FRANK 20: Rock by Frank151

Bounty Hunter

An Interview with Bob Gruen Words Schui Schumacher All Photos Courtesy Bob Gruen SS: You’re a legendary photographer. Certain images you’ve taken have ended up being part of the Rock culture and have become icons. What is it like as a photographer to have an image become iconic? BG: When I take a photo I’m not expecting it to become an icon. Every time I take a photo I’m just hoping it comes out! Usually when I work there is some purpose to it, like a magazine story or an assignment from a record company. Then certain pictures I’ve been lucky enough to have shot have taken on an extra life. I’ve been lucky that some of my pictures have been able to sum up certain situations and certain people and certain groups. It takes years for a photo to become an icon. SS: Why do you think that is? BG: Well, because it takes time for people to see something in different situations over and over again when you’re talking about the same group or the same person. The picture of John Lennon I took in 1974, it was only published a few times in the next couple years. At that time John was a house husband, he was out of the lime light so he wasn’t really promoting himself. Most of the stories written about him were about his seclusion. But then in the ‘80s he’d been in New York for a while and had by that time become associated with New York. And then people started associating

that image of him with New York more and more. There’s also the picture of Led Zeppelin with their airplane that became really well known. That became an iconic image of them and also of the excesses of the ‘70s Rock bands in general. I started meeting people who would tell me they had these pictures in their lockers during high school. That feels very good. I feel very lucky to have that kind of success, to have been able to make something that so many people appreciate. SS: What kind of attitude or disposition do you take when you go into a photo shoot with these Rock stars who are either ultra famous or on their way to becoming famous? BG: I don’t have different personas for people. I am who I am. I try to get to the people as they are. Most people are pretty easy to get along with. You know, I try not to be in the way, I try to be helpful, I try to do something that is helpful. I was always in it for the long run. I wasn’t into exposing people, catching them with the wrong woman or some drugs or something. I prefer to show people as they want to be shown and not expose them in some scandalous way. People will ask you to come back if you don’t embarrass them. SS: Do you think there are any

photographers out there today who are chronicling the Hip Hop movement much the way you were capturing the Rock movement? BG: I’m sure there must be. You know, when I was taking my pictures I was making no money. When I first saw The Clash they were playing their second show, didn’t have a record deal, didn’t have any money. John Lennon, when I met him, he was an out-of-work Beatle. I took that picture of him in ‘74, it wasn’t till ‘84 that people started to notice it and it wasn’t until ‘94 that you could even call it an icon. It’s going to take twenty or thirty years for people to see those images from the Hip Hop era and then you’ll find out who the people are from Hip Hop that really stand out over time. SS: Was there any one particular

shoot, or a couple shoots, that stand out as great experiences? Not necessarily an icon image, but a shoot that you just enjoyed. BG: Going to the Statue of Liberty with John Lennon was a hell of a lot of fun. It was really a kind of nice afternoon. Driving around with The Clash trying to find steamy streets that looked like Taxi Driver was a great time. And tramping around Kyoto with KISS was a great, fun day. KISS rarely puts on their makeup in the daytime. Photographing KISS was different from all the other bands I worked with because all the other bands you could take pictures of them during the day anytime and after the show take pictures of them at the party. With KISS, they were only KISS for ten minutes before the show after their makeup was on. When

they came off stage the makeup was already running and there were no more photos I could take. So for them getting into makeup in the daytime was a big thing. Walking around the streets of Japan during the day with KISS was quite an experience. People were following us all over the place. That was a lot of fun. SS: Is there anything about Rock in general you would like to impart to young people today? BG: As long as you believe in the music, you’re free. Music is like photography – they are both an international language. In a photo I always try to capture the feeling of an event, the emotion, and that comes through in any language.

Bob Gruen’s Top Ten I couldn’t narrow the list down any smaller than 14, and that leaves a lot of favorites out, this is pretty much in the order I heard them, 1. Holy Modal Rounders - First Album 2. The Fugs - First Album 3. Miles Davis - Kind of Blue 4. John Coltrane - A Love Supreme 5. Rahsaan Roland Kirk Volunteered Slavery 6. Beach Boys - Smiley Smile 7. Bob Dylan - Blonde on Blonde 8. The Rolling Stones - 12 X 5 9. Otis Redding / Jimi Hendrix Live at Monterey 10. John Lennon - Plastic Ono Band 11. Ike & Tina Turner – “Ooh Poo Pah Do” 12. Reggae Artists - Rockers (movie soundtrack) 13. The Clash - Sandinista! 14. Paul Simon - Graceland

Words Melanie Scherenzel Photo Corky Gunn, circa 1984 - 1988 Corky Gunn has seen it all. Lead vocalist for independent glam band Sweet Pain turned road manager for LA Guns, Gunn has played and partied with all the ‘80s big boys, from Def Leppard to AC/DC. Now 44 years of age, Gunn lives in Long Island with his 10-year-old son. A far cry from nights binging with Motley Crüe, Gunn gives us the run down of life in the world of the ‘80s glam bands, as told to Melanie Scherenzel. Back in those days there were the heavy/thrash metal guys that were supposedly tough, and they would call all the glam hair band guys “posers.” So if you dressed up in women’s clothes and had the wild hair and makeup you were always called a “poser,” and if you wore just jeans and a T-shirt and had long stringy unkept hair they thought you were the “real deal.” They thought glam guys cared more about how they looked than playing.

the first androgynous rock band that dressed in women’s clothes. It could go as far back as David Bowie, but he was more of an alien. Some groups like Motley Crüe were more like KISS, in the beginning, in the sense that they wore stage costumes, a lot of makeup and a lot of hair, and eventually got into wearing women’s clothes. In the ‘80s it just got real crazy, Poison kind of took it that way.

Hair Metal We used to go to women’s clothing But if you really boiled it down, Bar andthe Grill stores and go shopping. We were in glam band guys were way crazier there trying to find women’s size 11 In The Club than the thrash guys – they would shoes to wear. For our hair we always kick your ass in a minute. All those used Aqua Net hair spray. That was All Access supposed tough thrash guys were THE hair spray for all the hair bands essentially wimps. If they ever got because it worked like glue. You Synesthesia into a scrap with any of the hair would turn your head upside down so Skate band guys, the hair band guys would your hair hung and spray until it was always kick their ass. We Chunky wouldn’t glue. Then matte it down and shape it bother the thrash metal guys, but a bit. Till this day if I smell Aqua Net, it Kind of Cover Band they always had something Some negative brings back memories. Back then, the to say. I guess because they were bigger the hair the better. You would The Wild Angels insecure or thought we got more end up looking like a chick most of girls, but that’s when it wouldRiders start. the time, but the girls really dug it. Zakir

The whole concept of dressing up and the makeup came from the Loveband Song The New York Dolls. They were Posters

I think maybe we thought we had to be tougher because we were dressed in women’s clothes, but

we were never really fighting over anything of real substance. I don’t know what it was about that scene but we would get drunk and high and messed up and want to fight with anyone. I mean I was forever just diving into the audience and pouncing on somebody. We didn’t want anyone fucking with us. If there was someone in the crowd giving us a hard time and we wanted to shut him up, and you add drugs to the mix – you think you are Superman. We were forever brawling; we just didn’t take any shit. We used to do a lot of partying with Motley Crüe back then. I can honestly say there is probably nobody who partied harder than Motley Crüe. Any story you have heard about them is

probably not crazy enough. Those guys were really out of their minds. They would fight at the drop of a hat. We would come up to their hotel rooms when they were in New York. Nikki would be by himself with the lights low in the room, so we used to go to Tommy Lee and he would have all the girls and booze. He would have chicks partying in the room right next to a photo of Heather Locklear. The wildest girls would be in places you don’t think of, Kansas City, North Dakota – they weren’t exposed to as much as the girls from the cities. After a while it wasn’t about sex anymore for the guys because they had so much of it. It was about who was doing the wildest stuff. I remember the guys would get the girls to do stuff like have the phone receiver up inside them as

they would call their mothers. Cocaine was the drug of choice. That was the ‘80s drug. When you do cocaine it allows you to drink more. You could drink a bottle of vodka and still walk around because the drugs were keeping you going, keeping you wired. I remember one night Rat played at Pier 84 in New York with Twisted Sister. The drummer from Rat came off the stage, after the show, and he literally walked off stage down the steps, and right under the stage he started snorting it. It was just constant. You just couldn’t get enough. It was just day after day after day. Cocaine was just so mentally addictive. The spot back then to party at was the Hustler Mansion. Larry Flint’s wife

Althea would be at The Rainbow and all these Rock clubs and would invite everyone up to the Hustler Mansion. Once you got there, you wouldn’t leave for three days. Althea was nuts, but that was Hollywood at that time. The whole scene started to fade once grunge came around. When groups like Nirvana and Pearl Jam came around dressing normal and singing songs with a lot of anger and depression they hit big and the kids really took to that. But it was about that time to end anyway. Once you have seen all that, you can’t get much lower. You just feel death creeping under the door. You think that is what you want and what you want to be around, but you can’t get much lower.

Words/Photo David Tai Bornoff There’s a million tales about the now infamous Rainbow Bar and Grill on the Sunset strip here in sunny fuckin’ Los Angeles. Marilyn Monroe met Joe DiMaggio on a blind date, Vincente Minneli proposed to Judy Garland, etc, etc, etc...

Who gives a fuck? After the Hollywood glory days died, the Rainbow took on a new face, a Rock & Roll anti-establishment where heads like Alice Cooper could come eat some soup and snort a rail off a 16-year-old’s face, all while Roman

Polanski who (as time has told) was probably on the other side getting bobo from a thirteen-year-old under the table whilst pouring a glass of Moet and cheers-ing Jack Nicholson, who in turn was fucked up on ludes and dope, eyes half closed, head cocked back laughing hysterically and falling to the floor etc, etc, etc...

single soft song in it, and you can light a cigarette and some fucking yuppie couple from Brentwood ain’t gonna feign a cough or shoot you a sneer cause they’ll get fucked up and be dragged out half dead, bloody and screaming, talking about second hand smoke is the leading cause of cancer. Fuck You.

The Rainbow’s history is filled with these kinds of tales. Tales we hear about years after the fact, tales that resonate through the years, tales that compel us to seek out our scum stories in gutter dives where a shot and a beer still only costs a couple bucks and the juke box ain’t got a

These are the tales, some small, some epic, which shape our collective subconscious and form the picture of what we in our most tender (drunk) moments look upon and call, Rock & Fuckin’ Roll.

Words Steven Blush Downtown Rock clubs exist as separate and unique cultures. They are social magnets – hubs for hipsters and wannabes. The clubs provide places to make connections and live out one’s Rock Star dreams. These trashy clubs unite a variety of character types, all attracted to the energy and creativity. Serious music heads, hangers-on, schmoozers, networkers and tourists mingle within the dark environs. Night after night, an endless succession of bands (good and bad) mounts the clubs’ fabled stages. The bands, modeling themselves on previous generations who once played on the same stages, perform before audiences ranging in size from full houses to no one at all, and if they’re lucky, receive some sort of positive feedback; more Metal likely they receive hollow Hair accolades and insincere encouragement from Bar and Grill self-anointed experts and drunks. Then they go out and do it overInagain the The Club next night at another club. But despite All Access the endless effort, fame and fortune remain elusive. The odds ofSynesthesia any of the bands ever “making it” are staggering.

