Defination:
Punk: Being your self and not giving a fuck what
people think about you or say about you.
So where did the word "punk" originate from? Not from the 70s, as most of you think.
Most envision Johnny "Rotten" Lydon of the Sex Pistols wearing a safety pin
in his ear as a defining moment. Punk rock man.
But where did the slang word originate from?
Let's take a stroll down memory lane, that is if you still have one. Back in 40's
and early 50's there were a series of films and then a television show, first
titled "The Dead End Kids," then later "The Bowery Boys".
You can thank Leo Dorcey and his cohorts for uttering the word
as part of their Brooklyn-ese vocabulary.
You could say James Dean and Sal Mineo were punks from the film
"Rebel Without A Cause". The hairstyles gave it away. Slicked back on the
sides and the pompadour in front. That lasted all the way through the 60's.
In the 70's hair grew, but in the 80's it became the mohawk, and from
that point all the way up to today, a shaved head signifies at least the look.
And what was a "punk"? Was it an attitude?
But, of course it was and still is.
To the masses and the church going public, a punk was a juvenile
delinquent, later called a "greaser". The look was different also, as
compared to the 70's through todays. Punk spelled trouble.
Athletic types would love to beat up on punks. Punks would love to
beat up on athletes, and bookworms.
It was simply a progression of lifestyle clash.
Perfect name for the next real "punk" rock band, The Clash, of course.
Less attitude, but a hell of a lot better musically.
Was "Punky Brewster" a punk? No, but a nice use-age of the word
anyway. Was "Cow punk" for real? I don't think so.
Maybe Scott Goddard would dispute that.
The implications of "punk" in society has left its mark in society.
No doubt about that. Let's slice it up into different categories, shall we.
Punk-a-loco: The lowest form. Has the look. Has very little brains.
Acts before thinking. Usually from a poor background, and has little common sense.
Punk-a-boo: Has the look, and that's all. Just wants attention.
Could be the man or woman that has so many
metal piercings, but that is just for self-expressionism.
Punk-ability: Has a realism about them, and maybe the look.
Maybe not. But the attitude is in check.
Punka-alicious: The true punk. Has the look in their eyes.
Is bright, has a 'tude, and make no mistake, taken seriously.
Oh, that would be me. lol
A true punk is considered a "bad boy" in society's eyes. Many women
love them. Many clean cut men despise them.
"Bad boy's" from Robert Mitchum to Sean Penn and so many more
are adored by the mass appeal audience in film.
Shaving your head into a mohawk like DeNiro did in "Taxi Driver"
didn't make him punk, although for looks it had a point, it just made him a wacko.
Punk doesn't mean that you have to prove a point to anyone or everyone.
On the other hand, punk is most definitely a lifestyle. Be it looks or attitude.
My belief is that as a true punk, I really don't even know it. It is just pointed
out to me over and over, how punk I am. Not just punk rock. That is just
an expression. Example. "He's so punk rock". Now that doesn't mean
I sit around and dwell on the music from the early days of punk.
Of course not. Dig it. I like all styles of music. Okay, so maybe
I'm a bit hard edged in my tastes. That's just me.
The Southern California so called "Pop Punk" of the 90's which still is
remarkably around today, led by Blink 182, Green Day, etc
originally, was never my cup of tea, but the masses
ate it up and are still lapping it up today.
To me, someone like New England white boy rapper Sage Francis is
much more punk, musically, then 90% of the musicians trying
to recreate the old sound in 2010.
He is a wordsmith. His prose and style is so punk. Believable.
Punk is very much a state of mind. The thousands that recently converged
in the small town of Duisburg, Germany went under the guise
of a festival called "The Love Parade". Many were trampled to death due to
a poor setup in security and a tunnel that was a death trap.
The music they went to see was not what you would call
punk rock, it was an electronic music festival instead.
But, very punk in the whole scheme of things. The promoter, who could
not do the festival anymore in Berlin, after years of leaving rubbish in the
streets, took his caravan to a city that had a mayor Adolf Sauerland who
okayed it so the town could make money.
Most likely according to report's, this was the last festival.
As an observer, this was absolutely 'punk rock' from the beginning to the fatal end.
The new punk, is to not drink, not do drugs, and eat healthy, so you will live
longer and your views will be heard for many years to come. Yes my friends,
being self destructive is now the norm.
Hope I have put some of the pages back in for you. Now it is time for me
to take a nice long walk. Come home and drink der wasser, eat some fruit,
and crank some Rammstein loud.
