Most people are used goods.
Their ballyhoo of being chewed up by their jobs, their girlfriends or boyfriends, or whatever emotional problem is fashionably crippling, is enough to turn my stomach. Fact is, they've got very little problems of note. Rather, It's their subservience to crisis, the woe-is-me nonsense which shelters them like a surrogate mother's teet, that has Chewed them up.

With the exception of The King...of Celluloid, What I Learned from Elvis Films, and How About that Anti-Semitism in Star Trek?, everything in Crank #6 was written by and is copyright (1997) Jeff Koyen.

The rights to those articles noted above are retained by their respective authors. Dennis McGee illustrated the cover; DB Velveeda illustrated the E.T. article. Dan Kelly supplied his own artwork; I didn't ask where it came from. All other illustrations were stolen from various sources.

The devil and I shook. "It's a deal," he said.

"I've got a good lawyer," I told him,
"so don't you try to back out."

Crank is a production of Jeff Koyen and is written off as such come Tax Time. ISSN 1076-9201.

Feel free to reprint whatever text strikes your fancy, but please contact me regarding the reprinting of artwork, layouts, etc. Excerpts of reasonable length and the Crank logo may be reprinted for the purpose of review; please send me a clipping when you've got the chance.

For the technically curious, Crank was produced as a single Mac Quark document and output straight to film. That's why it looks so darned pretty.

These printers should be ashamed of themselves: Nittany Valley Offset (College Park, PA) and Premier Press (Cherry Hill, NJ). Nittany Valley declined to print Crank #6 after seeing issues #4 and #5--they were afraid it would be too offensive for "the women in the plant."

Premier Press was a bigger disappointment (and surprise)--their decision to not print Crank #6 was a genuine shock. Not only did they print issue #4, but they also printed Highball, a goddamn titty magazine. Apparently, Crank #6 "is getting too rank," and might offend "the ladies who work [t]here." Fuck--Crank #4 was much nastier than this one. So, after a six-week delay, this issue was finally accepted by a shop in Florida. (Ironic, considering Florida's track record of obscenity prosecution and censorship.) My thanks to Ken Oatman for referring me to this printer.

If you don't like it, stop doing it.
No one-and I mean no one-is required to do
anything. Granted, some exits are extreme,
even criminal; but there are, nonetheless, exits.
If you're too afraid, that's another story.
I can't help then.

On behalf of the entity known as Crank, I would like to thank young Marcy Gilbert and Amelia Peterson for donating their time to pose for this issue's cover illustration. Likewise, I would like to thank their very liberal parents, Ms. Laura Gilbert and Mr. & Mrs. Edwin Petersen, for not filing charges after seeing the rough sketches which resulted from their daughters' afternoon photo shoot with us. Incidentally, Marcy [left] was catching, Amelia [right] was pitching. Each was paid with a week's worth of Taco Bell Kid's Meals. A boatload of credit goes to Dennis McGee for changing Amelia's gender at the last moment [without requiring a new shoot with a male model!] when Ms. Petersen expressed hesitation with the original kiddie/lesbian concept. If you think this cover is disturbing, you really should've seen my original idea.

I take responsibility for my own actions. And my own mistakes. If I were you--namely, a Believer--I would, at the very least, expect the same from my god.