Inside Madame Wong's

If you were going to clubs in LA during the punk rock heyday, you will certainly recognize this sign from Madame Wong's Chinatown. But have you ever seen the inside of the Dragon Lady's office? In Santa Monica?



Well, that's it. Esther Wong is the one standing, wearing the black cardigan. You can't really see her but for her profile. Somewhere, oh somewhere, I do have a cool portrait of her...I think in storage in NYC... I promise as soon as I do find it, up it will go!

But what I find interesting about looking at anyone's room or office some 30 years later... what they have hanging on their walls! This photo was probably taken in 1979 or 1980... she's got a poster of The Police, who did play at her club in Chinatown to about 10 people. She's got a poster of The Motels, who she loved and who played her Santa Monica club frequently. And of course, there's a poster of Blondie - but all you can see are Debbie Harry's unmistakable lips. Blondie never played Madame Wong's, however.

Speaking of Blondie...tomorrow (July 1) is Debbie Harry's birthday, so I'm going to post one of my favorite Blondie photos in her honor!


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Also... July marks the month in 1976 when The Ramones did their first tour of England... and turned the British on in more ways than Helen of Troy's smile moved soldiers... or something like that.


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Favorite Punk Records - Doggie Do - The Dickies

The dapper Dickie, Karlos Kaballero wrote Doggie Do, which is the flip side of the Dickies' cover of the otherwise serious 1960s protest song, Eve of Destruction.

That cover was great punk parody, further affirming The Dickies well-deserved crown as the Clown Princes of Punk...not that a song called Doggie Do didn't! I mean... it was kind of a love song to an enamored called "Doggie Do." Awesome.



Back in punk rock days, brightly colored vinyl was all the rage. Well, isn't it always all the rage? Nothing looks cooler than a bright pink record!





Stan Lee co-produced this record with John Hewlett (their manager at the time) of John's Children fame (Marc Bolan was a member of John's Children).




Billy Club warming up backstage with one of my fave people from punk rock - Kent Smythe in the background. Kent kept every punk rock band together back in the day. When you think he's holding up the wall...he's really holding the Hollywood punk scene together.



Leonard Graves Phillips.... oh Doggie Do! in a wolf mask.



Doggie Do songwriter Karlos Kaballero, front and center.

Super Sale Deals ---- Last Two Days!!!

There are only TWO DAYS left in month of June special on Billy Idol photos. Click the photo above to get it now at 1/2 the gallery price!

If you miss this chance, you still have until July 3 to bid on it - its on my eBay.

If you are a Germs fan, you have a chance at getting a very limited edition of an image of Darby Crash in rehearsal. But hurry! Only 50 prints will be made.

Germs Movie Opens

The long awaited narrative feature about The Germs, entitled What We Do Is Secret had its premier at the Los Angeles Film Festival and the reviews are rolling in! Here are a couple, Sound the Sirens and Film Threat, though I'm sure many more will be popping up... so if this is your thing, keep your eyes on the papers.

Me - I'm just going to share with you photos I took of the Germs in 1977 when we were all a bunch of regular people hanging out together. Perhaps only Paul Beahm aka Bobby Pyn aka Darby Crash had an idea of what would emerge from these times...





I had no idea when I took all these photos in Pat Smear's mom's garage in West LA that this murky reproduction of one of the images would become synonymous with LA Punk. Thanks Germs!



I like so many other frames from that late afternoon in the garage - they show sides of Darby that you didn't get to see when you ran into him in public, or saw him onstage.





The nice folks at Get Hip have a swell t-shirt version of the image below...if you want to wear your Germs on your sleeve, so to speak.


click the picture!

Get the Gore!

If you live in or around Detroit, tomorrow night, you will get the Gore! The Gore Gore Girls are having a record release party and its sure to be a great rockin time...also on the bill, The Muldoons and DJ's Freddie Fortune and Steve Nawara.

Click the link on the title to hear some new Gore! "Don't Cry" at Spin.com!


Amy Gore and Matt Pendleton at the 2006 Ponderosa Stomp record show

Available for the First Time

Because I'm putting another touring photo exhibit together for the Fall, I'm offering this photo of Stiv Bators and the Disconnected band, an outtake from the sessions we did for the "Disconnected" album cover.... I'm only going to make 100 prints. This is a very limited edition. Get yours now! Click the title or the photo for more info!

Also for a limited time, in honor of the release of the Germs movie, What We Do Is Secret, the image of Darby Crash below is once again available - but only 50 copies will be made. A very limited edition. Don't miss out!