Since 1973 Hilly Krystal has owned the legendary Bowery club CBGB. He cites The Ramones, Talking Heads and Blondie as the biggest names to come out of his club. Trigger, who opened The Continental in 1991, proudly points to his role in launching early ‘90s jam bands like Spin Doctors, Blues Traveler and Joan Osborne, as well as local punk sensations D Generation. Club veteran Don Hill, who opened his venue in 1994, hosted the first gigs by The Strokes, Interpol and Stellastarr, and provided a home base to queer metal cult band the Toilet Boys.

These club icons have witnessed the Skate action firsthand, and put out albums Some of the clubs, launching pads from to document the action: Hilly selfChunky which aspiring bands either rise or fall, released Live At CBGB to capture the survive constantly changingSome stylesKind andof Cover Band venue’s punk rock heyday; Trigger’s fashions. Owned and operated by local new Best Of NYC (Live at Continental, The Wild Angels legends like Hilly Krystal (CBGB), Trigger w w w. c o n t i n e n t a l n y c . c o m ) offers (Continental), Don Hill (Don Hill’s), Jesse raw cuts by Downtown legends like Riders Malin (Niagara) and “Handsome” Dick Joey Ramone, Murphy’s Law and Zakir Manitoba (Manitoba’s), the venues have Lunachicks; and Don Hill’s’s trashy weathered it all, from punk to electro, Röck Cändy parties are chronicled on Love Song from police harassment to media praise, New York City Rock & Roll (Radical and their resourceful proprietors Postershave Records), with performances by the seen it all. We asked them to comment next generation of local upstarts, Flyers on that thin line between love and hate, including Sex Slaves, Slunt, and success and failure. Five Speed. The Art of Life asJoker a Roadie Apple Bong 101

For every Ramones-style success story there are thousands of flops. Hilly estimates CBGB has booked 75 bands a week for the past ten years, Trigger and Don Hill offer similar figures. To get an idea of how many people participate in the game, multiply the number of bands by the number of band members, and multiply that by the number of venues. That’s a lot, and very, very few of them achieve success, despite talent, timing and tenaciousness. To the outside observer, the Downtown Rock clubs are fun and entertaining, but to insiders they’re haunted, blood-soaked battlegrounds of broken dreams.

Despite the Downtown Rock scene seeming to function as a school of Rock, few bands make it out of here. Quality ain’t always the issue. There’s no explanation why so many solid bands never make it while some shitty ones become household names. Hilly recites a long list of remarkable also-ran bands you’ve never heard of, including Crossfire Choir, Orchestra Luna and The Shirts. Don Hill rattles off a litany of near-miss stories like Psychotica and Circus Of Power. Trigger cites Honky Toast and Sea Monster as examples of local outfits that did everything right, yet still wound up on the wrong side of viability. “The odds are astronomical,” Trigger offers. “Just getting signed to a label is nearly impossible. Then you’ve gotta deal with the industry obstacles.” Quips Don Hill, “Many are called but few are charted. Playing these venues is like going to school, a university of misfits.” Hilly Krystal offers his twocents’ worth: “A lot of the problems

have to do with lawyers and would-be managers. It’s a tough, tough business. But then again, how many actors or fine artists make it?” In 1999, Dick Manitoba opened his own bar on Avenue B, a Cheerstype set-up with the ephemera of his personal Rock history emblazoned on the walls. Dick recorded for four major labels throughout his career with cult punk bands The Dictators and Manitoba’s Wild Kingdom, so he knows the deal: “It rarely takes off. Bands get signed, act like big shots, and six months later they’re back bartending. I’ve been through it, it’s a humbling experience.” Around the corner from Manitoba’s sits Niagara, Jesse Malin’s bar since 1998. Malin, referred to by friends as “Mayor of The Lower East Side,” ran the clubs Green Door and Coney Island High, and sang for Downtown bands D Generation, Heart Attack and Hope, yet only recently achieved a modicum of industry success as a solo artist with two albums on the Artemis label. Niagara is recognizable for its tribute to The Clash’s Joe Strummer painted on the outside wall, which explains all you need to know about the vibe inside. “It’s easy to get caught up in all the attention you receive in the local bars and clubs,” Malin says. “But you don’t wanna end up as a legend-inyour-own-mind. That happens too often here. I know too many people like that. It’s tragic, kinda pathetic.” Rock is a young band’s game. The average band’s lifespan is two or

three years, and they’ve gotta strike while the iron’s hot; gotta know when to hold’em, and know when to fold’em. Trigger concurs: “The name of this business is new bands. If you look at booking calendars from three or four years ago, eighty percent of those bands have broken up. So that gives you an idea of how difficult this path can be.” Along with the throngs of local bands come the aspiring out-of-town bands that travel to New York for their big industry showcase. They’re often in for a sobering reality. Sometimes these failures can be tragic. Five years ago a hot Southern band called Four Squirrels played their CBGB showcase to a lukewarm reception, and were killed on the way home when their van crashed on I-95. No one will ever know if a despondent, self-critical conversation distracted the driver’s focus. “I’ve seen ’em come from as far as Japan and play to three people,” Don Hill says. “There are thousands of bands from all over playing to huge crowds and making a living, but no one cares about ’em. This is the entertainment capital of the world, and it lives by its own rules. You gotta earn it here, it’s not a given.” So what exactly does this all mean? It means stay in school, don’t give up the day job. Focus on all those socalled career goals. Rock stardom is elusive; no standards apply here. It ain’t like baseball, where you bat .300 and go to the Hall Of Fame. It’s a damn crap shoot, where many are called but few are chosen.

Uncle Mikeâ&#x20AC;&#x2122;s Backstage Pass Collection

TO THE OAKLAND FADERS FROM OAKLAND, CA for winning Scion's 2004 FREE UP YOUR MIX NATIONAL DJ SEARCH!

Props to the contest's regional winners:

Oakland Faders (Oakland, CA) DJ Scene (Seattle, CA) DJ Spider and Steve1der (Los Angeles, CA) Fredyblast (Philadelphia, PA) DJ Mel (Austin, TX) DJ Tommee (Boston, MA)

Rob Wonder (Atlanta, GA) DJ Idiom (Denver, C0) Why B and Kid Cut Up (Milwaukee, WI) J. Period (Brooklyn, NY) Johnny Quest (Lawrence, KS) Ruckus Roboticus (Dayton, OH)

PEEP: www.scion.com/ mix for more info on the contest, itâ&#x20AC;&#x2122;s judges, sponsors, winners and honorable mentions, as well as information on upcomming Scion events.

Words Carlo McCormick Album Covers Courtesy Dave Read & Don Grossinger

That concomitance of sensations

have our favorites, that record cover

where we hear a color or taste a

where you can literally hear every

sound is the convergent topography

note, perhaps even the crackle of that

where art and music collide. For all

delicious patina of surface noise, the

its long and gloried history, from the

anticipation of the skip, the smell and

theatrical and operatic to the Beat

taste of those many joints you rolled

poets and abstract painters of the

upon its now tattered sleeve. These

Jazz

cross-associative

affectations of our emotions are the

merging of the senses has attained

mimetic devices of our memory of

its greatest potency and meaning in

youth, the bands that forged our

the hybrid medium of Rock art. We all

lives and (for better and worse) had

Age,

this

much more to do with determining

consciousness. Arguing over what

our identity than most anything else

sucks and what rocks is about as

in our official education. It is not for

hopeless a discourse as religion,

us to tell you what moment in the

politics and sports combined. Let us

musical

rather consider this past half century

than any other, nor even for us to

of cultural collaboration for those

presume arguing the legacy of any

artists and moments who so captured

Rock genre or group based upon

and defined the ineffable spirit of a

the aesthetic significance of the

particular musical experience on a

creative packaging that has seared

level that is so iconic and emblematic

itself into the retina of our auricular

that it is, well, anthemic.

landscape

matters

With due honor to Alex Steinweiss

Flora who (at Columbia in the 40s and

who, when CBS Radio bought a

RCA Victor in the 50s) brought some

defunct

record

printing

plant

of the most eccentric, visionary and

Connecticut

back

outrageous work to a medium riddled

the late 30s and named it Columbia

with mediocrity- there is little in the

Records, was not only the first to

history before Rock art you should

conceive of making art on an album

know. If you want to impress your

cover that would emotively reflect

music aficionado and art-fag friends,

the music inside, but also created

just keep in mind the following- the

that cardboard marvel of packaging

great socialist artist Ben Shahn turned

origami that became the standard

his hand to this most democratic

record sleeve with the advent of the

medium, he influenced the brilliant

33 rpm LP, and his later disciple Jim

and prolific David Stone Martin, who

Bridgeport,

in turn taught Andy Warhol everything

artist more famous than Warhol to

he needed to rip off to get into the

do a cover would be Salvador Dali

game. You can see that legacy if you

whoâ&#x20AC;&#x2122;s inimical Surrealism graced the

get a hold of the early Warhol efforts

dubious 1955 Jackie Gleason Capitol

for jazzbos like Kenny Burrell, but if it

LP Lonesome Echo. Oh yeah, Picasso

comes down to a serious discussion

himself authored the logo for a minor

you best remember Andyâ&#x20AC;&#x2122;s landmark

label aptly named Pablo Records.

investigations

dimensionality

record covers- specifically the peel

The reason why excellence is the

away banana cover for the Velvet

rare exception rather than the rule

Underground,

and the zip down

when it comes to the interface of

pants Sticky Fingers cover for the

music and visuals is because, well,

Rolling Stones. Perhaps the only

the music industry is not the brightest

lot. When the big record companies

Martin Sharp in England and Gary

are involved, feeble minds breed

Grimshaw in Detroit.

mediocrity. The work that matters is largely independent, be it those

Rick Griffin would certainly become a

moments when a band attained a

master of record cover art, defining

degree of fame and monetary value

the look of the Grateful

that allowed them to direct their own

and

visuals, the emergence of visionary

Steppenwolf

indie labels, or those ruptures in

Mouse and Kelly would create their

youth culture that created their own

own studio in the 70s and spread the

looks. As early Rock & Roll had little

glory of airbrush art to the Midwest

of these self-determining factors, we

rock scene of bands so famous

can pretty much skip over the seminal

but embarrassing to our tastes that

greats who invented the genre. It only

they shall remain nameless here.

really starts to get interesting in the

Moving through that imperceptible

mid to late 60s, with the emergence

slippage from the late 60s to the early

culture.

70s, some of the best design work

Here, modes of cultural production

produced came out of Hipgnosis

merged, and music was a central part

Studio in London, where you can

of a greater cosmic symbiosis. Pay

find your pantheon of prog rock and

heed here to Abdul Mati Klarwien, a

relive your fondest memories of Led

painter whose work was used most

Zeppelin and Pink Floyd. Two artists

famously for Santana’s Abraxis, and

who surely distinguished themselves in

Miles Davis’ Bitches Brew. Other

this time would be Roger Dean, for his

aspects of the underground that

long standing epic gatefold work with

coalesced at that time included the

Yes, and Neon Park, for his extensive

all-immersing light shows, from Bill

collaboration with the band Little

Hamm in San Francisco to Joshua

Feat. But nostalgias aside, we are

Lightshow in New York to USCO

dealing with a time of fading effects

the world over, the underground

as Rock music became ever more

comics

probably

corporate, complacent and canned.

best represented here with Robert

Then, thank god (or the devil), along

Crumb’s seminal Big Brother &

came Punk Rock.

the

psychedelic

scene

Holding

Cheap

Thrills,

youth

that

Company and

the

producing

Dead,

masterworks and

Bob

for

Dylan.

album, poster

Hand

made

and

yourself,

artists, including the Big Five of the

raw and in your face, the art that

Filmore- Rick Griffin, Alton Kelley,

accompanied Punk was the visual

Victor Moscoso, Stanley Mouse and

embodiment of such sonic vitriol.

