Punk Turns 30

On this day in 2001, Bryan Gregory passed away from multiple systems failure.

The Cramps, Whisky A Go Go, 1978 The Cramps are one of the highlights of the Target Video body of work - their performance at the Napa State Hospital is infamous and fortunately, because of Target, the (moving) pictures can prove it. I've often said it (and the Target principals think I exaggerate BUT, I think its true): San Francisco's Target Video was the punk rock version of Andy Warhol's Factory. Their solo gallery exhibit opens in Los Angeles tomorrow, November 17. The text below is directly from the press release for the over-arching project Pacific Standard Time, a collaboration of art/culture centers celebrating Art in Los Angeles, 1945-1980 (or as I call it from Post War to the beginning of Post Punk): targetvideo77: Cal Punk & Performance As a participant in Pacific Standard Time, Annie Wharton Los Angeles is pleased to present “Cal Punk & Performance,” the first solo gallery exhibition in Los Angeles by targetvideo77. In 1977, artist Joe Rees started...

Original Cramps drummer and co-founder of Norton Records and The A Bones, rock n roll lady extraordinaire, Miriam Linna just launched a blog with her memories of the earliest days of the Cramps, when she was their drummer. Miriam played in the line-up that included the late Bryan Gregory on guitar alongside Lux and Ivy. Bryan Gregory in foreground What strikes a chord in me, however, are the scans of letters Miriam has saved over the years. A couple years ago, Miriam showed me letters she received from our mutual friend, the late Stiv Bators. Seeing Stiv's familiar, Catholic school boy penmanship and his particular signature just brought back a flood of memories, and seeing them again on Miriam's blog and being able to read and re-read his words help bring the Dead Boy back to life. For anyone who knows only the Urban Legend of Stiv Bators, Miriam's blog will open your eyes. For those who knew Stiv, Miriam's blog may bring a bittersweet tear alongside the warm...

The Dils, a Target Video perennial fave... The Target Video show on April 30 at Los Angeles' Silent Movie Theater (part of the on-going Don't Knock the Rock-curated shows at that venue) will be quite a departure from past shows. Unlike other Target shows, this one basically presents footage direct from the vaults. Uncut. Unmixed. Raw and original. The Cramps and Target Video = a can't miss combination! The folks at Target have begun calling the show "Raw Power" for its sheer voyeuristic quality. The pieces document explosive musical events from the late 70's and early 80's. The soundtracks are all original: from a simple camera microphone recording to studio mixes. Presented more music tv style than movie. The Germs, another band captured first and best by Target Video Target Video presents an authentic thrill ride through the West Coast's punk past. It's not pretty. It's raw and the way it was. Be there! Get your tickets here!!

OK - so its October, the month where Halloween/Day of the Dead is celebrated... all things undead, creepy, crawly, mysterious and magical come to mind... and today is October 12... the day in 1492 that Cristofero Colombo's ships made landfall in The Bahamas thinking they'd reached East Asia... and with them, they brought European diseases to the indigenous people of the Caribbean, and took home to Europe spices, fruits and vegetables. This date used to be a holiday. Now we just acknowledge what it is, banks and the government get the day off (though on whatever Monday falls closest to actual October 12), and there's a parade in NYC that's always controversial. HOWEVER... those whose consciousness is more in tune to the Halloween/Day of the Dead mysterioso side of life will acknowledge October 12 as the date in 1875 that weirdo, "magus," inspiration to Jimmy Page and possible sperm donor to the lady who gave birth to Barbara Bush (W's mom, making W the ...

Flipper headlines this amazing bill of San Francisco punk rock pioneers - July 26 at the Fillmore in San Francisco. Tickets go on sale on June 1 - don't miss out on what looks to be the greatest line up of the punk rock from the Western Front. Penelope Houston and the Avengers will perform as will Negative Trend and The Mutants, representing the best of classic 77 punk rock and pure San Francisco art punk. Backstage back in the day - Avengers and Mutants hang out This show isn't until July - but tickets will be scarce if you wait that long. June 1 - that's when tickets go on sale. Don't forget... and just a week later, if you are in Los Angeles, find your way to the Museum of Contemporary Art to witness what we enjoyed back in the 70s and 80s - Target Video. Target Video at MOCA, Los Angeles on Saturday June 7, 2008 7-11pm, the cost is $8 for the general public, free to MOCA members and those going to the museum. It's going to be a great show. Henry Rollin...