Details at the Punk Rock Gift Shop. Click it!

Favorite Punk Records - Something Better Change

The Stranglers, like Television were much more accomplished players than most of their punk rock counterparts, due to their existence and experience together as a band for a few years prior to punk rock breaking out, and with it, their records. Also, like Television, the Stranglers were not considered a punk band per se (I guess it was the keyboard sound...New Wave perhaps?), but had tons of punk cred... if Television created a forum for punk rock in NYC, the Stranglers showed England a thing or two in 1976 when they opened for the Ramones on the New Yorkers' first British tour. That Ramones tour gave UK punks a kick in the ass. Everyone who became anyone was there. By extension, they all saw and heard the Stranglers as well.

Prior to the punk circuit introduction courtesy of the Ramones tour, the Stranglers were a pub rock band. Nothing wrong with that...some of our greatest musical heroes emerged from that scene...Nick Lowe, Elvis Costello, Ian Dury...I don't need to go on, do I?



The Stranglers sense of humor (dark and also misogynist) won them many fans despite or because of the perception of something sinister going on. Still, it wouldn't stop girls from throwing themselves on stage and baring their breasts. The Stranglers had more than one incident where feminists protested against them. It just added up to the chaos one wants to see at a punk rock show.





"Something Better Change" hit Number 9 on the British charts in 1977. It is from the Stranglers' second album, No More Heroes. This EP pictured was released in the USA by A&M Records (the major label that distributed the punk imprint IRS) and they spared no expense in producing a fantastic punk facsimile....from the art work, to the Monty Pythonesque description of the record on the back cover, and the pink vinyl with a semi-3D label (it would be 3D if you watched it as it spun on your turntable). I'm a sucker for colored vinyl.

Favorite Punk Records - Little Johnny Jewel

By 1976, I was deeply into reading New York Rocker, Creem, Rock Scene and any ‘zine that published info and photos of this punk rock thing.

Patti Smith had already released her album “Horses,” a work that stands up today still, as groundbreaking and genre-defining; it fills in the gaps between rock n roll, poetry, art, punk and the underground. Back then, you couldn’t say “Patti Smith” without also saying “Television.”



Some of the now and then legendary singles that you absolutely had to have were Television’s “Little Johnny Jewel” and Patti Smith’s “Piss Factory.” I had them both. Today, my copy of “Piss Factory” is missing in action – but I carried it dutifully with me on every move I made, from Los Angeles to London to Paris to Dublin, back to LA and then to NYC. If my copy of “Piss Factory” found its way into the collection of any of the bands that have camped on my couch in various apartments from Brooklyn to Manhattan and back to Brooklyn again, then I guess it is in good hands.

I am happy to have not one, but two copies of “Little Johnny Jewel.” Why? Well, you could say that having two of a particular item you really love was a habit I picked up from my mom (she used to tell me if I found a pair of shoes I loved and that were comfortable or a pair of jeans that fit right, I should buy at least two pair! Now that woman could shop!) but the truth is, “Little Johnny Jewel” is a 7:30 long song, and on the single, it is divided into Part One and Part Two, over the two sides of the single. I could stack them and listen to the song without having to flip the single over. Pretty clever, huh?

Seven minutes and thirty seconds is completely antithetical to punk rock’s bar set by the Ramones with their 1-2-3-4 furious songs of three minutes and under. But Television weren’t a punk band, even though their insistence on turning the bar CBGB into a rock n roll venue opened the door for punk rock in downtown NYC…as musicians, they were practiced perfectionists whereas their scene peers were spontaneously sloppy.



Television would play near-jazz-explorations and they’d do it like jazz masters… speaking of which, Tom Verlaine has been playing that Fender Jazz Master for as long as I can remember. It’s a fine machine and not the weapon of choice for rock n roll guitar players until Verlaine popularized it. It certainly wasn’t the Mosrite favored by Johnny Ramone or the super cheap Airline popularized during the Second Coming of Garage Rock by Jack White after he bought it from the all-too-often-unsung genius Jack Oblivian. And all that adds up to all these guitar heroes who aren’t really punk rockers at all…their cues come from early in the 20th Century. Meanwhile…. I’m waiting for the Third Generation of the Rickenbacker (that would be post-Beatles, post-Paisley Underground).

Television have but three studio albums to their credit, and three releases of live performances. Both Tom Verlaine and Richard Lloyd combined have a great deal more in solo albums. Every groove of that vinyl is worth owning.

