Punk Turns 30

September 2 rock show , originally uploaded by Theresa K . Its Summer's last hurrah. Let's work backwards from Labor Day weekend - If you are in NYC, be sure to mark Friday, September 2 on your calendar and come on down to Union Pool in Williamsburg to see BBQ, Demons Claws and the Turpentine Brothers. Gas is too expensive for you to take a road trip. Stay home and rock out here! I think you will love these bands. Here are links to their websites. Listen to their tunes, and then see them live: BBQ / Mark Sultan Demons Claws Turpentine Brothers If you are in LA, do not miss the opportunity of a lifetime! Alice Bag and The Castration Squad are making Friday night special for you. This is a special Castration Squad reunion, with Dinah Cancer and others, including Alice Bag (on keyboards)at the Key Club. You may never get another chance to see this, so go. Friday, September 2. Monday, August 29 in NYC, Cleveland's answer to the Minutemen, The New Lou Reeds ...

from the Flipside Fanzine site On Saturday, March 17, 1979, I was a senior at UCLA, and on the following Monday at 8 AM, I would have a final in French 5; at noon, I would have a final in a class on French drama, concentrating on Racine; and at 6 PM, I would have a final in a class about James Joyce's "Ulysses." It would have been imprudent to go out Saturday night, but I was going stir-crazy. The entire school year, I barely spoke English during the day. Three of my four classes were in French or French literature and not in translation. Going out to meet my friends and see punk rock bands would give me all the English language vulgate I yearned to hear. But it was not to be. My sister, who had just graduated mid-term from high school, decided she was going to move in with me. That very weekend. Nevermind that I had no time to entertain her since I was going to be in the middle of a grueling week of final exams, three of which were on the first day of finals week. ...

Stiv Bators Live , originally uploaded by Theresa K . THANKS, my beloved Dead Boys for allowing Stiv and me to be a part of your show by using this picture on stage. I feel so honored. See you again tonight, and see you Cheetah on Sunday! New Yorkers, if you wanna catch this show, you should show up at CBGB about an hour before the doors open. There are some tickets available for the walk up crowd. Me & Stiv at Dead Boys Reunion, Cleveland, 2004 photo by Jim Lanza

Dee Dee & Stiv - your fave? , originally uploaded by Theresa K . Reminding everyone - and also paying tribute --- The Dead Boys at CBGB tonight and tomorrow. These two really dead boys, Dee Dee Ramone and Stiv Bators will be directing your party from the netherworld....

Over night, I received the following two comments: From the ever-popular "Anonymous:" what gives..no Black Randy, no Tomato Du Plenty and where are The "I hate the rich" commie rockers, DILS?? Well sir or madam, where have you been? We got Black Randy here! Black Randy has appeared on these pages a couple times. You have to peruse the archives. Blogger only shows a week's worth of entries at once. Tomata du Plenty is still in negative form, I'm sorry to say, in a nice, safe, acid-free folder. Don't know where you live, Anonymous, but we've had one hot as hell summer here in NYC where I live. I haven't been able to get into the darkroom in several weeks. The combination of no AC and those chemicals...I just can't do it. Yeah, I'm a wimp. But let me take this as a "Fried Green Tomatoes" moment - I'm probably older than you and have more complaints about weather and rightfully so! That's the benefit of aging... yo...

I love that you readers know stuff that I don't know! Fred posted this comment - This Belinda photo on your archives... those two guys ended up in the most popular (circa 83-84) lineup of the Joneses. They were brothers. The dark haired guy tried out for the Cramps but didn't get the gig. Thanks Fred! I didn't know that. I wonder if Belinda does. Lux Interior of The Cramps I'm very excited, and I hope you New Yorkers are too -- Dead Boys at CBGB two nights in a row! August 26 & 27. Jimmy Zero, in a reunion hug if ever there was one. If you get shut out of that show on the 26th, go up the street to Otto's Shrunken Head and see another Cleveland band, a bit younger but just as fierce, The New Lou Reeds. The New Lou Reeds DO NOT play Velvet Underground covers... they're more like the Minutemen so there ya go. Its a great weekend for punk rock - again, if you are shut out of the Dead Boys on the 27th, Kid Congo is playing at 1 in the morning on Saturday...

Jett Idol , originally uploaded by Theresa K . This picture of Joan Jett and Billy Idol is one of the several photos I am donating to the CBGB Gallery Auction that will open on August 31. Many other photographers in NYC are donating as well - so if the CBGB cause is something you want to contribute to, and you want something in return - please check out CBGB online and mark your calendar for August 31. You may not be able to put your arms around a memory, but you can put up an 11x14 print that helps you remember. Other images I am donating include: Johnny Ramone Blondie and a really nice BW image of the Cramps that has only been seen at the Grimey's and NYCD exhibits so far. Come on down to CBGB and see for yourself! Its Lux and crew sitting around a crystal ball, from 1978 and it was shot inside the erstwhile fabulous and trashy Tropicana Motel.