Wes Wilson - and other notables like

Cartoonist

John

Holmstrom

co-

founded Punk Magazine where a

empire, who remains one of the truly

drawing of Iggy Pop was as sure and

supreme under-recognized artists. As

pure as any photo, and Holmstromâ&#x20AC;&#x2122;s

England took to this sound and fury

juvenile drawing style would come to

with an intensity that would change

grace some of The Ramones most

the course of musical history, surely

popular records. But if you must credit

due credit are the fashion designer

The Ramones as the germinal seed

Vivian Westwood and the father of

for the deviance that followed, it is

that ransom-note style, Jaime Reed,

Arturo Vega, the father of their logo,

who will forever be remembered for

designer of their earliest recordings

his great Sex Pistols album cover

and maestro of their merchandizing

art. Peter Saville, a conceptual design

artist who worked as a poster artist for

named Foetus.

the Manchester club, The Hacienda,

The West Coast too would spawn

and an upstart label called Factory

equally noisome and subversive art-

Records, would provide a brooding,

damaged music, and our favorites

austere minimalism to the recordings

there would have to include the collage

of Joy Division, New Order and

artist Winston Smith, who designed

others.

Other

the logo for Alternative Tentacles and

artists

across

notable

include

art for its most prominent band The

Andrew Johnson, who did the art for

Dead Kennedys, Gary Panter, who

his brothers band, The The, and Jim

was the resident artist for the seminal

Thirwell, who made the art for his own

zine Slash (which later morphed into

collection of mock groups variously

the most successful record company

the

post-punk

pond

of the era), and Raymond Pettibone, whose brutal noire drawings became the cover art for his brother Greg Ginnâ&#x20AC;&#x2122;s band Black Flag. The only other music as fierce and formidable in its expression of youthful disaffection was Heavy Metal. Boring executives overly predetermined much of this genre, but among the many artists who shined in this milieu we must draw particular attention to the work of Pusshead (for Metallica) and Joe Petagno (for MotĂśrhead). If this is all too white for you, take a trip from the Blue Note photographers, through the primal abstractions of ESG records (in particular the work for Sun Ra and the Ayler brothers), and glory in the funk of Pedro Bell, the visual spokesman for Parliament Funkadelic. While many exceptional designers and photographers came to be employed in the seminal old school work of early Hip Hop- such as Haze, Futura 2000, Dr. Revolt, Zephyr and Glen E. Freidman- we already begin to hit the era of diminishing returns. By the mid 80s, the look of music was too often delegated to the pseudoHollywood industry of music videos (and yes, some tremendous talents made their mark in this media as well) and the once glorious canvas of the LP record was reduced to the plastic and savagely belittled delivery system of the CD jewel box. Great work between art and music still continues, but as we fall into the visual void of digital downloads and MP3 players we must face the sad truth that we may never see music in the same way again.

Words Oliver Sutton Photo Lila Lee & Josh Wildman

I remember a time in the late ‘80s riding the Staten Island ferry to Manhattan, going to the Brooklyn banks, skating the parking garage in the World Trade Center, and heading to that skate shop on Avenue A – what was that place called? Skate NYC, I believe. Never was one for SoHo Skates, they were a little too expensive. Being from Staten Island, I basically got my stuff from either Seriously Cycles on Henderson or Benji’s in lower Manhattan. After a day of skating, and if the day was well thought out, we would either take a shower at someone’s apartment

who lived in the city, go back to S.I. to take a shower or just go out stinking. Where were the places we would go? That’s simple, everywhere. This was a time in New York when everything was available to those who knew where to go. For example, on Tuesdays you could go see the Butthole Surfers perform at this dive near Avenue B called The World on Houston, then on Thursday go to the same spot and see Public Enemy do their thing. You could go to the Ritz (when it was in MidTown) and get wild at the Super Bowl of Hardcore, and after that you could skate, run, cab it or take the subway

down to S.O.B’s to check out a Tribe Called Quest or see De La Soul. You could hit this mini ramp in Brooklyn called Ben’s, then go to a KRS-One show at M.K’s. Also performing live were the Beastie Boys, Leaders of the New School and Cypress Hill – who everyone thought was from Cypress Hill, Brooklyn. It was kind of a shock to find out they were from the West Coast. And, of course, Third Base – I had many a late night skate session with my walkman blasting “Steppin’ to the AM.” This was a strange, yet wonderful time to be skating in New York. People were actually skating, not all this bullshit profiling and name dropping that I see a lot of today. The same thing for the music: people gave shows, and you always got your money’s worth. Not to mention, it was definitely a lot cheaper. If I’m going to pay you $30 these days at least give me two hours. But that’s a pipe dream. I feel those days won’t come back for another five years or so. Music has always been a part of skating, but for the most part the Hardcore/Punk Rock sound of the West was dominant in skate culture. Groups like Suicidal Tendencies, Dead Kennedys, J.F.A. and Agent Orange were some of the bigger names you would hear on skate videos. Of course there were more, but I don’t have time to mention everyone. Hip Hop wasn’t prevalent until Gangstarr made skate videos with New York skaters doing their thing. I honestly give it up to the 411 videos for making Hip Hop more main stream in skate culture. Mind you, it was always around; however, stepping in to 2005

you would think that it had always been the main voice of skating. For me, if it wasn’t Bad Brains, Fishbone, Underdog, or 24-7 Spyz thrown on a custom mix tape, I didn’t consider it all that. Honestly speaking, skaters that were listening to Hip Hop in the late ‘80s kind of hid from the Hip Hop community that they were skating. It wasn’t really a common occurrence to see some thugged-out cat doing kick flips. Yet, these days I feel inadequate if I’m not skating with a gold chain. Now this is not entirely true – like I said you had a lot of people (myself included) who listened to Native Tongues or Hieroglyphics and were quite open with the fact that they skated because we honestly did not give a fuck what other people thought. I asked skater Keith Hufnagel his thoughts on this and he told me he was “too busy skating to really care”; I laughed because this is true. For the most part, a lot of the guys who are pro today were definitely the ones too busy to care about the social politics. I look at some old videos these days and I still hear a lot of what would be called “Skate Rock,” but I think this is more the business side of it (selecting the music) as opposed to the individual riders’ musical preferences. Think Transworld’s greatest hits number three for example. When riders choose their own songs for their footage segment, the Hip Hop spirit is heard. For the last eight years, Hip Hop has bolstered its presence in skate culture. I wonder if we will prefer the whole screw-faced, thugged-out image becoming dominant in the skate world or just be open and accepting to

whatever comes our way. Skating and Hip Hop are two subcultures from the past that you can now see and hear in your children’s cereal commercials. I personally don’t think it’s a bad thing. Tony Hawk doing Doritos commercials and the Black Eyed Peas doing “Let’s Get It Started” is fine by me. Fuck around and I’ll be able to come home from work in time to watch Monday Night Mini Ramp. Hip Hop has changed skating, but I wonder, has skating changed Hip Hop? I don’t think so, a tad, if any. Hip Hop is so viable money wise. A lot of people who actually hate the music and the people make a lot of money off of it. That is the one thing I’m proud of about skateboarding: even though the corporate element has appeared it does not have such a choke on the people within in it, as in Hip Hop. I think this has to do with what makes a good skater versus what makes a good MC. Good skaters, whether you like them or not, have undeniable styles that make them outstanding individuals. This comes from hard work and dedication, lots of pain, and in some cases, loss. Footage is proof of a good skater. Some people consider contest skating a good way of telling as well. This is an important aspect of skating, but I don’t think it’s an absolute. Skating has more freedom than that. However, in the music world, with the right studio, well placed ads in rap magazines, and a fancy video, you can make a lot out of nothing. Keep in mind there are some fantastic MCs a lot of the masses will never hear because they don’t do the corporate okey doke. Therefore, they are only heard by the few and far between.

Even battles aren’t like they used to be. What you have now is a bunch of MCs insulting each other from their respective studios. It’s not like you can go to the park and see one crew represent against another. This was the standard back in the day and I still think it’s a great way of gauging someone’s skills (although not entirely, it still helps). I mean, think about it: what if Biggie and Tupac actually got on stage at the same time and flexed their rhymes to settle the beef? It would be a completely different rap world, don’t you think? I don’t think either one of them would be dead and it may have shown the community that you can settle your issues without violence. Well there I go pipe dreaming again. I guess the closest skate equivalent would be contests and Rodney versus Daewon videos. Time will tell the evolution of skate. As soon as someone figures out how to make even more money exploiting skaters – I mean to the extent of

how the video game industry exploits testers or just plain old out-sourcing – skating will take a dramatic change. Until then, skating is fine. We have already seen what happens to Hip Hop in the corporate scheme of things. It’s funny that corporate culture can’t really seem to get its hands on the whole Punk Rock world. I mean there are some exceptions, like Green Day, who have more of a mass appeal feel which is quite marketable. However, for the most part, the world of Hardcore/Punk Rock tends to flow in and out of popular culture, which is to its advantage. Not everyone is going to be the Sex Pistols or

Circle Jerks. Where as in Hip Hop you have groups like Wu-Tang where almost every member has their own solo project, or like Leaders of the New School and Tribe Called Quest in which the groups separate but still make individual music. Skaters were the double agents in the NYC – now the world. They are one of the few groups of people who can skate a spot by the projects where everyone was blasting Mr. Magic or a Red Alert show from the night before, then take off and be seen doing slappies in front of CBGB’s. In the end only the skating matters, nothing else.

If this vans a rockin’, then don’t bother knockin’ Photo Ken “Superbeast” Schwarz & Bigknock.com

die

Words Chris Shonting With the factual guidance of Angela Boatwright666 There once was a Metallica that absolutely ripped up arenas and swore they would never do a music video no matter who paid them what. They owned every crowd they played in front of, and their landmark albums were an absolute detriment to any Brady Bunch ideals that parents had hoped to instill in their children. Their name was scrawled on countless classroom desks and notebooks. Their albums Kill ‘em All, Ride the Lightning and Master of Puppets were the standard issue soundtracks to smoke-filled, vodka-drenched basement gatherings all over the world. Quite simply, they were the shit. Then of course came the seasons of wither. But you already knew that. Let’s get back to their humble beginnings. There are coinsures of shred who might contend that in those early days when the band was on the come up they were traveling along a murky grey area between riff robbery and eager fanaticism. Upon review, there’s some validity to this contention. Whose riffs were they heisting? What bands were they obsessed with? Well, these are bands that Average Joe Music Fan usually has never heard. They are bands like Diamond Head, Holocaust, Satan, Angel Witch, Saxon, Raven, Tygers of

Pan Tang, and Bleak House. This list could go on forever, but this isn’t meant to sound like an article in a medical journal, so I’ve listed the key ones only. These and a slew of other bands fall into a genre that at the time was labeled the New Wave Of British Heavy Metal (NWOBHM). In my experience it’s an often overlooked vein of music; however, it had an unmistakably massive influence on Metallica’s growth as a band. These names may seem obscure to you but to the four dudes that would form

Metallica it was anything they could do to sit at the same table as them. At the time (‘79-‘81) these NWOBHM bands were shunned by the mainstream in the UK. Even the term “Heavy Metal” was taboo and there were no real venues for this new music to get exposure. They were forced to play shows in bingo halls, and their sets were slated before, in between, and after the games. Frankly, that just had to have sucked. But an inevitable

characteristic of good music is that it comes hand-in-hand with good music fans. So there became a massive tapetrading scene at shows and hangouts. It eventually started spanning the Atlantic Ocean via our trusty gunmen at the postal service. Now our good old opinionated friend Lars Ulrich was the son of a pro tennis player and had the means to fly to the UK for the sole reason of…well, of basically stalking these bands from

show to show. He focused most of his attention on Diamond Head and managed to befriend their singer Sean Harris; he even sat in on studio time with the band. When he arrived back home in LA he had an arsenal of ground-breaking music to play for his friends. Around this time, a friend of his named Brian Slagel opened LA’s only Metal shop. This brought all types of creepy crawlers out of the woodwork and helped to spawn the Metal scene in LA.