Note: I wrote this piece for an upcoming reborn issue of
Howard Salmon's SLIT MAGAZINE.
Howard is an accomplished author and writer.
He began SLIT MAGAZINE in the early 80s in Tucson, Arizona.
The last issues were incorporated in my magazine NEWSREAL.
One of my oldest music friends and personal friend is an American music icon.
He has a discography of over 30 albums, and is known well in Europe
and big cities and little hamlets in America. We met in 1980.
He splits his personal life between Tucson, Arizona, and Denmark.
He recently sent me the liner notes for the re release of Giant Sand's very first album
"Valley Of Rain". I am running this, because it is a story, not just album note liners.
It shows the inside of a musician determined. Very determined. The result,
from embryo to now a full blown adult. This is classic, so read on.
~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~
Howe Gelb
“Valley Of Rain” was the first Giant Sand record and was released in 1985,
but a country record done a year earlier was self titled from another band name
of mine called “ The Band of… Blacky Ranchette”.
They were each recorded for 400 dollars and in a day and a half at a Los Angeles
8 track studio called the Control Center.
The previous line-up called Giant Sandworms had just broken apart in Tucson
and I wanted to make good on a gig that was already set up in Los Angeles at
a venue called Madam Wongs. so me and bassist Scott Garber headed out to
try and play it no matter what. Tucsonan Winston Watson was now living out in
LA and helped us out on drums that night and came with us the next day into
the same studio where I had earlier recorded the country record. We had 30 minutes
worth of tape like the country record and was also engineered by Ricky Mix (Novak).
Way later after both sessions were recorded, I got separate label offers for
each and decided to move to Los Angeles from Tucson to help them along.
This was also how I learned how to make records. Record them fast and improvise
through any problems, then license them out for 3 to 5 years with a small advance.
A French label called New Rose was going to release the country record and
Enigma records in Torrence (Los Angeles suburb) was going to release
Giant Sand in the states while Zippo records was going to release it in England.
We drove across the desert the 9 hours to Hollywood to accept the label’s invitation
to come to the release party of “The Screamin’ Sirens” at Club Lingerie.
When I parked my van, I got a feeling it was going to get broken into to
and told Scott. (I had emptied my stuff out of the van earlier
but Scott still had his stuff in there.)
After a night of drinking off the desert run, we found the van was busted into and
all of Scott’s stuff was gone. So we drove to Canter’s Deli to sober up.
then and there I realized I forgot to remove the master tapes from both
sessions that I had hid under the couch in the van. When I went out to
check, only 2 out of the 4 reels were there. a pot of cactus that
Jonathan L gave me to deliver for him had saved 2 of the reels that
rolled behind it and probably gave the intruder a good poke in the dark.
The final mixed master reel of Giant Sand’s “Valley Of Rain” was gone, and so
was the pre-mixed tape of the “…Blacky Ranchette” session. But I had at least
one reel of each session to work with and was able to continue on.
The next morning I decided to go back to where the van was broken into and
search the area for the stuff that was stolen, including my “address book” with
all my contact phone numbers of the labels that wanted these records.
When we got to the parking spot on Wilcox, I realized we had parked in front
of a dingy run down transient hotel. I was searching a trash container outside
when an older rail thin dude came out of the hotel and figured I’d see what he
knew about any of it. I looked him squarely in the eye and asked him if he’d
seen an address book laying around here. Yes he did. When he turned to go
back into the rank hotel, Scott excitedly pointed out that that dude was wearing
his Giant Sandworm t-shirt! (which I hadn’t noticed.)
He came out with my book of numbers. just the fake leather cover was ripped
off it. He said it was in a pile of other stuff at the bottom of some stairs in the
dark hotel. We went in with him to check it out. it was shadow land in there
and very funky. When we headed back out into the bright daylight to cut a deal
I told the man that if he could come up with any of the missing reels I would
pay him 50 bucks. He was game. As I went to pay him 10 bucks for my
address book the police pulled up behind with guns drawn and told us not
to move. (I was just able to remove a forgotten “9 hour desert drive doob”
from my pocket) and chuck it into the weeds before being spread eagle
on the squad car and searched. They thought they were making a drug bust
when I handed that dude the cash.
That was my first 24 hours of joining the recording industry in Los Angeles.
We continued our deal with the French cowboy record and with the Los Angeles
rock record, but had to add several more songs to bolster its length. And
that’s where we got Tommy Larkins to drum on the rest of the material
and met Eric Westfall at ‘Mad Dog Studios’, who would go on to co produce
and engineer the next umpteen Giant Sand records.