Darby Crash 1977 , originally uploaded by Theresa K . Punks already know that Darby Crash and The Germs made a lasting impact on rock n roll - not just in Los Angeles, but far and wide. The Los Angeles Times today gives some coverage to punk rock, telling us its not dead. Rather than re-print the article here, and because of copyright issues, I give you this link to the piece - you do have to register with the LA Times online to read it, however. In essence, the Times tells us about the two Germs movies being made and discusses other documentaries that are in the pipeline and festival circuit that you can look forward to. No... punk ain't dead. It's not even the next big thing. It kept living, "critics" just started to pay attention again. After the initial punk heyday of roughly 1976 - 1980, there was a lull in music, at least for me. The 80s brought us "corporate rock" and even people who did "dangerous" things did not have the sp...

I'm pretty excited that one of my favorite LA bands, The Last, led by the under-rated genius of Joe Nolte, are gonna be playing in a month's time in LA - in a special 80s line-up, no less! Its a record release party for a couple of comps you really need to get if you want to hear a taste of what it was like in LA back at the turn of the 70s into the 80s. Dan Nolte, of the musical Nolte Brothers, some of whom who make up The Last, keeps you up to date on all these things on The Last website. I recommend clicking over right now and delving into a little yesteryear reflection... and its probably new to a lot of you out there.

Cheetah & Jimmy Zero , originally uploaded by Cool Auntie . From Cheetah Chrome's website -photographer unknown - the two guitar heroes of the Dead Boys, Cheetah Chrome and Jimmy Zero today. Before I show you recent photos I took of Cheetah with his family (Anna and their lovely infant son, Rogan), I want to ask him if its OK with him. I love these two guys and what they bring as a pair to the rock n roll. Cheetah plays a brutal rock and Jimmy's the pop master. Together, you had a unique thing in punk, and I'm so happy that we all get another chance to see the Dead Boys musicians performing as a band again. Of course, it's not the same without Stiv, but don't we know he's pulling some strings from somewhere? The Dead Boys play CBGB on August 26 and 27; Cheetah Chrome plays with his own band on the 28th. Go to CBGB's website for the entire benefit show lowdown. Its a lot of great music you will not want to miss.

Lance Loud of the Mumps, live at the now-defunct Starwood in West Hollywood on that Halloween night that they opened for Devo. Devo may have been all that... all art school and cool, ironic and groovy. But at the time, for my money (and film), my home boy, Lance Loud was the "art fag" who had it all. Lance had a bigger than life personality, on stage and off, he put on an amazing show without holding anything back. In fact, in his own words, he sweat "like a hog." An unwitting teenaged "reality tv" star in the days when "reality tv" consisted only of the ground-breaking cinema-verite of his family's life on PBS, "An American Family," Lance Loud emerged as a natural icon. We are from the same hometown, and Lance and his friend and Mumps bandmate Kristian Hoffman were heroes to me because they got out of town pretty much right after high school, moved to New York and became the darlings of the underground doing nothing more t...

I have no picture at this time to share with you, although I photographed her many times. Madame Wong has died. here's the story from an LA Times writer. The title is clickable to the full story. Esther Wong -- godmother of punk music Myrna Oliver, Los Angeles Times Wednesday, August 17, 2005 Los Angeles -- Esther Wong, the unlikely "godmother of punk" who showcased such groups as Oingo Boingo at her Madame Wong's clubs in L.A.'s Chinatown and Santa Monica in the late 1970s and 1980s, has died. She was 88. Ms. Wong died Sunday at her home in Los Angeles of natural causes. She had suffered from emphysema. Slow to accept punk rock, new wave and other 1970s music, the colorful and sometimes controversial Ms. Wong came to be one its most ardent patrons in Los Angeles. Her Madame Wong's restaurant in Chinatown, which she opened in 1970 with her late husband, George Wong, originally featured Polynesian bands. But when that music attracted smaller and smaller crow...

Lobotomy , originally uploaded by Cool Auntie . Pleasant, Randy Detroit, Kid Congo, Brad Dunning and I were the various Lobotomy "staff." Pleasant and Randy dreamed up Lobotomy and we all did stuff for it. I had the Famous Lobotomy Apartment, as I was the one amongst us who had her own place. That's where we threw quite a lot of parties as well as created several issues of the zine. I also took a lot of pictures for this zine. Pleasant and Randy decided what we were going to cover from live reviews, band interviews and records reviews. More often than not, Pleasant's bedroom was ground zero for Lobotomy planning meetings. We'd ALL OF US go on the interview. Pictured here is a copy of when the Mumps were featured on the cover of the VERY FIRST ISSUE, that was naturally full of stories about our friends like the Mumps and The Runaways . The Mumps were among our favorite people, for sure. As I grew up in California, Lance Loud and Kristian Hoffman were ...

