Punk Turns 30

I have sad.... no... devastating news to report. Brendan Mullen , one of the pillars of the LA punk rock community, its greatest fan and documentarian passed away today. It was reported by Media Bistro today that he suffered a stroke that he did not survive. The news came to me from my Trusted MOG friend, Brittany Rest in Peace Brendan... say hello to our good friends.

Iggy Pop is enjoying a renaissance… and has been since the late 70s when David Bowie produced a couple albums for him in Berlin, which catapulted the inadvertent co-inventor of punk back into the stratospheric level of pop culture in which he belongs. This last quarter of 2009 brings forth not one but two books where Iggy is a subject matter. On November 1, Dave Thompson ’s Your Pretty Face Is Going to Hell, which examines the relationship between Bowie, Iggy and Lou Reed is published. But right now, Detroit-born and bred photographer, and CREEM Magazine revitalizer and its current publisher, Robert Matheu ’s book, The Stooges: The Authorized and Illustrated Story is on book shop shelves. Robert Matheu is a fellow photographer whom I met when he came West to LA from Detroit in the late 70s. We had then, and still do, have pretty much an identical circle of friends, and common musical interests. CREEM Magazine was something we had in common – both as readers/fans and contributing ...

Good news for fans and followers of two of my favorite people to have made punk rock music, who are now playing the music of their (and our American) roots - Tommy Ramone and Peter Case. There are tour dates and new records to report! Tommy Ramone , the first man to produce that band whose name he still proudly goes by, and Nerves/Plimsouls guitarist and singer/songwriter, Peter Case are just two veteran punk legends who have spent their "solo" careers playing in the genre some call Americana, some call alt.country, some call contemporary folk... just like some of other veteran punk legends with whom they've shared stages in the past - X / Knitters bassist and singer John Doe, and Blasters / Knitters guitarist and singer Dave Alvin . This fall and winter, fans of Ramone's bluegrass outfit, Uncle Monk, the duo with Claudia Tienan will get to enjoy them live and in person --- here it is, lifted straight from Chuck Monk's informative email -- the tour dat...