Slagel decided to put a compilation album out consisting of LA Metal bands. Lars demanded a spot and guaranteed that he’d come up with a band and a song. All three happened. And interestingly enough, this record launched Slagel’s now legendary Metal Blade Records. The album was called Metal Massacre and the first song to hit wax was “Hit The Lights.” Lars brought together James Hetfield on guitar and vocals, Lloyd Grant on

lead guitar (who was replaced by Dave Mustaine right after that recording), and Ron McGovney on bass – you know the name, Metallica. They spent much of their time practicing songs by these NWOBHM bands. According to McGovney, Hetfield went to great lengths to emulate Sean Harris’ vocals, but he could never quite pull it off. Finally, he opted to sing in his now famous Hetfield voice which is more similar to Gary Lettice of Holocaust than anything else. On early demos you can hear Hetfield’s Diamond Head style and it’s an obvious stretch. After a short run of gigs, McGovney quit the band and was replaced by Cliff Burton, who was a very gifted bass player as well as a certified badass. A short time later, Lars and the gang decided that Mustaine was too much of an inebriated tornado for the band’s own good, so he got the boot and they replaced him with Kirk Hammet. But that’s all pretty much getting into VH1 material and I want to tap into a bit of the Warren Commission side of this situation. The following is an attempt to lay a few of the similarities out between Metallica and these lesser known masters of shred. I’ve left a few possible similarities out because I’m just not feeling that paranoid today. But they are there, lurking in the shadows for you to find. THE NAME GAME: -Diamond Head had a song named “Shoot Out the Lights” and soon after Metallica’s first song was released entitled “Hit The Lights.” -Diamond Head had an album

entitled Lightning to the Nations. Metallica named their second album Ride the Lightning. HEIST OR HOMAGE? -The opening riffs of Bleak House’s “Rainbow Warrior” and Metallica’s “Sanitarium” are almost Siamese twins, except “Rainbow Warrior” was born first. -Diamond Head’s “Sucking My Love” lends itself to multiple cover versions by Metallica (in the early cover you can hear Hetfield wrestling with the vocals) as well as lending its riff to their song “Seek and Destroy.” -Diamond Head’s “Ishmael” may lead one to think that maybe Metallica was black-out drunk one night while listening to it and one of them woke up in the morning, took another swig and exclaimed, “Dudes! Last night I dreamt of the greatest song ever!” then proceeded to write their hit song “One.” What’s with the muffled sound effects intro and mellow strumming dispersed over the song? I’ve got nothing against covers. It’s quite a treat when your favorite band covers some random song, blindsiding all of your expectations. I’m actually very pro-cover. I’d even go so far as to call them special. It’s not my intent to bash Metallica. They’ve done that themselves with the last ten years and movies about group therapy. But since so many of these NWOBHM bands are/ were incredibly talented and relatively unknown I think they are worth your attention. Ignoring them is cheating yourself of so much great stuff. Like more songs and bands you’ve never heard of, completely insane cover art, and God only knows what else. It’s like

they are all crammed in behind your closet door. Open the door and you’ll be up to your tits in sheer magic. So to all fans of early Metallica: man, woman, or beast I implore you, open the door! THE SIDEBAR OF CRUCIAL NWOBHM COVERS!!! - “The Small Hours” by Holocaust - “Killing Time” by Sweet Savage - “Let It Loose” by Savage - “Blitzkrieg” by Blitz - “Am I Evil?” by Diamond Head - “It’s Electric” by Diamond Head - “The Prince” by Diamond Head - “Helpless” by Diamond Head - “Damage Case” by Motorhead* - “Overkill” by Motorhead* - “Stone Dead Forever” by Motorhead* - “Too Late, Too Late” by Motorhead* - “Run To The Hills” by Iron Maiden* * I omitted talking about these guys earlier because along with Judas Priest they were already playing in arenas and massive venues. They were the more successful NWOBHM bands and were an obvious influence on Metallica. Plus if you’ve never heard of them you are a complete idiot. OTHER COVERS - “Astronomy” by Blue Oyster Cult - “So What” by The Anti Nowhere League - “Stone Cold Crazy” by Queen - “Tuesday’s Gone” by Lynyrd Skynyrd - “Turn the Page” by Bob Seger - “Whiskey In The Jar” a traditional Irish folk song recorded first by The Dubliners and then Thin Lizzy

er Band

Words Record Brother Rock comes in all sizes and colors. Rock soundtracks, moreover, are particularly deep in size and color. Sure there are the obvious Rock soundtracks to band oriented films that had a loose story, stringing together an opportunity for the band to play their songs—like the Beatles’ A Hard Days Night and Help, or the Monkees’ Head. Then there are the Tourumentary Live Shows and backstage tour films. The Stones shot Gimme Shelter and its bastard sibling Cocksucker Blues, Led Zeppelin gave us The Song Remains the Same, and The Who made The Kids are Alright—even the Grateful Dead made a tour movie. And of

course the Rock film that goes to eleven, Spinal Tap, which takes a good piss at the lot of em’. Then there are the Rock movies that are a bit more subliminal: Performance, Tonight Let’s All Make Love in London and who could forget, Tommy. Punk gave us The Great Rock ‘n’ Roll Swindle, the penultimate punk masterpiece starring the Sex Pistols who recently released The Filth and the Fury, another tourumentary. The Clash’s Rude Boy, The Ramones’ Rock ‘n’ Roll High School, and Penelope Spheeris’ brilliant The Decline of

Western Civilization come to mind, but there’s also a plethora of others now out on DVD. Just so you know, there’s a darker side to this select area of Rock. Not that watching Robert Plant walk through Alistair Crowley’s garden or Jagger&Co. standing in shock as all hell breaks loose at Altamont isn’t dark, but in the mid-‘60s Hollywood wanted in on the booming youth culture and began releasing biker/ youthsploitation films. Directors like Roger Corman put out flicks such as The Trip, The Wild Racers, and The Wild Angels (which starred Peter Fonda and Nancy Sinatra). Fonda went on to make the biggest earner of the biker film genre with Easy Rider. Jack Nicholson—who wrote The Trip and starred in Hells Angels on Wheels (most of the actors were really Hells Angels)—greatly contributed to this genre. Hell’s Angels ‘69, too, should be on your “gotta-see-that-shit” list. John Cassavetes, Dennis Hopper and Adam Roarke also took their turn on a bike or tripped out for the Hollywood youthsloitation machine—hell, the Billy Jack franchise started as a character in The Born Losers, a biker flick. Many of these films have a long episode of dragnet-type script, and with the exception of the ones that had real bikers as actors, most are as realistic as a $29.95 blow-up doll. Yet most of the music in these movies ROCK, mind you some of it is straight up soundtrack background wallpaper (all the better to sample). But the gems, ah the gems, will fuck your head up…no joke! Happy hunting and listening!

For further rambling on this and other topics check out www. recordbrother.typepad.com

Limited edition goggles and apparel hitting shops Fall 05

spyoptic.com

Hair Metal Bar and Grill In The Club

Words Brian Trunzo

guage interpreter at a Poison show. Black Sabbath All Access Poison requires all venues to supply an In Black Sabbath’s 2001 OZZfest Ridinterpreter for their deaf fans, in comer, Ozzy needed his water biscuits, Synesthesia pliance with the Americans with Distea bags, and New York-style bagels abilities Act. separate from his kids’ creamy but- Skate ternut squash soup and strawberry Chunky ZZ Top Haagen-Dazs. Not to be done in by We knew they’re The Prince of Darkness, lead guitar- Some Kind of Cover Bandgetting old, but not this old. ZZ Top requires an oxygen ist Toni Iommi requested 36 assorted Wild Angels to be available a half hour before beverages, not including the two bot- The mask and after their performances. And tles of Chardonnay and one bottle of Riders only the production assistant knows French Cabernet. Top’s secret sauce for cocktail franks, Zakir consult that guy and he’ll let you in on Kiss Song Grown men wearing black leather Lovethe secret. and pounds of makeup shouldn’t Posters mind unconventional appearances, Nine Inch Nails right? Wrong, Kiss requires all their Flyers The “very large” pieces of various fruits drivers to be “professional in appearfor their juicer and the corn starch The Art of Life as a Roadie ance” when touring. are considered “very important!” We thought “very important” was reserved Apple Bong 101 for security and safety, or at the least Pantera vodka and condoms. Metal bangers Pantera can’t live with- Graffiti out their post-show Taco Bell. Wash Hardcore Marilyn Manson that down with a liter of Wild Turkey, two the weakest self-proclaimed bottles of Chimay ale and three bottles Fun Perhaps Lovinʼ Criminal anti-Christ ever. Haribo Gummy Bears, of good French wine. Four packs of Rocksoy Tease milk and mini chocolates? Ouch. Camel Lights seem like enough. Air conditioning is “REALLY important!” Tops to Lucifer’s lackey, wonder if they have Poison central air in the bowels of hell... Don’t be surprised to see a sign-lan- Bounty Hunter

Hair Metal Bar and Grill In The Club All Access

What would you do if at 15 George Harrison had walked into your living room and popped on the new Beatles album? In a world where almost every child dreams of becoming a Rock star, the thought of having a “Beatle” come home to dinner hardly rates below earth shattering. For a young musician growing up in India the experience was of a prolific nature, one of the first in a series of meetings that would lead to collaborations with some of the greatest musicians in the world. The young boy was tabla maestro Zakir Hussain, the album, the Beatles’ Revolver. Already a child prodigy and an advocate for Rock & Roll, the meeting with Harrison afforded Zakir a link to the musical revolution of the West, a revolution that he understood on a fundamental level to be the future of world music. Enthralled by the innovative sounds of a youth driven movement and armed with the musical prose of a master, Zakir cultivated a passion for experimenting and incorporating different musical styles with his own Indian classical form. Through the introduction of the Beatles, Indian classical music became popularized in the West; however, in the 1960s Bombay was hardly accepting of Rock music. In the extremely rare case that Western music was available, it was even rarer that people actually listened to it. Zakir’s father was the great Ustad Allarakha who toured with Beatles’ collaborator

Interview Anisa Qureshi

Synesthesia Ravi Shankar for 37 years and played

such legendary music festivals as Woodstock and Monterey Pop (where Chunky Jimi Hendrix lit his guitar on fire). Upon returning from one of his numerous Some Kind of Cover Band tours abroad, he gifted his 13-year-old son with a boom box and an arm full The Wild Angels of Rock & Roll tapes. In doing so he Riders granted permission for Zakir to explore other musical traditions, a practice he Zakir continued throughout his life. It was TheSong Doors that first ignited Zakir’s love Love for Rock. The overpowering sound of Posters “Light My Fire” was unlike anything he had ever heard and prompted him to Flyers hit the streets of Bombay, tape deck blaring. feltaslike a king,” says Zakir, “no The Art of “ILife a Roadie one had ever seen a machine like this, Apple Bonghad 101 ever heard anything like no one this. I was on top of the world.” Skate

