Bill Steer, Andrew Pek (R.I.P.) & ‘Middie’ Peter Middlebrough – guitarist, vocalist & drummer of ‘Carcass’ (also in ‘Disattack’ before) – from Wirral (near Liverpool) did this zine… They started it in the first half of the 80s. Some bands featured: ‘Wretched’, ‘Mau-Maus’, ‘Disorder’, ‘The Fits’ (#2), ‘Rattus’, ‘Iconoclasts’, ‘Varukers’, ‘Kaaos’, ‘Deformed’, ‘Riistetyt’, ‘Bad Brains’ (#3), ‘Mellakka’, ‘Inferno’, ‘Metallica’, ‘Dirge’ (#4, 1984 – available on Jason Netherton’s metal-zine archive project Send Back My Stamps). Soon (second half of the 80s) it turned into more of a metal fanzine (Phoenix Militia)…
‘Disattack’ line-up here: ‘Tizer’ (drums), ‘Storm’ (bass), ‘Skully’ (guitar) & Karl (vocals). On the A Bomb Drops… tape (1986): ‘Middie’ (drums), Paul (bass), Bill (guitar) & Pek (vocals).
‘Disattack’ was just a joke in the beginning (1984). There wasn’t an actual band going at that point; just an invention/parody of their fave band (‘Discharge’) put about in a couple of zines… All just intended as a joke. It was in another zine aswell (Wasteful Existence) and they tried to get a feature in Final Curtain but Plebbs wouldn’t print it (probably suspected it being a joke)…
Pek & Middie had been in bands previously: Middie was in ‘Hereditary Disease’ (in ’82) and Pek was briefly in another band around 1983 – ‘Permanent Damage’, I think.
Pek circulated demos at the time that were by other bands. By 1985 he got the urge to turn it into a real band which is well documented. By 1986 they got the actual real band going.
I lost touch with Pek in ’85 (around issue 5 of his fanzine). There wasn’t a ‘real’ band going; I guess when Bill Steer came into the picture – a talented guy – that they could do a real band.