A profile of Mondo Bummer Books on the occasion of their fifth anniversary:

The adage not to judge a book by its cover has perhaps never been treated with more aplomb than by Amy Berkowitz. Almost all of the previous 45 titles out on Berkowitz’s chapbook press, Mondo Bummer, are simple letter-size pages, printed out and then stitched or stapled and either folded in half or into a trifold.

“They’ve mostly been under five pages so that they can fit in a regular letter envelope,” Berkowitz said from the couch of her Lower Haight apartment. She celebrates five years of Mondo Bummer this weekend with readings from past contributors and the release party for Ted Rees’ “The New Anchorage,” the press’ first full-length chap.

Read the rest in The San Francisco Chronicle.

Readings by previous contributors, with a launch of Ted Rees’ The New Anchorage (MB’s first full-length chap), live music, and (of course) a party this Saturday at 6pm at E.M. Wolfman.

Here’s the RSVP, and performer info below:

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Claire Becker was the recipient of a full-length collection of poetry, which she titled Where We Think It Should Go and published through Octopus Books. At the California School for the Blind, she teaches young adults to be 70% informative and 30% humorous. Her Mondo Bummer book, We Know In 2010, We Survive, was published in 2010.

Brittany Billmeyer-Finn is a poet, playwright & shopgirl. Her Mondo Bummer book, (the geraniums), was published in 2014.

Brandon Brown‘s new book is called TOP FORTY and is published by Roof Books. His Mondo Bummer book, from The Poems of Gaius Valerius Catullus, was published in 2010.

Nico Peck is a writer, artist, and teacher in San Francisco. Their book The Pyrrhiad was published this year by Dirty Swan Projects. Their Mondo Bummer book, I Love The Dark The Lord of The Night, was published in 2013.

Ted Rees is a poet and essayist who spends most of his time in West Oakland, California, but travels around the western US on a regular basis. He is the author of Outlaws Drift in Every Vehicle of Thought (Trafficker Press 2013), and has had work featured in Armed Cell and eleven eleven, with work forthcoming in ON Contemporary Practice and Tripwire. His Mondo Bummer book, The New Anchorage, will be published in 2014.

Maya Weeks was born and raised on the central coast of California. Her Mondo Bummer book, Panic Train, was published in 2013.

Working at the boundary between sound and music, subnaught uses field recordings, algorithmic techniques, and just intonation in order to conduct experiments in auditory perception. A recent collection of works for oscillators was described by Tiny Mix Tapes as “a mesmerizing work, [and] a near therapeutic experience.” subnaught lives in Oakland, California and looks at clouds often.

The rest of the music starts at 8:00 or so:

Andrew Weathers Ensemble & Marcus Rubio Ensemble play The Songs of the US: Andrew Weathers (Oakland) & Marcus Rubio (Austin) are composers working in both the American experimental & folk traditions. This special set features each Ensemble playing re-workings of songs from the others’ repertoire.

glou glou, active in the Bay Area since the beginning of 2012, is dedicated to creating improvised electronic music that is primarily ambient and consonant. Gretchen Jude plays Roland SP­404, koto and sings (among other things); Arjun Mendiratta plays laptop, violin and rocks (and such). glou glou [pronounced glue glue] is the birdsong of the future. glou glou is concerned with texture, timbre, tonality, post­human improvisation, and whimsy. glou glou is a french word meaning glug glug. Small children are particularly receptive to glou­ glou.