We had to re mix the original session tape there too and it didn’t come out
quite like we had it the first time. But this year Jim Blackwood found the
original mixes on a cassette tape that was buried in boxes of old tapes.
And then he transferred it and kept the cassette sensibilities that now sound
way more wonderful unique then the typical digital recording, especially
when the tape crumples perfectly in “Tumble And Tear” the way cassettes
used to do way back when we thought they sounded inferior, but now
sounding superior and sweet to hear in all its hissing glory.
Winston went on to drum for Bob Dylan for almost 5 years, Tommy is still
playing with Jonathan Richman, and Scott lives and plays in Austin.
Chris Cacavas who sat in on piano with the title track
is living and playing in Germany.
I changed the song order slightly because I can. Originally there was no
side A listed on the record: just side B and side C. I think it was my way of
illuminating the fact that I had officially left the desert and was then living
relatively B side the C side. Anyhow, now there is only one side. Just A side.
-Howe Gelb
Funny, as I was reading one of the only two english written magazines
in our flat, I had an epiphany.
Both, Gabrielle bought at Heathrow Airport on her trip to Phoenix
back in January of this year.
One is National Geographic, and the other was Time Magazine.
It was in TM that I read this article last night, and it inspired me,
or maybe it brought me down a bit. The jury is out.
I still don't know yet how I feel.
Joel Stein, who writes the last column in the back of TM,
"The Awesome Column", basically tears down our fascination
with video calling, and mainly the one time new breakthrough of Skype.
As Stein weaves between tongue and cheek-is-m's, and hardcore
opinions that run more negative than positive, me,
as one who now has to rely on the once future outlet, I am really thinking.
Skype, who ironically is one of my advertisers on my website www.jlradio.com
happens to be also my only open line to the world, as far as having a real
conversation with friends and acquaintances, other than
e-mail and instant messaging.
He let's us know that all our interest in the future devices may have
failed us in some areas. He doesn't like the face to face glamour of webcams.
Being a newer Skype user since I moved across an ocean and far removed
from relatives, friends and acquaintances, I need it, I want, and
sometimes I love it. The webcam is not really my thing,
but the PC to PC talking real time is.
Stein really is over the top on his love of texting.
He describes using Skype is too stagnant for him. He prefers to wash
dishes, do chores while on Skype or his cell phone, as to sitting still at his PC.
In the end he is running away from Skype and instills in his readers mind that
better to text while being fidgety. He has a great analogy that
incorporates Star Trek being one of the early pioneers of
video conferencing. He is clever with how he describes
Bones and Jim, and especially Sulu would be checking out
GoFugYourself.com while Bones and Jim were using the video only 20
yards from each other. Funny. A good titter there, but overall he
bashes the new technology so much I wonder how he got to have a
lofty position at Time.
Don't take it wrong though, he had me riveted reading his article.
When I lived in the states, I was a phone junkie. Big time. I was usually
the one who initiated at least 80% of the calls. My
attitude, is/was, why wait. Dial and pick up the phone.
Direct communication.
Yes, I used all the other outlets too. E-mail, although I get depressed
when I have to type an e-mail longer than a couple of small paragraphs.
I love instant messaging. I still use them most of them. AOL and MSN
are my preferred options. But I love the instant gratification of not only
Skype and MSN and let's not forget Mac users, with iChat.
The latter two also have webcam capabilities.
These are free. All of them. Are they great? Not always.
Skype has drop outs and fades, MSN doesn't always work.
The one that seems to be most dependable is iChat, but alas, so few
people have it, it is gets little usage.
At this point, maybe my excitement about Skype is diminishing as fast
as an ice pop in summer time. The flavor goes quickly.
I might point out, I am not a big fan of the webcam either, but the
phone chat PC to PC is essential to me.
I am now in my fourth month in Germany, and this is where I will be
the rest of my life. So, one would think, hey, JL is really into Skype.
I am, but have found out that most that I have asked to join and let's tawk,
have either had an account from the beginning, but have not used it for so long,
they can't remember their password. At first I thought that was funny
as one by one I was told that, but I do understand.
The other thing I understand with reservation, is that people cannot or
will not find the time, mainly because using Skype or the others mentioned
above require sitting stationary for the duration of PC phone chatting.
The main problem is not setting up an account with Skype, that takes
only minutes, it just isn't really important to most.
