Now Is the Time to Invent! collects writing from Puncture, a little magazine that covered the indie scene of the late '80s and '90s with authority, scope, generosity, and a lovingly critical eye. Founded in 1982 as a San Francisco punk zine, Puncture continuously grew, publishing engaging profiles of the indie rock biggies--Pavement, Hole, Beck, Sleater-Kinney, Belle & Sebastian, the Flaming Lips, Cat Power, the Pixies, Nick Cave, Neutral Milk Hotel, the Magnetic Fields, Jeff Buckley, Fugazi, My Bloody Valentine, Guided By Voices, and many more--alongside culture essays, reviews and coverage of film, art, and literature. Like the bands it wrote about, it was informal, yet tastefully made . . . The writing was smart and engaging, enthusiastic but never fawning, concerned with the health of the music scene even when assessing its progress meant calling out its insularity or lack of energy. Along with its sensitivity to indie-rock's often unbalanced gender dynamics, Puncture backed the right aesthetic horse by celebrating the homespun, literary, warmly opaque, self-consciously arty, and vulnerable--bands like Camper Van Beethoven, the Mekons, Sebadoh, Palace, and the Mountain Goats. - Rolling Stone Recommends--Jon Dolan "Rolling Stone"