Maintaining Bohemia in a Gentrifying San FranciscoRandy Shawbyline‚ May. 15‚ 2008During the late 1990’s, a zine in the form of a newsletter emerged in San Francisco’s Central City with the unusual name, Turd-Filled Donut. This title belied what was often an insightful and provocative look at the city’s politics. I never knew the people behind the publication, but its co-creator, Erick Lyle, has now put out a book that includes both stories from that publication as well as other materials he wrote from 1997-2005. At its heart, On the Lower Frequencies is the story of how some twenty-somethings sought to survive in San Francisco through their art, music, and political engagement at a time when most of their brethren were arriving in the city for high-paying jobs in the booming tech industry or in corporate offices downtown. Lyle raises some important questions about the prospects for an ongoing counterculture in steadily gentrifying cities like San Francisco, and also about the effectiveness of non-traditional strategies for impacting urban politics. |