Punk Turns 30

I am not sure what she means by "scary stories," but Pleasant said she'd be telling some on Monday night when she will be one of the performers in the Ian Harvie Show in Los Angeles - just check the flyer here. The quintessential It Girl of LA Punk Rock in the 70s and 80s, these days, Pleasant has an alter ego - Princess Farhana. As the Princess, she is an acclaimed belly dance performer and instructor, traveling around the world so much that I can't keep up with her. Someone has kept up with Princess Farhana, however and the end result is the documentary, UNDERBELLY, which will have its Los Angeles premier on Wednesday November 5. That should be an easy date to remember.... its the day after Election Day.

Tonight as Thursday September 25, 2008 turns into Friday, my good friend Jack Oblivian will perform at the 5th Goner Fest in Memphis, TN. This marks Jack's second starring role on a Goner Fest night with the Tearjerkers.... although he's made appearances at Goner Fest with Knaughty Knights, as a member of the Limes, though this year Shawn Cripps has a whole new line-up for that project, as a guest vocalist with the Royal Pendletons and as a member of the garage rock supergroup, Brand New Love Affairs. Wonder if I'm leaving anything out? Jack plays dirty rock n roll the way its meant to be played. Don't miss him. But before the night gets rolling, you'll want to stop by the Goner Store itself... King Louie One Man Band will reprise a role he's played before... opening the festivities with an unpredictable and always fun set. Dare I say it - King Louie might just be the equivalent of Dee Dee Ramone for the post-punk set... you might think he's a c...

On September 23, 1977 at the Hollywood Palladium, there was a "Punk Rock Fashion Show" that featured musical performances by Blondie and The Avengers. Strangely, The Avengers played after Blondie, in the so-called headliner spot. Avengers drummer, Danny Furious gave the low-down on that in an interview he gave in 2004, which you can read HERE at this link. Danny Furious being interviewed at KROQ in 1978 Back in 1977, mainstream promoters were trying their best (and most of them failed) to bring punk rock into their offerings. A lot of them didn't get it, or they didn't get how to do it the right way... that punk rock fashion show was pretty stupid as I recall. Local girls wore their own clothes and an announcer described what their fashion statement was supposed to mean. Belinda Carlisle and friends... punk rock "it girls" and their fashion statements hanging backstage I think the promoters just didn't realize that the crowd was supporting their ...

Iggy, iconic singer for the Stooges - in the Rock n Roll Hall of Fame Billboard reports that Metallica, Run-D.M.C. and the Stooges lead the list of nine acts up for induction next year into the Rock and Roll Hall of Fame. Of the nine acts, five will be chosen in January for enshrinement during an April 4 ceremony at Cleveland's Public Hall. Also on this year's ballot are Jeff Beck, Chic, Wanda Jackson, Little Anthony and the Imperials, War and Bobby Womack. The 2009 ceremony marks the first that that this seemingly secret party will be open to the public, and if that ain't enough, it will be held in Cleveland, the home of the Rock and Roll Hall of Fame and Museum for the first time since 1997. I think most of you reading this probably couldn't care less, and probably are THRILLED that the Sex Pistols shunned the dubious honor... but are just as thrilled that some of our favorite fuck-ups - such as Dee Dee Ramone got to show up at the shindig and simply be themselve...

Dave Treganna, Dave Parsons, Jim Carroll and Stiv Bators, NYC, 1981 Before I write another word: a hundred thousand thanks to Sham 69 and Wanderers guitarist, Dave Parsons for not only keeping a copy of that photo above for the 27 years that have elapsed since we took it, but for sending me a very nice scan so I can share it with you. It was 1981, and Stiv Bators basically joined Sham 69 when Jimmy Pursey left and that band became The Wanderers. Their most excellent and only album, Only Lovers Left Alive is a paean to conspiracy theories and one Peter Beder, with whom Stiv was fascinated. Stiv Rehearses in LA with The Wanderers Stiv often showed up on my doorstep in LA with musicians in tow. And 1981 was no different. Disconnected photo session The previous year, he was in LA with the band who recorded Disconnected with him, and now it was The Wanderers. Business as usual for Stiv meant putting together an incredible live band, working out some crazy shit to stun audienc...

