Adrian Salas

IS 464

Razorcake Oral History Database

Razorcake/Gorsky Press, Inc. is a Los Angeles based publisher of a bi-monthly punk
rock fanzine founded in 2001. In 2005 Razorcake was granted status as a 501(c)(3) nonprofit organization. In the years since being founded Razorcake has conducted a
significant amount of interviews of bands and participants in the independent punk rock
community for both their print and web outlets. The organization has decided to collect
their materials which cover under-represented groups in the traditional punk rock
historiography narrative, and assemble these assets into a searchable database/repository
styled on oral history programs. The selection of interviews chosen will be based on a
framework of identifying traditionally marginalized minority parties by ethnic
background, sexuality, gender, or some combination thereof.
With the maturation of punk rock culture since its founding in the late 1970s (or
arguably even the 1960s, depending on the touchstones one goes by), there has been a
steady stream of publications centered on its history. These works often focus on the
histories of individual bands or geographical areas where thriving scenes existed. These
books range from biographies written by band members1 to larger overviews of punk and
do it yourself (DIY) culture written by fans and members of the punk community.2
There have also been a number of documentaries produced covering much of the same
1

Just a few of these autobiographical works include: I, Shithead: A Life in Punk by Joey Shithead Keithley of D.O.A,
Bob Mould: See A Little Light: The Trail of Rage and Melody by Bob Mould of Husker Du and Sugar (co-written with
music journalist Michael Azzerad), and the enjoyably bizarre semi-fictionalized The Primal Screamer by Nick Blinko
of Englands Rudimetary Peni.
2

Some of these include: American Hardcore: A Tribal History by Steven Blush, Going Underground: American Punk
1979-1992 by George Hurchalla, and Gimme Something Better: The Profound, Progressive, and Occasionally Pointless
History of Bay Area Punk from Dead Kennedys to Green Day, by Jack Boulware & Silke Tudor.

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ground as the aforementioned published works. Razorcakes intended audience and endusers are the spectrum of researchers with an interest in studying and writing on areas and
entities within punk culture that are under-represented or non-represented by these other
more widely accessible sources, whether for academic purposes or for amateur
researchers who are interested in the history and interactions that lesser known figures in
punk have had on their local communities.
As Marcia Bates said in her article on digital library access, [a] good, user-centered
information system is not just a pretty interface. Design choices based on knowledge of
users should penetrate deep into the system, should shape each one of the design layers
and affect how those layers can best be integrated.3 This effectively sums up the main
idea behind how the proposed database like Razorcakes should focus its attention. Since
the organization lacks the dedicated information technology workers of a larger entities, it
must focus on making sure that their information is clean, uniform, and standardized so
that it can be effectively searched and utilized, rather than focusing on making a site that
is very flashy but lacking in content and navigability. If the data is managed well, it can
much more easily be used to interact with the more aesthetic layers of interface design
later on as skills, time and necessity allow. To quote Dagobert Soergel, the system must
present its information structure its conceptual schema and its hierarchy of concepts
in a way the user can understand.4 The parameters that are under consideration as
searchable focal points for the collection are the following: geography, time, race, gender
and sexual orientation, topicality, and class. These categories not only define the esoteric

Bates, Marcia J. "The Cascade of Interactions in the Digital Library Interface." Graduate School of Education and
Information Studies, UCLA, n.d. Web. 24 Mar. 2014. <http://pages.gseis.ucla.edu/faculty/bates/articles/cascade.html>.
4
Soergel, Dagobert. "An Information Science Manifesto." American Society for Information Science Award of Merit
Acceptance Speech. Washington D.C. 5 Nov. 1997. Speech.