Graffiti

To him it didn’t matter that no one Hardcore understood the music – that was

Fun Lovinʼ Criminal something he knew would come in

time. “It was the uniqueness of the sound Jim Morrison had created, to take something, any musical form, Tops and change it to the point that it truly Bounty Hunter seemed like something new. That appealed to me, that clicked.” Rock Tease

Zakir was soon touring throughout Europe and the U.S., but his love for Rock only grew with the success of his classical career. Appreciated both in the field of percussion, and in the music world at large, as an international phenomenon, his consistently brilliant and exciting performances were

quickly garnering him world-wide fame. The youngest professor in history at the University of Oregon, he taught ethnomusicology before accepting a teaching position at the Ali Akbar College of Music, a classical Indian school based in Northern California. It was there that he created his first rock group Shanti, an experimental mix of Indian classical fundamentals and Rock & Roll sensibilities. Armed with an eclectic mix of instruments and melodies, the group hit the club circuit in a classic VW bus, traversing the country with their new sound. Shanti in turn gave way to other unique collaborations such as the Diga Rhythm Band, Shakti which he founded with Jon McLaughlin, Making Music, The Rhythm Experience, and Planet Drum with Mickey Hart, for which he received a Grammy. It was a unique time and a unique place; Marin County was a gathering point for musicians to come from all over and play. For a musician like Zakir, now considered an architect of the contemporary world music movement, these interactions were essential in forging a path to the place where the cross-culturalization of music would be accepted as a genre.

biggest stars that are usually the nicest people. Whether it was his neighbor Van Morrison just dropping in to say hello and play a little music or Bruce Springsteen asking permission to get on stage and jam with the group, it is the character of a true Rock star that has always impressed Zakir. He recalls a night in London after a private concert where a young man he didn’t know was offering him a drink. Zakir was 18 years old and would not accept alcohol. The man went out of his way to serve him and though Zakir was at first skeptical his friends assured him that the drink was just apple juice. The man was Mick Jagger and Zakir was always struck by the kindness shown him, a young tabla player from India, by one of Rock & Roll’s most notorious stars. They passed the night eating Chinese take out and playing music, watching television; not unlike any other house on the block.

“I remember jamming on stage with the Grateful Dead, Jefferson Star Ship, and Quicksilver Messenger Service. Mickey [Hart] would have sessions in his studio with Jerry Garcia, David Crosby, Grace Slick, Country Joe and The Fish, John Cipollina and many others.”

Blind Faith The Rolling Stones -“Paint It Black” Beatles - Abbey Road The Eagles - Hotel California The Band (Editor’s Note: No, not MTVs Da Band! God-for-fucking-bid) Jimi Hendrix Traffic The Doors Bruce Springsteen - USA Janis Joplin - Me and Bobby McGee Crosby, Stills, Nash and Young

Throughout his countless intimate experiences with Rock’s greatest icons, Zakir maintains that it is the

“The more famous they were the more simple they were. They were already established musicians, they had nothing to prove, they had done it all and they were the nicest people.” Zakir’s Rock and Roll Faves!

Hair Metal Bar and Grill In The Club All Access Synesthesia Skate Director: Niki Hall @ LACES (www.lacesgroup.com) Fashion Photographer: Taku (www.takuphotography.com)

Chunky

Hair/Make-up: Paola de Souza

Fashion Jessica SomeAssistants: Kind of Cover Band Lechuga and Alexandra Ashmore Photographerâ&#x20AC;&#x2122;s Assistant: Sean McCullough

The Wild Models: KimAngels Matulova @ Ford & Kelly Briter @ New York Models Riders Zakir

Special thanks to Gracia Walker @ Kiehlâ&#x20AC;&#x2122;s for providing body products for the shoot.

linen pinstripe tuxedo jacket, Sass & Bide; satin shorts, Alice & Trixie

Love Song

vintage Sex Pistols t-shirt provided by Uncle Mike; skirt, Sass & Bide; shoes, Christian Dior

Lace tank, Only Hearts; handmade bra, Butterfly Clothing pants, Fake London; pumps, Le Silla

Motorhead t-shirt, Bravado Merchandising (www.bravadousa.com); crocheted shrug and scarf (worn as belt), Twinkle; croquette skirt, Ashley Tyler; jewelry, modelâ&#x20AC;&#x2122;s own.

Shiva Tuni dress, Ashley Tyler; bra and panties, Butterfly Clothing; feather barrette, Lisa Levine

Mantis dress, Ashley Tyler; jewelry, modelâ&#x20AC;&#x2122;s own

handmade bra and pantie set; Butterfly Clothing (www.butterflyclothing.com)

vintage hat, stylistâ&#x20AC;&#x2122;s own; Elissa dress, Ashley Tyler (www.ashleytyler.com)

handmade bra, Butterfly Clothing; zebra print camisole, Buddhist Punk; lace hipster panty, Only Hearts; earrings, Lisa Levine (www.lisalevinejewelry.com)

100

Hair Metal Bar and Grill In The Club All Access Synesthesia Justin Hampton

Skate Chunky

Lyman Hardy

Jason Cooper and Jeff Wood Jason Mecier

102

Derek Hess

Frank Kozik

EMEK

Robert Lee

104

Print Mafia

Frank Kozik

Justin Hampton

Rob Schwager

106

Hair Metal Bar and Grill In The Club All Access Synesthesia Skate Chunky Some Kind of Cover Band The Wild Angels

Words Howie Pyro Riders Flyers Courtesy Howie Pyro & Reid van Renesse Zakir THAT CAN ONLY BE CENSORED STREET FLYERS: FREEDOM OF SPEECH PHYSICALLY...BY REMOVING THEM! Love Song

I’ve always been obsessed with flyers. I’vePosters making it that much more fun! Many collected them my entire adult life. They of my friends were arrested and spent are the real gutter advertisements—fromFlyers weekends in jail for scotch taping religious rants to lunatic diaries posted for innocent communications on a pole in The Art of Life as a Roadie the world to see, to bands making their the Lower East Side of NYC, including black & white statement (I guess there’sApple the singer Bong 101 of my old band D Generation, more color options these days). Jesse Malin. Never underestimate the Graffiti strength in freedom of speech and the You can tell so much about a band from power of free advertising “they” are Hardcore their flyers: their sense of humor, political afraid!!! Paste On!!! stance, how much they care about whatFun Lovinʼ Criminal Howie Pyro is currently working on Punk is Dead, they’re doing, etcetera. is Everything, a coffee table book of flyers RockPunk Tease

which is the follow up to the highly acclaimed It does involve a bit of fun (i.e. vandalism), Topsbook Fucked Up and Photocopied by Brian Ray. especially when you get crafty with placement on public property (alwaysBounty Hunter my favorite). It was just harmless fun until Giuliani elevated it to crime status,

108

110

112

Synesthesia Skate Chunky Some Kind of Cover Band The Wild Angels Riders Zakir

Words Brian Trunzo Photo Erawk & Spray K

Love Song

Posters *Note: The names have been changed due to the fact that these guys have done Flyers

some crazy shit.

Everyone has a story to tell. It just turns out that Erawk’s* stories are better than yours. Frank151 took some time to speak with the former tour manager of rockers like Soundgarden, Pearl Jam, and Rage Against the Machine. Consider Apple Bong 101 this your guide to the good life on the road. The Art of Life as a Roadie

Graffiti

Roadie: 101

Hardcore

TheCriminal 17 year road all-star offered us Fun Lovinʼ some roadie knowledge.

First and

Rock Tease foremost, we needed to know what

exactly defined a “roadie.” According to Erawk, “A roadie is a guy living his life the road, in pertinence to music. It Bounty on Hunter can be anyone from a guy who tunes guitars to a guy who humps cases, or even a personal assistant. We all kind of call ourselves roadies.” Tops

For some, this may seem like a tall order. However, Erawk was born for life on the road. The 40-year-old Seattle native has been managing tours since the late ‘80s and has no desire to slow down. “Sometimes I wanna just go home and be mellow, then I’m home for a while and get this weird urge that I’ve gotta travel.” Remember the Times… Erawk

first

started

touring

with

Soundgarden in the late ‘80s. Being that this was his first gig, he felt pretty liberated and carefree traveling with the Seattle rockers. During a night off in Florida, Erawk met up with some local skaters for a night of boarding. Kickflips on the street turned to beer bongs on the beach, and Erawk returned to the hotel inebriated and full of adventure. Scouring over the landscape, Erawk decided to take his new-found cronies to the Jacuzzi. “The band members made it back there [the hot tub] and there must have been about a dozen people there, guys and girls having a really good time and I showed up with my board and a couple of local dudes real drunk. I walked right up to the hot tub and just started pissing in it. I ruined the party.” Some of you may be saying, “Yeah, I pissed in my friend’s hot tub last week at a house party, that ain’t so special.” Well, if your friend is lead singer Chris Cornell and if he was accompanied

by hot girls, kudos. But, you would NEVER urinate in Soundgarden’s hot tub. Never. Keepin’ Sane On the Road. Jumping ship from Soundgarden to Pearl Jam in the early ‘90s, Erawk experienced a change in tempo as well. Gone were the days of carefree, unadulterated fun – Pearl Jam’s fan base was so intense everyone in the camp had to remain on his game to keep the show in order. Erawk and his friend, Pearl Jam video artist Spray K*, found a new method of mental release: art and graffiti. “Me and Spray K made some stickers, stencils, whatever. You’re in a new town every night, there are fresh walls to be taken care of, you know? I mean, with the bigger bands we fly at night on chartered planes, so we might arrive at our new hotel at 1 a.m. and not know what to do with ourselves. So we go out and take a walk around the city and investigate. Usually we can leave the city with a little bit more than we arrived there with. For me, that’s the best release.” Erawk attributes long days “on the job” and “dealing with all sorts of madness” for his inspiration to be creative. “So when everyone goes to sleep, it’s too late to see a band and TV sucks, so you get creative.  Not every night is out on the town putting up stuff, rather most nights are all-night stencil cutting sessions, or big bong buildoffs – anything that doesn’t resemble what you have to do to pay the bills.” Almost nothing is sacred when Erawk bombs, and he sure does love to hit up the most innocuous spots. Recently,

114

Erawk has found inspiration in bike signs. “The bike signs were a reaction to cyclists in my neighborhood, and their ridiculous self-righteousness and the outfits they wear.  The sign campaign has gone on for about 8 months now, and just keeps getting put back up when people rip them down.  I have a bunch pre-made, and I take them on the road with me.   They work amazingly in front of Starbucks on sunny weekend mornings.  We put them up about 3 or 4 am, cover them with black plastic, then walk by and unwrap them in the morning.” The signs themselves look like authentic road signs, so at first glance, people really believe they are city mandates.  “The reactions are amazing.  Then there are the victims, who are, as the guy in the photo, so self-obsessed, that he didn’t even see the sign under his nose.  He thought I was taking a picture of him because he looked so cool.  Direct hit.  This is the reaction I strive for with all my left behind pieces.” Erawk also leaves hotel rooms with a little bit more after his departure – he calls this the “McGuyver Element.” It is not unusual for Erawk and his boys to dismantle hotel sinks to make a bong or replace hotel art. What was once a painting of a peaceful landscape, is now decorated with colorful cartoon birds when Erawk is in town. Imagine the look on the faces of room service when Erawk checks out. Hardcore Mullets: Good idea? Maybe. Fun? Hell Yeah. While touring with Pearl Jam in 1998, Erawk and his fellow roadies looked

toward practical jokes to balance out the rigorous schedule of being on the road. One particular instance involved Spray K, $3200 and a pair of scissors. The agreement was if Spray K allowed Erawk to cut his Samson-esque hair into a mullet the members of the band would pay him to wear it like that for a week while in Canada. Never one to back down, Spray K acquiesced and sported his new do for seven days. On the last day of the bet, Pearl Jam made their way back to the states for a show in Detroit. Just for kicks, lead singer Eddie Vedder decided it would be cool to have Spray K invade the stage as a possessed, mullet bearing fan, and cut the pathetic thing right off. Now, there’s a difference between rocking out in front of a couple thousand hardcore rockers and performing in front of stadium audience that seats over 50,000 obsessive fans. The audience had no

116

clue as to what was going on when Eddie stopped the show to cut Spray K’s hair. “Now the crowd wants to beat him up on stage or something, because we’re in Detroit. So Eddie grabs this big fucking giant pair of scissors that no one even knew were a prop, they were a foot long, and Eddie said ‘I’m gonna cut that fucking stupid hair off!’ So we held him down and cut his whole mullet off. But the crowd thinks we’re just fucking attacking a guy for a mullet.” Erawk recalled fans actually screaming at Eddie, telling him to stab Spray K. Eddie quietly let Spray K dip out backstage, and peacefully finished the show. Within an hour cops were on the scene, wanting to arrest him for assault and MTV and radio stations were reporting the incident on air. “To this day, until people read this, they’re gonna think Eddie really cut somebody’s hair in Detroit.”

