jeffrey Vallance, John Waters, Diamanda Galas, R.A. & Isha Schwaller de Lubicz, Karen Finley, Heraclitus, Luis Bunuel, Gerald V. Casale, Bell Hooks, Kathy Acker, Genesis P-Orridge, the Surrealists, and all the great people we've met through our books!

My Blog

V. Vale RE/Search Newsletter Oct 2008: Nick Cave, My Bloody Valentine, Jill Tracy

WELCOME TO V. VALE's RE/SEARCH NEWSLETTER 76, October 2008. HERE'S THE NEWS FROM SAN FRANCISCO... ALL READERS ARE INVITED TO SEND CONTRIBUTIONS AND FEEDBACK! And subscribe to our blog at www.researchp...
Posted by RE/Search on Sat, 11 Oct 2008 11:24:00 PST

9/24/08 8pm FREE RE/SEARCH PARTY TONITE!

9/24/08 8pm FREE RE/SEARCH PARTY TONITE!showing "The Counter Cultural Hour" "featuring Monochrom and Roboexotica" - MONOCHROM in person, all the way from Vienna, Austria!Million Fishes Art Gallery, 25...
Posted by RE/Search on Thu, 25 Sep 2008 05:41:00 PST

V. VALE RE/SEARCH SEPT O8 NEWSLETTER

WELCOME TO V. VALE's RE/SEARCH NEWSLETTER 75, September 2008. HERE'S THE NEWS FROM SAN FRANCISCO... ALL READERS ARE INVITED TO SEND CONTRIBUTIONS AND FEEDBACK! And subscribe to our blog at www.researc...
Posted by RE/Search on Sun, 14 Sep 2008 03:24:00 PST

RE/Search at DORKBOT Wed Sep 10, 730pm, S.F. Million Fishes Gallery, 23rd/Bryant St.

RE/Search at DORKBOT Wed Sep 10, 730pm, S.F. Million Fishes Gallery, 23rd/Bryant St.it's this wednesday sept 10 at 7:30pmand thanks to ulrika will be hosted at million fishes at 2501 bryantmc'd by the...
Posted by RE/Search on Wed, 10 Sep 2008 07:02:00 PST

Wed Aug 27, 730pm FREE RE/Search party in San Francisco

Wed Aug 27, 730pm FREE RE/Search party. RE/Search books will be on sale and we will show a Counter Culture Hour video on the topic of "Punk Rock ." Million Fishes Gallery, corner Bryant / 23rd St, Mis...
Posted by RE/Search on Tue, 19 Aug 2008 11:24:00 PST

V. Vales August oh-eight RE/Search newsletter

WELCOME TO V. VALE's RE/SEARCH NEWSLETTER 74, August 2008. HERE'S THE NEWS FROM SAN FRANCISCO... ALL READERS ARE INVITED TO SEND CONTRIBUTIONS AND FEEDBACK! And subscribe to our blog at www.researchpu...
Posted by RE/Search on Mon, 04 Aug 2008 06:10:00 PST

V. Vale RE/SEARCH on BIAFRAs 50th Birthday Party, 6/16-17, Great American Music Hall

V. Vale on BIAFRA'S 50th BIrthday Party, Mon-Tue June 16-17, 2008, Great American Music HallJune 17, 2008 - JELLO BIAFRA'S 50th BIRTHDAY (Okay, so he must have been born in 1958).Woke up after seeing ...
Posted by RE/Search on Tue, 24 Jun 2008 05:57:00 PST

Rules for Living (Some) - posted by V. Vale RE/Search

The below was so worthwhile I felt compelled to post it as a blog or message. -- V. Vale1) Refuse false binaries, such as 'yes' or 'no'. Opt instead to linger between opposed absolutes in gray areas, ...
Posted by RE/Search on Thu, 12 Jun 2008 11:37:00 PST

Addendum to V. Vales JUNE 2008 RE/SEARCH NEWSLETTER sent 6/09/08

Corrections/Additions TO 6/08 V. VALE RE/SEARCH NEWSLETTER 6/9/08() CORRECTION: Wed June 11, 8pm (early show), DNA Lounge, 375 11th St, S.F.: CD Release Party for one of our favorite singers, JILL TRA...
Posted by RE/Search on Tue, 10 Jun 2008 09:53:00 PST

V. Vale’s RE/Search June 2008 Newsletter

WELCOME TO V. VALE's RE/SEARCH NEWSLETTER 73, June 2008 - UPDATED 6/2/08! HERE'S THE NEWS FROM SAN FRANCISCO... ALL READERS ARE INVITED TO SEND CONTRIBUTIONS AND FEEDBACK! And please subscribe to our ...
Posted by RE/Search on Tue, 03 Jun 2008 05:23:00 PST