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boundaries of the collections scope, but also the data that the information structures
involved will be groomed to make explicit to end users. By making a focus of the subject
and keyword metadata.
Razorcake operates within tight financial parameters. Paid full time staff is currently
composed of two individuals who function as managing editors, but there is a very large
and diverse talent pool who volunteers, interns, or remotely contributes skills in some
capacity. As a non-profit organization, Razorcake has proven successful in acquiring
grants and monetary contributions in the past, so it will be assumed that the oral history
database initiative will be funded by a combination of targeted grants and donations. In
the interest of prudent financial planning it will also be assumed that these funds are a
windfall rather than a steady source of income, so the database will be designed so that it
can be populated largely by volunteer staff with only moderate training after the initial
setup of the system by myself and contracted programmers and allow most future funds
to go towards system maintenance and upkeep rather than full time information systems
staff. It is also possible that should the database prove successful it could also be used as
a concrete example of work that Razorcake has undertaken towards fulfilling their
mission statements community focused goal to provide consistent coverage of do-ityourself punk culture that you wont find anywhere else.5 This could lead towards better
standing for Razorcake in their future grant applications or fund raising campaigns.
The interviews that will be used as the resources for this project will likely exist in
multiple versions (outlined below in the Entity Relationship Diagram). The main version,
at least early on in the project, will usually be edited text interviews that mirror the

"Mission Statement." Razorcake.org. Razorcake/Gorsky Press, Inc., n.d. Web. 16 Mar. 2014.
<http://www.razorcake.org/mission-statement>.

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originals used for publication in the print edition of Razorcake. The other versions would
include expanded or alternate edits originally posted on the Razorcake website,
audio/video recordings of the interviews, and raw transcripts that document entire
interviews. The forms these documents will take, at least as far as the textual materials,
will ideally be a variety of formats such as simple HTML pages, and mobile reader
friendly PDF and MOBI files. Beyond the text documents, the site would need to be
flexible and expandable to allow the inclusion of the other supplementary documents
such as photos, streamable video, and audio that would be relevant to the subjects in the
collection and cleared for use.
While these assets currently are ordered in a way that facilitates internal access, this
does not extend beyond standardized naming conventions and filing according to
hierarchies based on publication schedules. As such, all the assets that the organization
intends to be entered into the database will have to be prepared by conforming them to a
qualified Dublin Core metadata schema. Dublin Core does have its drawbacks, chief
among them being that it is prone to vagueness and confusion due to the looseness of its
element set definitions. Ironically it is this same looseness that makes it a good candidate
to organize a data set that deals largely with specialized, subculture oriented terminology.
Initially thirteen fields have been identified as needed to accurately describe each asset on
the item level using Dublin Core elements . These Dublin Core fields should be mapped
to more natural language headings on the front end where users will interface with the
records. The success or failure of the metadata is extremely tied to the need for controlled
vocabulary and guides that clearly lay out how to use these resources to the people tasked
with doing what is essentially non-professional cataloging. Many of the subjects who are

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intended to be covered by the scope of the database are not well known or standardized
by the general public, so what information there is needs be properly managed so as to
make sure all material is properly locatable. In the best case scenario, the site could
hopefully function much like the digital library interfaces that many institutions are now
working on as resource entry points to their collections.
Initially thirteen fields have been identified as needed to accurately describe each
asset on the item level (see table 1 for full set). Subject is used on the back-end for two
different display end elements, Interviewee and the repeating field Keywords. There
will be one element field, Notes, that will be defined through use of an application
profile extension of the Qualified Dublin Core set. To maintain consistency and structure
throughout the program, local controlled vocabularies will need to be compiled as the
authority files for three back-end elements/four display, Title/Title,
Subject/Interviewee, Subject/Keyword, and Creator/Interviewer. The Title field
will actually be reformatted from the published version, which is the authority, according
to a guide. This is to ensure that the title element will make sense in a federated search
environment outside of the local context. For example, The Gun Club will become An
Oral History of The Gun Cub and Los Illegals will become An Interview with Los
Illegals to ensure that records can be properly interpreted by outside parties.
The Description.notes/Notes field will be populated according to criteria outlined
in an application profile usage guideline, so as to avoid abuse of the field. Coverage
(Spatial) and Document Type will utilize the Getty Thesaurus of Geographic Names
and the Art & Architecture Thesaurus respectively. Abstract/Summary will be a concise
free text summation. The Extent, bibliographicCitation and Publisher fields will be