GOTH - you just can't kill it is the thesis of a comprehensive NYTimes piece on that subculture and fashion statement that has more lives than a cat operated by the Energizer Bunny. The tag line for the article reads: "Goth style endures, in high school and in high fashion, because alienation will always be chic." Bags bassist, Patricia Morrison, pictured above, was a fashion forward progenitor of the style within her own punk rock peer group. Simultaneously, Siouxsie Sioux was donning similar severe make-up, and Patricia's future beau, Damned frontman, Dave Vanian was vamping it up in Vampyre style. Were these harbingers of high fashion alienated? After the Dead Boys, Stiv Bators noticed that the so-called "New Romantic" genre was both fey in musical style as well as fashion sense, and he loved the idea of a man in frilly shirts and gypsy jewelry, so he adopted only the wardrobe, and stuck to his hard rocking roots when the Dead Boy turned Wander...

Tommy Ramone, 1977 Tommy Ramone, the producer genius and drummer for America's premier punk rock band, The Ramones has been doing this fabulous alt.bluegrass thing as Uncle Monk together with Claudia Tienan for a few years and I'm happy to report a few shows on the road away from their native New York. One is happening in my current home - Nashville, Music City, home of the business of country music and where starting this week, the Americana Music Conference is taking place. Uncle Monk 's first show in Nashville will be at Norm's River Road House on Tuesday, September 16 TONIGHT for the "Pre-AMA Road House Jam," with a fabulous line-up of great artists. Then on Saturday, September 20, they will play my favorite Nashville club, The Basement for the "Americanarama" bash. So, you probably want to know why this punk rock chick is talking Americana. Well, let me tell you - Punk Rock and what we now refer to as Americana grew up together and some of...

Johnny Ramone the guitar player of the seminal NYC punk rock group - The Beatles of punk rock - passed away on this date four years ago (2004). He was definitely one of a kind: his super furious and fast guitar technique, based on speedy down strokes and power bar chords set the bar for punk rock guitar playing and laid the foundation for speed metal and other thrash genres. Breaking the mold in a whole other way, Johnny was one of punk rock's few politically conservative people... an iconoclast until the end... too tough to die... his music lives on. Rest in Peace, John William Cummings.

Harlan T Bobo, King Louie and Jack Yarber - Loose Diamonds I took that photo in "Goner Alley" - the alley next door to the Goner Records store in Memphis in 2005, as Hurricane Rita was making her mark. It was the final day of Goner Fest 2... power was cutting in and out, lights going with it... Harlan T Bobo, just back from a European tour, was about to play a short set before joining The Limes who were closing the Goner Festivities. Limes - Jack Yarber, Harlan T Bobo, Shawn Cripps (Shawn is the only constant Lime, it being his project and all...) Without power to amplify, Harlan jumped up on the counter and played unplugged for all to see. He was joined for a song or two by Compulsive Gambler/Oblivian/Reigning Sound man, Greg Cartwright. Greg Cartwright - it seemed that every time he walked into the store, the lights would come back on As you know, Hurricane Rita came through a little less than a month after Katrina. Several New Orleans people I know evacuated to Memp...

You know that song, Lust for Life. Its got a long intro, very catchy - rhythmic, primitive guitars and drums inject in you a lust for life if you didn't already have one. And at some point in the 1990s, it seems that every advertising agency plucked the Iggy Pop - David Bowie composition to represent their product or service... a cruise line is the only one I can remember, but the song has been on TV and in movies even more... its in the early, pre-Material Girl era Madonna flick, Desperately Seeking Susan, and its in the spectacular Trainspotting which is a turning point in the song's visibility on the pop culture radar. On TV, aside from the cruise line commercial, Lust for Life provided cultural currency and narrative attributes to The Simpsons and for Drew Carey . Lust for Life, the album, was the second solo album Iggy released in 1977 (on September 9), just a few months after his "come-back" album, also recorded in Germany and produced by David Bowie, ...