People That Suck. Shady characters shouldn’t really come in contact with Erawk while he’s on the road, scammers in particular. Erawk recalled a specific New Year’s Eve show, circa 1992, where someone figured out his identification information. The thief moved swiftly, and received dozens of tickets to shows in the area around that time, as well as some sweet sportswear. Since then Erawk has been going on tour under a different name to avoid these types of problems. However, some problems are unavoidable, or at least catch Erawk off guard. “Even some autograph seekers are such tweaky dudes. I was walking with one of the guys I work with when this other guy kept reaching into

118

a bag and shaking it all weird. A couple of us said ‘Hey you gotta stop reaching into that bag, stay cool.’ We started to leave and he turned around and sprinted towards us. Just by natural reaction, I brought him down. I hit him so hard he fell down; that’s one thing I hate about the road, you don’t know who these people are everyday. Some people are just intense fans wanting an autograph, but you just don’t know.” A Roadie’s Farewell? Erawk is a true roadie, inspired by endless highways, sleepless nights and vivid paintings. When will this veteran roadie slow up? “I’ve lived most of my life for the last 16 or 17 years on the road,” he said, “and every time I get off the road for a little while I realize I just can’t, it’s in my blood.”

120

shmackclothing.com

Hair Metal Bar and Grill In The Club All Access Synesthesia Skate Chunky Some Kind of Cover Band The Wild Angels Riders Zakir Love Song Posters Flyers

Words Erawk Photos Spray K

How many times have you been somewhere with the greatest weed and an overThe Arthad of Life as a Roadie whelming desire to get high, but nothing to smoke it out of? When I travel, I’m constantly flying, or crossing borders, and I can’t afford trying to explain away Apple Bong 101 the dirty pipe, or rolling papers in my bag, so I carry a few apples. Nobody ever questions apples. Graffiti Hardcore Here are some simple instructions to create a cheap, clean, disposable weed pipe from an apple and a pen anywhere you may be. Hotel, grandma’s house, jail. Fun Lovinʼ Criminal Rock Tease

Step 1: You will need one apple, a pen that unscrews and comes apart in the middle, and a knife (optional).

Step 2: Make your first hole in the top of the apple (right where you want your bowl). Push the pen slowly into the apple, going a little past the core.

Step 3: Make a hole with your pen in one end of the core and out the other (one end will be the carb). At this point you may want to blow out all the apple sludge from your holes.

122

Step 4: If you have a knife, carve a nice little bowl. If you don’t have a blade, don’t sweat it, it’ll still works just fine without one. Just get a little MacGuyver on it.

Step 5: Disassemble the pen. Put one end of the pen housing into the end of the apple for a mouthpiece. take the small spring from inside the pen and stretch it out slightly, then put it inside the bowl to serve as a screen.

Step 6: Load. Light. Enjoy.

124

Hair Metal Bar and Grill In The Club All Access Synesthesia Skate Chunky Some Kind of Cover Band The Wild Angels Riders Zakir Love Song Posters Flyers

Words Reid van Renesse Visuals Zephyr’s Black Book

The Art of Life as a Roadie Apple Bong 101

“MR.BLIP”, a huge bubble letter fillToday, through books and award in with a round face character in Graffiti the shows, graffiti is known to the masses middle. It was the first piece I clearly as the visual art component to Hip remember. I saw it from the trainHardcore in Hop music. In music videos and Philly while visiting fam. I was 8. movies, television and commercials, Fun Lovinʼ Criminal if you see graffiti, most likely you hear Seven years later it was skateboards hip-hop music. Why not? It’s one of Rock Tease and hardcore shows. Graffiti flyers, the “four elements”, right? Well, truth Tops tagged spots, and bombed venues. of the matter is that kids were writing One of my favorite places had a huge on NYC trains long before Hip Hop Bounty Hunter VULCAN piece across the entire back was even a term. So what were they wall, behind the soundman, opposite listening to? Well, for many, it was the stage. Rock & Roll. A year later I was buying my first BDP record.

“I dropped out of high school to follow the Grateful Dead. I was a hippie, but that’s back when being called a

126

‘hippie’ meant you were peaceful. It wasn’t an insult.” says ZEPHYR. “We (Rolling Thunder Writers) would all meet behind the band shell in Central Park to drop acid, smoke weed, and play Frisbee.”

in Manhattan. We didn’t hear Rock & Roll in the Bronx.” KEL 1st adds, “I was raised on Spanish music and Motown, but I got into Santana and WAR. I remember Queen was big back then, too.”

The core RTW crew at that time was BIL ROC (Prez), MIN ONE, ZEPHYR, RASTA, and REVOLT. “BIL ROC was really into deep psychedelic rock, acid rock, and obscure bands like Ultimate Spinach and Psychotic Reaction.” REVOLT remembers. “Alice Cooper was very inspirational to me. We were rebelling against what our parents listened to. We hated the bad disco and ‘soft FM’ sound we heard on the radio. We would play the Rolling Stones and Led Zeppelin when we were painting at the 137th St. lay-up. SIE ONE did a ‘Disco Sucks’ whole car around that time.”

“I was with BIL ROC in the E/F layup @ 75th Ave. in Queens when I first met QUIK. He was wearing a Black Sabbath T-shirt,” laughs REVOLT. “Graffiti writers were a bunch of individuals with all different tastes.” says FUTURA. “I got into Rock & Roll by meeting different people during the 4 years I spent in the Navy. Every chance we got, we would go to rock concerts. Rolling Stones ‘Some Girls’ tour, I saw Led Zeppelin out in California, YES, Pink Floyd. The heavy era of laser light shows was very interesting to me. I’ll never forget seeing David Bowie at Madison Square Garden. During the break before the last chorus in ‘Suffragette City’, the entire arena shouted along to “Wham Bam, Thank You Ma’am!”. I remember feeling the power from the audience and realizing that I’m just a participant in something much bigger.”

“There wasn’t any Hip Hop when graf was in full force on the trains.” TEAM grew up in Greenwich Village and started writing in 1973. “I was listening to The Who and The Beatles until I went to Erasums High.” As part of a city school arts program, TEAM went to a predominantly Afro-American and West Indian high school in Flatbush, Brooklyn. “There I was introduced to Earth, Wind, and Fire and more funk music. It was also the first place I heard Bob Marley and reggae music. But as graf writers racially it didn’t matter. I remember bombing with SHADOW (Spike Lee’s little brother) and he was telling me I had to check out Van Halen.” “I didn’t really hear Rock & Roll until I came to stay with my Grandmother

For lots of graf writers, live rock shows were a popular social event. “It’s just what we did. Entire crews would meet up, smoke, snort, dose, and roll to a venue together. For $2.50 you could see huge bands at the Dr. Pepper concerts in Central Park, down at Wollman Rink,” remembers ZEPHYR. Both he and REVOLT both talk about seeing lots of groups like Bad Company and The Allman Brothers at the soda

128

Photos CAP 1 MPC

sponsored events. “…or how about Aerosmith at the Felt Forum or, my personal favorite, Frank Zappa and The Mothers of Invention at The Palladium on Halloween. That’s when they shot the film ‘Baby Snakes’, in ‘77.” ZEPH adds. “I remember seeing some big shows. Like when me and FUSE went to see Led Zeppelin at the Garden.” says TEAM. ZEPHYR, KIELY, and FUTURA were commissioned to paint a huge backdrop banner for an early NYC performance by The Clash. FUTURA went on to tour Europe with the band, doing live paintings during their performances. That led to their collaboration 12” record The Escapades of Futura 2000. “I got into The Ramones and Punk and NY Dolls and Glam Rock bands around ‘79,” says REVOLT. “I remember seeing KISS open up for Iggy Pop at one point” says ZEPH. Simultaneous to the appearance of Hip Hop music in the club scene was the appearance of New Wave and clubs like Danceteria that showcased groups like Blondie and the Talking Heads. It was

130

at that time that Graffiti as a movement and art form was really co-opted by the emerging Hip Hop movement of DJing, MCing, and Breaking coming from the South Bronx. FUTURA makes the distinction that “nothing was `official yet. Like the shows at the Roxy, club owners were asking ‘Are people really going to be into this?’.” But as we all know, the people were into it. From humble beginnings based in style and self-expression, the American Hip Hop music industry has gone on to become a multi-billion dollar international machine. Not every writer from that early period in graffiti’s history necessarily feels comfortable with the marriage of the two. Some feel slighted by it, that perhaps it was not necessarily as organic as it was contrived. The bottom line is that graffiti writers are as diverse as the music that they listen to and Rock & Roll definitely has its place in its creation. ROCK ON! Reid van Renesse is a filmmaker living in Brooklyn, he previously directed the graffiti documentary Dithers. You can check out his work at thequickness.com.

Raybeez (Warzone) & Jimmy G working the door at the Pyramid Club, NYC Summer 1987

die

Words J. Nicely Photo Craig Wetherby & Mike Schnapp New York City Hardcore Tattoo 127 Stanton Street Lower East Side, Manhattan Uncle Mike Schnapp, this issue’s Guest Curator, and Frank151 paid a visit to Jimmy G and his crew at his second home, the establishment that he co-owns with Agnostic Front’s Vinnie Stigma, New York City Hardcore Tattoo parlor. With a music career spanning over three decades Jimmy G can lay claim to having been at the epicenter of numerous events crucial to New

132

York City music history. Early in his career he was opening for the Beastie Boys and Run-DMC on the first major Hip Hop tour ever. As the “Ambassador of Beer” he wasn’t just drenching crowds with booze, he was planting seeds and influencing styles that in turn would go on to influence countless kids who were seeking out a new cultural experience in the early ‘80s. For over 20 years Jimmy and his band Murphy’s Law have managed to entertain crowds and stay true to their hardcore roots.