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filled using simple templates. There will also be a module incorporated into the full
record views on the website to allow user tagging. This will be moderated to ensure tags
are relevant. The important thing in this metadata undertaking is maintaining good clear
controlled vocabularies and practices, and maintaining an easy to use bible of these so
that anyone of reasonable competence can be entrusted with the data entry needed to
build this collection up in a useful resource for researchers. There must also be a certain
degree of leeway in the main entry fields so that they can easily be adapted to document
supplementary material that will hopefully be integrated into the sites interface at some
future point. For instance, perhaps adding a duration field to records for audio or video
elements.
One example of the need for good controlled vocabulary is in searching when
variants are involved. In the case of many punk figures, they often used pseudonyms in
addition to their given name. For instance, a band who could potentially be included in
the collection is the very early Los Angeles synth-punk band The Screamers. One of their
principal members was singer Tomata du Plenty who had the legal name David Xavier
Harrigan. Outside of the Screamers, du Plenty also had a lengthy career as a visual and
performance artist. It is important that a controlled vocabulary records always link
Tomata du Plenty and David Xavier Harrigan together. One way this would be used in the
information system is through linking multiple names into the name field in the database
through a relational table. For instance, Tomata du Plenty should be included as the
main entry and David Xavier Harrigan should also be included for certain, as well as
several variations that might potentially be used by researchers such as Tomato du
Plenty, Tomata Duplenty and David Harrigan. If one is working with a flat

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document then it should be formatted to where at least the two main entries are included
by injecting the main entry with its principle variant, such as Tomata du Plenty (David
Xavier Harrigan). Another vocabulary peculiarity that emphasizes the importance of a
controlled vocabulary is the habit many punk bands have of using acronyms as their main
name (a few examples include T.S.O.L./True Sounds of Liberty, P.I.L./Public Image Ltd.,
and S.N.F.U. who have no defined meaning for their initials). Perhaps the most extreme
sample of this naming confusion is the band M.D.C., whose many naming intricacies are
outlined in the sample vocabulary record appended onto the end of this document. In any
case, a controlled vocabulary is an essential tool so that disparate records describing the
same entities can be drawn together in a search and and ensure users can both obtain all
relevant information they are looking and do so without a lot of redundant labor.
Once the resources are formatted into Dublin Core schema, a back end production
database will be assembled with resources and expertise that are funded through the
grants and donations received for this purpose. This will allow the metadata records to be
exposed to harvesting by indexing robots and web crawlers, and also OAI harvesters. In
an ideal situation, these records can then be submitted as XML files to aggregators such
as OCLC where it can be cross-walked into MARC records and submitted to Worldcat
and Oaister among others, as well as other search services that utilize OAI harvesting.
Should the database prove to be a successful archival resource, a project that would be
very interesting to look into would be to submit the collections records to the Online
Archive of California (OAC). This would be a more long term and complicated project to
undertake at present though, as the OAC requires collection data be submitted to them as
EAD or MARC collection guides or encoded to the METS metadata standard which

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could require making extensive metadata crosswalks.6 Most importantly though, the
website will probably most likely be entered through Google, so as much item level
record metadata as possible will need to be exposed to the open web. This means a lot of
attention must be made to making sure there is rich, clean, and uniform data across the
subject categories seen in table 1.
The simple search display records will display Title, Sub-title, Interviewer, Year,
Document Type and Publisher. This will give searchers a reasonably clear and precise
search display for the brief record, and is roughly in-line with other search displays in
Worldcat. If searchers choose to go to the full record view, it it safe to present the entire
metadata record as there is no particularly sensitive information about Razorcake as an
organization that might be exposed. What is important though is to make sure that the
publisher and bibliographicCitation fields are always present and filled out. These
fields would be the closest to rights metadata that would be associated with most
records.The entire process for interviews and contributions involves no formal
agreements or releases between Razorcake and the entities involved, but is instead based
on mutual trust. The lack of formal agreement is where Razorcakes operating method
has one of its most noticeable schisms with the praxis of professional archivists. This
practice does not stem from irresponsibility on the part of Razorcake, but rather its
adherence to different community standards. As Jessie Lymn states in his article on the
archival possibilities of zine anthologies, Zines play with, and disrupt, standard literary
ideas of publishing, distribution, and capital.7 The inclusion of publisher information
will serve as a corporate body statement of responsibility for the materials and also as a
6

http://www.cdlib.org/services/access_publishing/dsc/contribute/docs/forcontributors_collection_policy.pdf. Accessed
23 March, 2014.
7
Lymn, Jessie. "The Zine Anthology as Archive: Archival Genres and Practices." Archives and Manuscripts 41.1
(2013): 44-57. Tandfonline.com. 14 Mar. 2013. Web. 13 Mar. 2014. Pg. 53.