whisky a go go , originally uploaded by Cool Auntie . If you went to the Whisky A Go Go anytime between 1976 and 1982, chances are you paid your money to me, or told me you were on the guest list. When I started there, I worked in the box office. If you happen to be Roger Taylor of Queen, you were the best-behaved, nicest really famous rock star I ever had the pleasure to comp! If you happen to be another drummer, one who lived in Los Feliz and played for a British guy... you weren't! But I digress...I think I spent the entire six years between 1976 and 1982 within those four walls (except for the times I was on the road with Stiv or other bands... which was encouraged by the bosses). I lived on Clark St., which is the same street as San Vicente - its just called Clark St. running north of Sunset. It crosses Sunset Blvd. and its on the corner of San Vicente/Clark St. that the Whisky is located. My apartment building is now infamous for being the place where Motley Cru...

Stiv Bators and the Disconnected Band , originally uploaded by Theresa K . George Cabaniss was the guitar player on "Disconnected," Stiv Bator's solo album. He's the second from the right in this photo. Prior to joining Stiv, George played in Akron's Hammer Damage. Hammer Damage played a gig in Akron recently, to the delight of punk rock fans in Northeastern Ohio. Let's wish George a happy one!

Stiv Bators & Cynthia Ross , originally uploaded by Theresa K . Stiv Bators and B Girl, Cynthia Ross here on the town in LA. Yeah, Stiv, little, scrawny... total ladies man. He always had beautiful women chasing him! Stiv & Sabel Starr And when he chased them (although he didn't have to), they fell for him. Nice guy. But you'd have to get to know him, of course, to find that out. On stage, he posed a menace, a troublemaker, faked his death, did anything to shock. Off stage, he was soft spoken and downright gentlemanly. I knew this because Stiv and I had a completely different kind of relationship. We were like siblings. We kept each other out of trouble and looked out for each other's best interests. I thought he was a pussy cat. A couple months ago, at my exhibit at Grimeys in Nashville, Catherine Irwin of Freakwater, who was there for the photos but more so to show support and enjoy The Reigning Sound for whom Freakwater's bass player, Dave ...

Rodney Bingenheimer & Friend , originally uploaded by Theresa K . Rodney Bingenheimer and his KROQ radio show Rodney on the ROQ used to be on during prime time on Sunday evenings. These days, KROQ management has relegated Rodney's show to a late/overnight time slot and that's just too bad. I never saw the movie "Mayor of the Sunset Strip" because I find it odd to watch a documentary about someone I know. This is what I know about Rodney: Sundays nights for years, Pleasant and I would not only listen to his show, but frequently visit him at the station(and he put us on the air sometimes as well)even though we lived in Hollywood and the station was in Pasadena. It was the thing to do on Sundays. Rodney supported local bands and was often the first DJ to play any punk single, and he exposed so many bands to the big LA audience. For that alone, we give him props. Rodney's passion for this music and his dedication to exposing local talent helped Lob...

September 2 rock show , originally uploaded by Theresa K . One of the most important and enduring contributions of punk rock to mainstream culture is graphical. LA's Slash magazine and its founders and core creative staff, Steve Samioff, Claude Kickboy Face Bessy, Philomena, and ace photog, Melanie Nissen made an indelible mark on the way we see things. That logo - part horror movie, part art school; that palette - urban and gritty; that design - bold. For a great place to see the best assortment of vintage, bonafide from back in the day collection of flyers, I'd suggest visiting two remarkable repositories: Flipside Fanzine's website and my fave punk lady of all time, Alice Bag's website because she has been one conscientious keeper of the flame - whether she knows it or not! This particular flyer is for a show coming up in NYC in the next couple of weeks. I'm helping to kick off a Labor Day Weekend where we are NOT dependent on Middle Eastern oil... ...

Me & Clem, 2004 , originally uploaded by Theresa K . This photo, taken by Creem magazine writer, Bill Moriarty is one of my favorites. As a photographer, I just hate being photographed! But in this case, Bill knew that Clem Burke and I have been friends for more than half our lives and he captured that friendship. Weird to say that its the punk rock that introduced us and kept our friendship going. Today's photos are a tribute to friendships that have endured all that punk and rock n roll throws their way - Wayne and Margaret Kramer For those who don't know, Margaret Saadi Kramer - Mrs. Wayne Kramer to you - is one of those people we call an angel. If not for her, Jimmy Zero of the Dead Boys might have been lost in the shuffle during those years where people forgot to acknowledge his important contribution to rock n roll. Jimmy Zero and me Margaret also runs the Muscletone Records label, a business she shares with Wayne. They've released records by ba...