Longevity: The Formula I think what gave me longevity with the band is I have fun with everybody, but then I take time out when I have everyone’s attention to get my point across, which let’s me get my point across so much better. I try to juggle it, here’s a beer, here’s another one on your head, look at this girl’s tits, now I got to tell you something. On Being a New Yorker I am the essence of Queens. I grew up with Greek, Indian, Jewish, Black, and Puerto Ricans kids; I grew up with everybody. New York shouldn’t be a part of the United States. The rest of world, including the U.S., should learn from New York and how we all get along. No one really does kill each other here like they say. Yeah, there is beef. People die over stupid things. If you are gonna rip somebody off, you’re gonna get killed in New York. Not if you’re gonna be in a café too close to where God farted. Here people die for reasons. They might come from a place where there are many uneducated people, and that’s not their fault, it’s the fault of the society you grew up in. The problems we have here are very real and simple: education, medical coverage, employment—very simple things. People have to sell drugs to live sometimes ‘cause that’s all they know; because they don’t have an education, and they have to eat. It’s all very simple, I should be a fuckin’ policitician because I don’t know why these motherfuckers are. Vote for me in 2010!

Punk Rock: What Happened to the Politics? Now it’s a business. “Punk” is a lot of guys who are more focused on what they are putting in their hair, and dying their hair black and getting piercings. There’s no message. There are guys 17 years old singing about broken hearts when they should be singing about these kids going to war; the only reason they are joining the military is to go to college. Why do kids have to join the military just to go to school? We’re supposed to be such a rich, great country, why do kids have to join the military just to go to school? Politicians are all rich, they all live better than us, and they all get to ride in a limo to work, and they all have social medicine. Politicians all get their health care coverage from our tax dollars, why don’t we? The money that is getting pitched in from our tax dollars isn’t getting turned around back to us for universal health care. Soldiers are coming back from this conflict with their legs blown off having to worry about how they are going to pay for treatment. On The Mohawk The Mohawk is still in, now you got what I call the “Williamsburg Taco.” You just mush your hair up into a Mohawk so when you go to your stockbroker job on Monday you can comb your hair back down. Violence Music and violence go hand in hand. Music and war go hand in hand. So do religion and war. Music, religion and war and violence all go hand in hand. It’s all an

expression. People go to war because they are trying to express something they can’t express peacefully. Seeing The World: The Perspective of a Blue Collar Musician The weird thing about traveling and touring as a blue collar musician is seeing places that during war we have bombed and annihilated and wiped off the face of the earth; that are now nicer than places here in America, like Detroit and Ohio and places in the middle of the country. I played Hiroshima; it didn’t exist because we blew it off the face of the earth, now it is a bustling city. Go to Detroit—now it is like a zombie movie. I love going to these places, and I love these people, but it shows that our government isn’t doing the right thing for its people. We’re looking out for other people. Which is okay, but charity starts at home. We should definitely look out for our people here. We have soldiers with arms and legs blown off and no money. One good thing about being a musician, you get to voice that and talk to kids, other people, soldiers, kids in other countries—there is a dialogue that goes around. One good thing I got from this music is I got to talk to other people and become a man of the world. Musical Influences Bad Brains, definitely into Bad Brains, The Stimulators. I grew up with people listening to The Doors and The Rolling Stones and HippieDippie shit like that, or Old Rock & Roll, a lot older than me, and people my age listening to people who were already dead. And here all of a sudden was

134

this band I could go and see. And you know they were a bunch of black guys, crazy black guys, and they were cool. They also played Reggae beside this insane music. Then bands like Fear and Circle Jerks, and then I was hooked. The dancing thing kicked in and it was good, I got to vent, and the music was just the whole thing. Hardcore Tattoo – When you come to New York, you got friends. The main essence of this place that kids should know is that they paid for this place. Every kid that ever bought a t-shirt, paid to get in a show. All that money that went to Vinnie’s band and my band, got reinvested into this place. So next time you sneak into a show or ask for a free t-shirt, go fuck yourself because we have to pay rent! On Hip Hop/Hardcore Connection It just happened because a lot of us were all friends. I was friends with Rick Rubin and Glen Friedman (coproducer, Dogtown and Z Boys) who were documenting the scene at the time. I actually jammed with Rick Rubin in a band called Hose that he played in during college, before he was doing all the Hip Hop stuff. I grew up right next to Queensbridge Projects, Astoria Projects and Ravenswoods Projects—right in the midst of all that[Hip Hop], so that was going on in all the parks in my neighborhood. Then Rick started doing his thing with Russell [Simmons]. I remember driving Russell home, and hanging out with Oran “Juice” Jones and a bunch of other Hip Hop artists. I remember when Rick called me up and told me to bring a bunch of people down to the Ritz, cause this band was playing.

The band was Run-DMC, a bunch of stuff like that happened. Hip Hop was approachable then. It wasn’t East versus West, it was just guys from Queens doing their thing. Now it is the same thing with Punk Rock, there is a whole expectation to it. Back then there were no expectations of Rock music and Hip Hop music, it was more of a neighborhood thing. A lot of guys I went to school with were doing their music and I was doing my music. Funny enough, people of color I grew up with were more acceptable being Punk Rock than the Italian kids or the Greek kids. Because a lot of the kids I grew up with, they were making a certain kind of music for the first time, and I was making a certain kind of music for the first time. So we were

feeding off each other. Two different forms of music coming from the same neighborhood, and with the same principles backing it: the street, abusive alcoholic families, no money, the neighborhood you grew up in, not being understood, or accepted, teenage angst. Anything Else? I got a new record coming out! the pizza guy’s here let’s eat.

Hey,

Then Jimmy G bought pizza for everyone, from Lombardi’s, one of the best spots in New York City. Holding a slice adoringly in his hand he exclaimed, “You know if I ever do get rich on tour, this is the type of shit I’d have Fedex’d to me overnight!” www.hardcorenyc.com

136

In The Club All Access Synesthesia Skate Chunky Some Kind of Cover Band The Wild Angels Riders Zakir Love Song Posters Flyers The Art of Life as a Roadie Apple Bong 101 Graffiti Hardcore Fun Lovinʼ Criminal Rock Tease Huey, from the Fun Lovin’ Criminals, is the kind of guy who peppers his Tops conversation with observations like, Hunter “When weBounty toured with U2, they’d send a jet home to Dublin whenever they ran out of Guinness,” and, “In Moscow, everybody’s got a bodyguard and a pretty blonde girl in high heel boots.” But such revelations are just everyday chit chat from an affable character that has no problem opening his home up to a pair of visitors on the afternoon of a blizzard. He is also an encyclopedia of pertinent information should you ever be blessed to enjoy the kind of Rock & Roll life that Huey has in his decade or so of touring with the Criminals. How else would you know

Words Angela Cravens Photo Damian Castro that if you’re ever caught in Dubai with a joint in hand, you might as well off the dude, “Because there – it’s funny – you get 20 years for possession, but only 10 for killing a man.” Back when he was a Puerto Rican kid growing up on the Lower East Side he dabbled in teaching himself to play guitar but “caught a whiff of the streets and next thing I knew, I was in jail.” Music came calling again though, on a day when his mother visited the 17-year-old in jail, carrying an envelope from his late father who died when Huey was three years old. The envelope had been set aside in his mother’s care until Huey was grown. Inside was a guitar tablature

138

for learning scales and a note reading, “If you can’t eat it, don’t fuck it.” His involvement with Fun Lovin’ Criminals was similarly fated. He met the other band members while working at the old NYC mega-club Limelight. “We kept doing gigs where the [scheduled] band would cancel, and the owner would be like, ‘You’re a band—go get your shit,’” said Huey. Their bluesy version of what he calls “New York music” blew up with albums like Come Find Yourself and 100% Colombian. “We were touring everywhere… Russia, Singapore, you name it. If they had electricity and beer, we’d go.” The band is now recording their latest album, having finally taken a break from touring. The new songs still have wizened elements of Leonard Cohen and their home city; however, with a Hip Hop influenced bass and a modernized production MO, a lot is happening on their computers. Sitting back in his new midtown apartment, surrounded by an impressive collection of guitars, Huey lets a haze of smoke drift from his mouth and says, “You know, I’m a regular guy. I made some money making music so, what else am I gonna do? I’m gonna do the shit I wanted to do when I was a kid: smoke pot all day, and buy cool guitars.” Huey’s Guitar Collection • That’s a 1959 Les Paul Junior. I’ve been using that for most of the [new] record... I was a really big Stones fan growing up, and Keith Richards was one of my favorite guys in the world, he

used to play those. You can hammer nails with it and it stays in tune... I call her “Ginger.” • There aren’t very many white Les Pauls, that’s the Eddie Van Halen guitar that he put out years ago. I grew up in the ‘80s where there was all this metal [music going on]. Even though I was Puerto Rican, growing up on the Lower East Side, I still got my rock on. • This 1950s cowboy guitar [belonged to] this guy who used to play with the Singing Cowboy Gene Autry back in the day. This guitar was played on Autry’s TV show. • I used to live in Hawaii, and this National steel guitar has a Hawaiian sunset etched on the back. • The Bo Diddley I found at a Los Angeles swap meet. It’s the cigar box guitar. I was in Chicago—they play a lot of blues stuff—and I flew out for a [couple of days] because I heard they had these out there. • The big old Gibson J200... is THE acoustic. I strung it up in Nashville, it’s an alternate string version... it sounds like a mandolin. • There’s the baby, the 1957 Gibson ES 225... at one point, it was owned by Keith Richards. That’s kind of the crown jewel, because I grew up listening to BB King, a lot of the blues dudes, and the guy who owned that guitar was a blues musician, you can tell [from] the way the guitar was kept up... My guitar tech won’t let me take it on the road.

Rae

Amy

Andrea

Chasaty

Snitch

Leslie

140

Belinda

Devo

Mizuo

Jayme

Tamikko

Kristin

Kelly

Marjorie

Jessica

Melissa

Ms. Bianca

Ellen

Stacy

Nicole

Giada

Noot

142

DJ Uncle Mike aka The Cadillac Selecter TOP DJ bathroom songs: You need a long song so you can split the DJ booth and hit the bathroom for some needed relief, aka taking a piss. • Allman Brothers – “In Memory Of Elizabeth Reed” – 11 min • Curtis Mayfield – “Move On Up” – 8 min • Led Zeppelin – “Achillies Last Stand” – 10 min • Lynyrd Skynyrd – “That Smell” – 6 min • Rolling Stones – “Can’t You Hear Me Knocking” – 7 min • Santana – “Soul Sacrifice” – 6 min • Ted Nugent – “Stranglehold” – 7 min

DJ Jus Ske 1. Metallica 2. Red Hot Chili Peppers 3. Jimi Hendrix 4. Jimi Hendrix - “Purple Haze” 5 AC/DC – “You Shook Me All Night Long” 6. The Clash - “London Calling” 7. The Smiths – “How Soon is Now?” 8. The Ramones – “I Wanna Be Sedated” Blitzkrieg Bop 9. Nirvana – “Come As You Are” 10. Blur – “Song 2”

DJ Klever’s Rock Picks 1. Metallica 2. Red Hot Chili Peppers 3. Jimi Hendrix 4. Black Sabbath 5. The Ramones 6. David Bowie 7. Led Zeppelin 8. Nirvana 9. Misfits 10. The Rolling Stones

144

A Trak Top Ten slept-on moments on Led Zeppelin’s “Physical Graffiti” 1. Ad-libs at the end of “In My Time of Dying”, e.g. “my dying, dying... cough” 2. All clavinet parts, especially on “Trampled Under Foot” 3. The guitar solo/breakdown on “The Wanton Song” 4. “Should we roll it, Jimmy?” at the beginning of “Black Country Woman” 5. The ping-pong-like beginning to “Boogie with Stu” 6. The hi-hats at the beginning of “Night Flight” (Barry White ain’t got nothing on this) 7. The maritime lyrics on “Down by the Seaside” 8. All the different breakdowns on “In the Light” 9. Robert Plant chanting “It’s got to be my Jesus!” on “In My Time of Dying” 10. The cowbells on “Houses of the Holy” (subtle but fierce)