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as a way for Razorcake to better make sure that they are credited by any parties who may
use materials from the oral history collections.
Hopefully the site can take cues from the many digital library projects that are
making headway at the moment, and provide a rich resource for community based
archive research for people interested in studying under-represented subject areas. There
will need to be a balancing act to make sure the database is controlled enough through its
metadata on the back end so that it is functional and returns search results that are
complete and useful. The need for strict data controls must also balance with the need for
the data forms to not be too complicated to be tackled by a revolving amateur workforce
of volunteers and interns, which is why locally compiled vocabularies would be
preferable to something like the Getty or Library of Congress Resources in most cases. In
the end the main focus of the site must never waver from the needs of the end users,
because as Soergel says, A truly user-oriented system must empower the user to take full
advantage of information resources and search capabilities.8

Works Cited
Lymn, Jessie. "The Zine Anthology as Archive: Archival Genres and Practices."
Archives and Manuscripts 41.1 (2013): 44-57. Tandfonline.com. 14 Mar. 2013. Web. 13
Mar. 2014.
"Mission Statement." Razorcake.org. Razorcake/Gorsky Press, Inc., n.d. Web. 16
Mar. 2014. <http://www.razorcake.org/mission-statement>.
Soergel, Dagobert. "An Information Science Manifesto." American Society for
Information Science Award of Merit Acceptance Speech. Washington D.C. 5 Nov. 1997.
Bates, Marcia J. "The Cascade of Interactions in the Digital Library Interface."
Graduate School of Education and Information Studies, UCLA, n.d. Web. 24 Mar. 2014.
<http://pages.gseis.ucla.edu/faculty/bates/articles/cascade.html>.

Soergel, An Information Science Manifesto.

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Vocabulary Record Sample

M.D.C. (American punk rock band, 1980-present)
Note: M.D.C. Is a far left leaning punk rock band formed in Austin, TX under the name
the Stains. The band released one single under this name in 1980, before changing their
name to M.D.C. and relocating to San Francisco, CA and later Portland, OR. The bands
sole constant member is singer Dave Dictor (b. 1956). The band is known for its habit of
ascribing new meanings to its initials upon reach release.
Names:
M.D.C. [Preferred]
MDC
MDC (Acoustic)
Magnus Dominus Corpus
Metal Devil Cokes
Millions of Dead Cops
Millions of Dead Cops II
Multi-Death Corporations
Multi Death Corporations
The Stains
The Stains (Austin)
Nationalities:
American
Roles:
Band
Hierarchical Position:
-Corporate bodies
-M.D.C.

Dublin Core
Element
Title

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User Element Set

Element Sample

Control

Title

Interview with Alice

Bag, 2013

Local Authority
(published title
reformatted to usage

10

guidelines)
Alternative

Sub-title

Narduwar vs. Alice

Bag

Taken from original

publication (if any
present)
Local Authority

Subject

Interviewee

Creator
Coverage
(Temporal)
Coverage
(Spatial)
Abstract

Interviewer
Year

Alice Bag (Alice

Armendariz))
Narduwar
2013

Place

East Los Angeles

Summary

Interview with
Chicana activist and
musician Alice Bag
of Los Angeles punk
band The Bags
(1977-1981) and
author of the
autobiography
Violence Girl: East
L.A. Rage to
Hollywood Stage, A
Chicana Punk Story
(2011).

Free Text Summary

Subject (field
repeats for each
term)

Type
Extent
Description.note
s

Keywords

Punk

Local Controlled
Vocabulary Pick List

Document Type
Extent
Notes

Chicana
Fanzines
9 pages
Also interviewed in
Razorcake 24

bibliographicCit
ation

Originally
Published in

Razorcake 75,
Aug./Sept. 2013,
pgs. 54-63

Publisher

Publisher

Tags

Tags

Razorcake/Gorsky
Press, Inc.
The Bags

AAT (when applicable)

Published Context
Free text dictated by
application profile usage
guidelines
Title, Volume, Date, and
Pages of initial print
publication OR Title,
Location, and Date of
original web posting
Razorcake/Gorsky
Press, Inc.
User tagged, moderated

Local Authority
Year Interview
Conducted
TGN

Table 1: Elements and Control Definitions

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