Years before the birth of MTV, artist Joe Rees, together with Jill Hoffman and Jackie Sharp formed the organization Target Video and began taping and editing what would become some of the first conceptually and aesthetically driven music videos. Now, the venerable Getty Museum in Los Angeles, California includes the works of Target Video in the exhibition called CALIFORNIA VIDEO, which runs from March 15 through June 8, 2008. Visit the Getty online for more details. Just when the show at the Getty is set to come down, the Museum of Contemporary Art (MOCA) will present a special outdoor screening of Target Video's legendary club show Underground Forces, featuring rare footage of West Coast punk and New Wave bands; their East Coast, Canadian, and European counterparts; and a healthy sampling of the artists, groupies, punk rockers, and weirdos that populated California's underground scene in the late 1970s and early 1980s. Saturday, June 7, 2008 The Geffen Contemp...

Pleasant, Lance Loud & me during the recording of "Muscle Boys" How fortuitous that Kristian Hoffman made possible an unveiling of newly printed vintage Mumps images... just in time for the 30th Anniversary of the gigs they did at the Whisky in 1977 opening for the Ramones - December 2 & 3, 1977. The Ramones had made a total of 4 visits to LA during 1977 and it seemed like so many New York based bands were spending the winter months touring on the West Coast. However... California gave them something unique that winter... torrential rains for days on end... never ending days on end... right near Christmas. My drive home immediately after class from UCLA was on the Pacific Coast Highway (my family home is west of Highway 1...) because it always seemed like a less-traffic-jammed option than the 405-to-101 option, especially on say the Friday that Christmas break started. However... torrential rains bring forth landslides, and driving through Malibu presented som...

Lux Interior of The Cramps, live at the Whisky A Go Go. Target Video's The Cramps Live At Napa Stage Hospital is one of the very best live music DVD products available anywhere.... I don't know if it will be part of this upcoming shindig..... but..... It is several months away - but save the date and mark your calendars! The Getty Museum in Los Angeles, CA is installing an exhibit called "California Video" which will feature the work of well-known video makers from California, including Target. Target's going to be showing it's classic footage at the show which opens March 15 and runs through June 8, 2008. Target's principals kinda laugh when I call it the Factory (as in Andy Warhol's) of San Francisco punk rock - but in my estimation, the Target team of Joe Rees, Jackie Sharp and Jill Hoffman were on the leading edge with their punk rock artist collective.

I am proud to announce the publication of this book because there are 3 Punk Turns 30 photos inside! The folks at Harry N. Abrams did a beautiful job of putting the hard work of all the photographers and of the author, Holly George Warren together in a compact, substantial piece of coffee-table quality art book. A must! Makes a great gift! Here's the blurb from Amazon.com (who I am sure would want you to buy it from them, so let me leave you with this link to its page on Amazon ) Book Description Thirty-plus years ago a dark rumble of noise gurgled up from the Lower East Side of New York City, made its way across the Atlantic to Great Britain, zigzagged back over the pond to the West Coast, and exploded. Its name — Punk. In Punk 365, the most provocative photography documenting the performances, the looks, and the attitude has been gathered together, revealing reverberations that continue to shake up the status quo. Here we see it all: Pre-punk pioneers, the Stooges, the New Y...

Every time I get ready to take Punk Turns 30 on the road, I go through this process of trying to figure out what images people want to see in person. This shot of the Cramps has been a favorite of both friends and strangers for almost 30 years, and those of you in cities where we will be showing for the first time (Oxford, MS, for instance) will get your chance to see this up close and personal. Its definitely one of my 'Greatest Hits.' Punk Turns 30's first tour date is October 25 in Oxford, MS at the One Night Stand at the Ole Miss Motel event, organized by the artist, Erin Abbott, who created this cool parking lot party/one-night art show and is taking that phenomenon on the road herself! This is a link to the story of the first One Night Stand. To take advantage of the motel setting, Punk Turns 30 will be showing a collection of photos taken in the World Famous Tropicana Motel, the favorite of all the indie and punk rock bands that came through Los Angeles while t...

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.