And if someone finds a copy of “Piss Factory” backed with “Hey Joe” by Patti Smith and you don’t want it… I might be willing to trade my second copy of “Little Johnny Jewel.”

The Last Pogo Update

The last time I showed you a picture of Cheetah Chrome, it was this one... not the most flattering shot.... especially since the punkest bad boy... or the baddest punk boy of all of punk rock has matured like fine wine, even though he doesn't indulge in that sort of thing anymore.

Required reading is the Blog from the filmmakers bringing you The Last Pogo. Just read it! That's why we do this linking thingie!!!

Punk Beach Weekend

Back in 1985, The Pandoras were at the peak of their game. The line up of Paula Pierce, Julie Patchouli, Melanie Vammen and Karen Blankfeld inadvertently made me the hero of garage punk fan boys the world over for the past 20+ years because of these photos. It seems to be a slow day in the internets... so I'll just let these photos do the talking... cuz summer's here and the time is right for splashing on the beach...

Punk's Inadvertent Invention: Iggy Pop

Whenever I think of John Cale, as I did yesterday when posting those pictures of him... I think of the Stooges and their amazing eponymous album he produced... the one with "I Wanna Be Your Dog" and other songs that became anthems and favorites and punk influences...and still continue to thrill audiences that hear them almost 40 years later.

The underground zeitgeist that midwife'd punk rock started with John Cale, but it was Iggy who broke the water and the conventions. Sometimes all you need to do is look at him and its all perfectly clear.






Just a word to remind you - you can buy just about any photo from Punk Turns 30. Click here!

Thanks, as always, for your support.

Punk’s Inadvertent Invention: Velvet Redux

I have always believed that punk rock got both its art factor and its “ok-to-play-even-though-you-don’t-know-how-to” factor from the Velvet Underground. They were equal parts music master and music neophyte.



While other bands of the era were still singing about relationships between boys and girls, the Velvets were singing about the psychological side of things…the personal demons and darkness at the edge of the soul, staring into the abyss of heroin addiction against a guitar riff as dirty as that needle on the intersection of Lexington/125.



The 60s was a decade both beautiful and brutal – and it is reflected perfectly in the music of the Velvet Underground. This beauty/brutality dialectic has always been present in the music of the underground, whether it was rock n roll in its nascent years, or punk rock, which took that dialectic all the way to the mainstream. I mean… when Jaguar, a symbol of elite Britain selects The Clash’s “London Calling” to advertise itself…I guess we musical terrorists (punk rockers) have won.

Punk Guitar Heroes - The Cramps Poison Ivy

The Cramps have had a long career, and several personnel changes over the 30+ years that they have been bringing the trash voodoo psychobilly garage punk camp to adoring fans the world over. The two constant fixtures have always been Lux Interior and Poison Ivy Rorschach.


buy it here!

While not a Bikini Girl with a Machine Gun, Ivy's weapon of choice was a great big guitar and a twangy, trashy reverb reminiscent of Link Wray, Hasil Adkins and surf heroes like The Ventures and Dick Dale. The hybrid genre of "psychobilly" is one I'd gladly give sole creation credit to the Cramps, and specifically to Ivy. She's a super hero, she's a vixen, and she's an innovator.

Punk Guitar Heroes - Chip Kinman

Chip Kinman, on guitar, performing alongside his brother Tony Kinman (bass) in The Dils at the People's Temple in San Francisco.



Back then, and to this day, The Dils represent to me everything punk rock should be: political, fierce, fast and stripped down to the bare essentials. The Dils were a 3-piece band yet made a lot of loud noise - noise that made a point.



The Dils always got their audiences revved up, cheering along with their punk rock anthems "Class War" and "I Hate the Rich." Of course, these photos show that San Francisco will always be San Francisco, and there's the obligatory dancing hippie chick on stage with the band... it really didn't matter what band.



What makes Chip Kinman a punk rock guitar hero... other than The Dils being the perfect punk rock band... he's faster than a speeding bullet, he can leap tall buildings in a single bound and all without missing a single power chord.



I have seen Chip's latest music project, PCH (as in Pacific Coast Highway), and he can still leap tall buildings, guitar in hand and still does Dils songs if you ask nicely, and always rocks the house. Remember that Chip and Tony almost singlehandedly created alt.country/punk when they formed Rank & File with Alejandro Escovedo. The Kinmans continued their cowboy ways with Cowboy Nation.

If you click here you will be transported by the magic of the internet to Chip's myspace profile, where you can hear some music and see a collection of photos from Chip's punk rock past... a history that is as rich as punk rock itself.