They don't find what was once the future, an important tool for their lives.
I would imagine the most usage is by Military persons and their families.
They I am sure, rave about it, but let's face it, the large general
population could care less.
So where does that put me? I suppose in a position where I will in time lose
many friends, or have very little contact with them at best.
This I will accept. I have to. There are no other alternatives.
So I guess Joel Stein, I have you to thank for waking me up to reality that not
all on this earth feel compelled to talk, but would rather instant message,
text, and of course the occasional e-mail.
Skype, you should pay me for being a card carrying fan,
but very few are buying into your once great idea.
The next great idea might come from the cellular phone companies.
Free international calls, but with a price. While you are talking, they keep flashing advertisements on your phone or every time you open it up.
Yo, I would accept that. Bet your ass I would.
Advertising is everywhere, so no problemo.
The title refers to our return to the vast ocean known as Osstee (Baltic Sea).
"Klappe die Zweite" translates to "take two", like in the movies.
As the summer kicks in, the weather has climbed to the high eighties and low ninety's.
So, on a beautiful Sunday June 27, we decided to go back to Osstee, as we did
weeks ago. The sun was bright, with pillow like clouds, around mid-eighties.
Before I go any further, I must tell you that this is just as much about a
Navigation system and Fussball (Soccer), as it is about the ocean.
On this occasion, we decided to leave earlier than the last time. 9:30 am should
get us to Ahlbeck by maybe 12:30, so we will have plenty of time on the
beach and just a more relaxing day than the last time.
Gabrielle set the Navigation system for Ahlbeck and we left Berlin. 3 hours have
gone by and we are close, Or we thought so. We ended up in small town after town
promising we are getting closer. One thing we didn't know.
There are two, not one, but two Ahlbeck's, one an hour further away, and
no ocean in site. At one point we are in a town and the Navigator had
me driving up a driveway and around in a circle of neatlty cropped high
hedges. Fuck! They were cool looking, but, FUCK!
The red flag is the wrong place. The blue flag is the correct one
You gotta be kidding! So after a bit of frustration, Gabrielle reset the
Navigator for Usedom, a town we were familiar with from the last trip.
Lesson learned: Next time, tell the Navigator, Usedom please.
At last at 2:20 pm we pulled into Ahlbeck, and were very lucky to get
a superb parking spot and then on to the beach!
One thing you need to know is that, and I forgot to mention this
in my last post, is that you drive 5 kilometers through an incredible
forrest of tall trees and a narrow road. It's awesome. Forrest, and then
there is this fantastic ocean. The trees keep the air so healthy and clean.
As we lay on our blanket soaking up the son, I noticed something
I didn't last time, most likely because there were many more
people on this day. I thought I was on a nude beach. Not more than
50 feet was a woman in her 60's completely naked on top. Just sitting there
and chatting with her friend, another woman. Her friend had a top on.
Frankly, she was an ugly site, but hey, she had the guts to do it.
A little further away was a boy about 6, running around with no
bathing suit and his little dong hanging out. To me, this was, so
this is Germany? Ha. Pretty funny. You had to be there.
We now had long forgotten about the longer trip to our new paradise. The only
thing left was to eat by the ocean and watch Germany take on England
in the World Cup. Big game, in Germany, no doubt about it.
I am a lucky man. My lady loves Fussball and follows it religiously. She
doesn't just watch Germany, but as many games as possible. She even keeps
a scorecard of all matches, writing in all scores as the Cup progresses.
She also loves boxing. She into these two sports.
So, naturally we had to watch the big game that afternoon in
Ahlbeck, not at home. Ah, eat and watch the game. Doesn't get
any better than this. We are both in heaven.
Keep in mind, me, as an American, I cannot turn on on ESPN or
any other sports channel in Berlin. I will confess, due to my
love of Baseball, I subscibe to MLB.TV and keep up with my
favorite sport, team, Los Angeles Dodgers, and my fantasy team
on Yahoo. Sure I can look on the net about all sports, but this is
enough for me. I don't want to waste too much time on TV.
We found this rustic big huge pub/eatery called Strandcasino.
It is located at Dunenstrasse 57
17419 Seebad-Ahlbeck 038378/333 44
We ate hamburgers, and salad and watched the game on
a regular size television with about 30 others. All different ages.
Very quiet people, but when Germany scored the place erupted with joy.
England lost 4-1 and has gone home.
To sum up the day. It was a great day.
Next time, and there will be another time soon,
enter Usedom into the Navigator. Simply that.