Bobbito Remembers “When I was 12 some of my cousins moved to Queens. It was around ‘78-’79, and it was the first time I was exposed to Rock. My favorite style was more on the Soft Rock side, mostly ballads by the Beatles, Simon and Garfunkel, Bread, Seals and Croft, etc. In the ‘80s I spent a ton of time watching MTV from the very first day they played the Buggles “Video Killed the Radio Star.” I actually saw the first broadcast. From there my mind opened up to more trashy stuff like Def Leppard and Journey. But just as with music videos today, I don’t think I dug the composition so much, I just fell into liking videos for the visuals. In the ‘90s, I got into record digging and discovering breaks, and found a whole new appreciation for Classic Rock that was on the more funkier side, stuff like Led Zeppelin and Cream – particularly Chicago’s “I’m a Man” is a favorite. I played it once in a club and an old timer told me that it was a jam back in the day at soulful down low clubs. I felt like I arrived at it not even knowing that, and was happy that even 30 years later a great tune is a great tune. I don’t need MTV, Classic Rock radio, or magazines to tell me what’s dope about rock. I just listen for the drum, and trust my ears.” - Bobbito

DJ Riz • R.E.M. - “Losing My Religion” • Scorpions - “Rock You Like a Hurricane” • Sniff ‘n’ the Tears - “Drivers Seat” • Fleetwood Mac - “Little Lies” • Boston - “More Than a Feeling” • The Police - “Message in a Bottle” • Chicago - “25 Or 6 To 4” • 10,000 Maniacs - “Because the Night” • Naked Eyes - “Promises Promises” • Carly Simon - “Why” DJ Cassette In no particular order... Albums, not songs. 1. My Bloody Valentine - Loveless 2. Spacemen 3 - Perfect Prescription 3. Gang of Four - Entertainment 4. Slowdive - Souvlaki 5. Sonic Youth - Goo 6. Galaxie 500 - On Fire 7. The Creation- How Does it Feel 8. Can - 1968 Delay 9. Joy Division - Unknown Pleasures 10. T-Rex - Slider

MF DOOM • Duran Duran • David Bowie – The Rockstar of that time, everybody had to be down with that. • David Lee Roth – Kind of pop, but everything he did was the shit. • Pat Benatar • “She Blinded Me With Science” – That dude, that cat, that shit was raw. • Huey Lewis and the News • The B-52s • Genesis – Stu-Stu-Studio • Tears For Fears • Frank Zappa

146

Ryan Sikorski’s Top Ten 1. The Steve Miller Band - Fly Like an Eagle 2. Cro-Mags - Age of Quarrel 3. Lou Reed - Transformer 4. Iron Maiden - Piece of Mind 5. Billy Squier - The Big Beat 6. Red Hot Chili Peppers - Blood Sugar Sex Magik 7. Misfits - Beware 8. Black Sabbath - Paranoid 9. The Jimi Hendrix Experience - Axis: Bold as Love 10. Jane’s Addiction - Ritual De Lo Habitual An additional for good luck! 11. AC/DC - Back in Black

DJ Mark Farina 1. Rush - 2112 2. ACDC - Back in Black 3. Led Zepplin - Houses of the Holy 4. Police - Ghost in the Machine 5. Jane’s Addiction - Nothing Shocking 6. Scorpions - Animal Magnetism 7. The Clash - Combat Rock 8. The Cars - The Cars 9. The The - Soul Mining 10. The Jimi Hendrix Experience - Electric Ladyland

Aqua & 3H • Traffic - Dear Mr. Fantasy • Marc Bolan and T-Rex - The Slider • The Police - Regatta De Blanc • Jimi Hendrix - Axis: Bold As Love • Sublime - 40oz to Freedom • Sugar Babe - Songs • The Clash - London Calling • The Steve Miller Band - Fly Like An Eagle • NOFX - White Trash, Two Heebs, and a Bean • Blue Oyster Cult - Agents of Fortune

RZA • AC/DC - Back in Black • Queen – “Another One Bites the Dust” • Rush – “Tom Sawyer” • The Jimi Hendrix Experience • David Axelrod • The Rolling Stones – “Honky Tonk Woman” • Rage Against the Machine’s first album • Bio Hazard’s first LP • Beatles - Greatest Hits • Eagles - Greatest Hits • Janis Joplin - Greatest Hits • The Doors – “Light My Fire” • Cerrone IV – “Rocket in the Pocket”

Sky Nellor • Violent Femmes - Violent Femmes • AC/DC - Back in Black • Radiohead - The Bends • The Beatles – The White Album • Jimi Hendrix – Are You Experienced? • Talking Heads - Little Creatures • Guns N’ Roses - Appetite for Destruction • The Clash - London Calling • The Pretenders - Pretenders • Led Zeppelin - Physical Graffiti

Sam Sever Hard to know where to begin but here are some Rock tunes that always stuck in my head growing up... 1. Bob Dylan - “Like a Rolling Stone” One of the earliest songs that caught my ear while playing pinball and drinking mad Maraschino cherry cokes at the age of six, making the rounds with my father (R.I.P.) at most of the bars in Greenwich Village. Incredible Organ, Harmonica, and of course lyrics and vocals.

148

2. Janis Joplin - “Cry Baby” Brings back memories of my mother (R.I.P.) who loved singing Janis in addition to Billy Holiday all the time. Singing from the heart at its finest. 3. Jimi Hendrix - “Little Wing” This is from when I first started checking that funny smell and crazy noise coming from my brother’s room, which was painted purple with blue lights and had mad furry posters on the wall. Incredible guitar, vocals, bells and ridiculous drum rolls into the downbeat. Great 2 minutes and 23 second song! 4. Eric Clapton - “I Shot the Sheriff” Great song which turned me on to Reggae and the incredible Bob Marley in addition to what my brother was smoking in his room. Bob wrote and recorded the amazing original but I’ve always loved both versions. 5. Buffalo Springfield - “For What It’s Worth” Simple hypnotic guitar riff and groove with lyrics and message that is just as relevant nowadays. 6. David Essex - “Rock On” This is a great song that I remember hearing while playing skelly on my block as a kid. It always bugged me out, Jimmy Dean!? James Dean!? 7. Creedence Clearwater Revival - “Fortunate Son” I remember driving to the beach with my family hearing this song on WABC(AM)and thinking John Fogerty was black. Great song! Great lyrics! Great voice! 8. Thin Lizzy - “The Boys are Back in Town” I heard this song around the time I was hanging out at Station Break Arcade in Penn Station before sneaking in the side door of Madison Square Garden for concerts, Knicks and Rangers games on some beer muscle type shit. 9. The Police - “Voices Inside My Head” Just a dope track with chant-like vocals and delayed guitar and drums that always caught my ear. Love this shit! 10. Heart - “Baracuda” This was me and my 2 week girlfriend from New Jersey’s favorite shit! She liked “It’s a S S S Saturday Niiiiight” by The Bay City Rollers also? Go figure? Damn, I’m getting old. This list could go on for ever...

150

152

Some Kind of Cover Band The Wild Angels Riders Zakir Love Song Posters Flyers The Art of Life as a Roadie Apple Bong 101 Graffiti Hardcore Fun Lovinʼ Criminal Rock Tease Tops Bounty Hunter

Words Sir Frank Photo Bounty Hunter

In his toy store Bounty Hunter- Nagasaki born, Punk DJ Hikaru has combined his punk spirit and artistic sense into creating a new style of toys. The store’s original toy has been the most difficult item to get even after 10 years since the first store opened in Tokyo. Currently, Bounty Hunter has 2 more store locations: Nagoya and Osaka. Furthermore, Hikaru has started a Bounty Hunter clothing line. As his interest in life grows, the Bounty Hunter’s world continues expanding. 151: Can you tell us about how you got into Punk Rock? BH: I found out about Punk Rock from the Sex Pistols when I was in Junior High School. I don’t think I would be here if I hadn’t watched their movie The Great Rock’n’roll Swindle, its impact was so overwhelming, it totally changed my life. 151: How did you get into fashion? BH: I’ve always enjoyed drawing or creating since when I was a child,

so I studied design in High School. I’m from the countryside, so there wasn’t enough info about fashion and music, and I had to go to Fukuoka city to buy cool clothes. Punk clothing was expensive, and it was too far to commute often, so I started making my own clothes. After I graduated High School I went to Bunkafukusougakuin in Tokyo; it’s like a fashion institute. 151: What happened after you moved to Tokyo?

BH: I knew about the event London Night even before I moved to Tokyo. I started going to the event all the time, and eventually met the organizer and DJ, Kensho Onuki. Then I started to DJ. I went to school everyday and hung out every night. There were often times when I went to school straight from the party without getting any sleep. I was sleeping on the street in front of school. It wasn’t a big deal back then because I was young. It’s going to be 25th anniversary for London Night this year, and it’s been 16 years since I started DJing there every week. I’m amazed of myself that I haven’t gotten tired of Punk after all these years. 151: How do you feel about London Night after watching it for 16 years? BH: There used to more interesting and crazy people, but I can’t really see what people like anymore. It seems to me that people don’t like insisting on what they like and are thinking it’s not so stylish to specify anything, that it’s easier to just say ‘I like everything’. 151: Can you tell us about your favorite Punk band and its influence on you? BH: I’ve always loved Rancid. I had an opportunity to interview them for the TV show, Punk Rock TV when they came to Japan for the second time. We’ve become good friends ever since. I love their personality, sound, and style. I even went to visit some members at the end of last year. 151: Can you tell us about how Bounty Hunter got started? BH: I got into a car accident, so I went

154

back to my hometown for a while. One day, a friend of mine asked me if I wanted to open a toy store. I always liked toys, so that lead me to open a toy store after I came back to Tokyo. Somehow, for better or worse, online shopping has advanced so much, and there isn’t much necessity for people to come to the store. Eventually, the sale of toys started declining. We had to come up with a new idea, so we decided to create our own original Bounty Hunter toys. 151: You’ve been collaborating with Disney, how do you feel about that? BH: It seems like Punk hates things like Disney, but I really liked it when I thought of it. I guess it goes for everything, but I like the bad guy that carries the shadow, because if there is any opponent, the hero will be just one crazy guy. 151: What have you been doing recently? BH: I’ve been making custom leather jackets, painting them by hand and decorating them with studs. I have over 50 of them. I like the feeling of analogical style, like drawing by hand instead of printing it, or old and dirty looks. I see the power in it. I also like designs from the early 80s, when Punk was changing into Hardcore. 151: What is your future plan? BH: Nothing will change. But I’ve been thinking lately that I did a 360. It looks like things have been getting back to where I started. I’m not bored, and everything is fun. I’m just doing whatever I want to do everyday.

www.bounty-hunter.com

156

158

weactivist Gino Iannucci doing the Crayfish at the crayfish party, Vasquez Rocks , LA. check out the rest of the crayfish parties at

www.thecrayﬁshparty.com www.weclothing.com we are the superlative conspiracy

The crayfish party is a ritual held every August, meant to compensate the Swedish people for once again being abandoned by summer. In the name of a backward walking creature, exquisitely tasting of salt, the Swedes let each other behave in ways not accepted otherwise. Dressing silly, singing out loud and making out with inappropriate persons is all very well this night. The natives thirst for summer sun is successfully quenched with schnapps, and while saluting the next drink with a ridiculous song, the Swedes shine a greasy smile, looking forward to six months or more of liquid light-therapy.

SKÅL!

160