LA Explosion at 30

I remember taking this picture of The Last in the little bedroom photo studio I had in my apartment at 1140 North Clark Street (Apartment 306) in West Hollywood. That apartment building was made infamous by one of Motley Crue's memoirs... but before those guys moved in, it was kind of like the after party / dorm complex of the Whisky A Go Go. North Clark Street is really San Vicente, or vice versa. Clark is what San Vicente is called north of Sunset Blvd., and the northwest corner of Sunset / San Vicente and/or Clark is 8901 Sunset - address of the Whisky A Go Go... where I worked, and one of the cocktail waitresses who worked at the Whisky also lived at 1140 and Joan Jett lived on San Vicente and more often than, after show parties went from Joan's place to mine and back again... but back to The Last.

I lived at Clark from 1979 through 1982, and that's the window during which this photo was taken, though I'm guessing its 79/80. This photo ran (as you can clearly see) in the erstwhile LA Reader when The Last had a gig deemed a Critic's Pick.

All their shows were critically great... if a columnist picked it or not. They were a power pop band that could play well with punk and hardcore bands... being from San Pedro helped I guess. They occupied that space that the Alley Cats also did. Nice people, great music, and could fit on any bill.



Last man, Joe Nolte announces in an email an LA gig to celebrate 30 years of LA Explosion... I lift boldy from said email:

Come join us to celebrate and/or throw things in Long Beach on July 20...

It has been 30 years since the "L.A. Explosion" album was released, so how about...

THE LAST, featuring

Joe Nolte
Vitus Matare
Mike Nolte
David Nolte
Bill Stevenson

Live at


Alex's Bar
2913 E. Anaheim St.
(Next to the Auto Zone, entrance in the back)
Long Beach, CA 90804
562-434-8292

Monday July 20th, with Scott Reynolds (All, Pavers) before us and Jr. Juggernaut after us...

Yep, it's the real LAX lineup, with Bill from the descendents providing drummage! (First time BIll and David will have shared a stage since, I think, that Pedro shwo with the Reactionaries)

I know that technically the actual anniversary isn't until August, but this is as close as we could cut it. We should go on around 10 pm.

If you check Alex's website (http://www.alexsbar.com/calendar.php) you will notice they still think it's just me and Mike.

Won't they be surprised - heh heh heh...


I can't be there, but all you LA people... you should try to make it.