Life Harvester #22: The Ramones, H2O, Less Than Jake, 25 Ta Life, Blanks 77, US Bombs, Social Distortion
Life Harvester is written by Colin Hagendorf and edited by Rebecca Giordano. This is the email version of a print publication available for low-cost individual subscription via Paypal or on Patreon. Life Harvester subscriptions are free to prisoners. If you know an incarcerated person who would like to receive a newsletter every month, get in touch with me directly and I’ll take care of it.
WHY AM I DOING THIS?
For the first time since I began this project I really didn’t want to write this issue. Becca says if I write about not wanting to write I might be able to learn why I don’t want to write, but she also said, “Look, you just started progesterone and a new SSRI within a week of each other. Your brain is broken.” So, in the spirit of generosity, I’m giving myself a mulligan this month and printing an old favorite piece of writing that many Life Harvester readers will be unfamiliar with.
The following are reviews of some punk shows I went to as a teen in the 90s, that I wrote from memory when I was 29. At the time I was recently sober, writing a book, and clinging to a crumbling relationship with someone who hated my active social life. These factors coalesced into a sort of sheltering-in-place in my Brooklyn apartment. It was mostly an endless monotony of chain smoking at my desk during the day and lying awake in bed unable to sleep at night, occasionally punctuated with a trip to the Key Foods for yogurt or a cigarette on the stoop with my friend Jamel. In many ways, that time was not so different from now, though the circumstances of my current confinement are vastly superior, both materially and emotionally. I didn’t want to write then, either. I pulled these reviews out of the dark recesses of my addled mind late one night as a favor to a friend. Now I'm pulling them out again as a favor to myself. Making t’shuvah to me, like I talked about last month. Our social lives have been uprooted for almost a year, it makes sense that many of us have turned to memory to keep track of who we are. The past is a bad place to wallow but it’s nice to take a stroll there every so often.
This piece was originally published in issue 10 of Ben Trogdon’s NUTS!, which is worth tracking down if you can find it. NUTS! was a newspaper-size foldout punk zine featuring art, photography, writing, and band interviews from just about every true freak involved in US punk from 2002-2017. It’s a chaotic and comprehensive document of a generation of punks. One day, I’ll write about it in the way that it deserves. The issues are long out of print, but you can still find some from Antiquated Future out of Portland. See what Ben’s working on now at tattoopunkfanzine.com. Happy birthday to Hannah Arendt, Ursula LeGuin, and the love of my life and editor of this fanzine, Rebecca Giordano.
SHOW REVIEWS
Ramones Final Tour - Capitol Theater, Port Chester, NY, 1996 My friend Jared invited me to come with him to this show for his Bar Mitzvah. Jared was my best friend for a while. I liked going to his house because we’d watch R-Rated movies and look at his older brother's condoms. We used to sit in his room and listen to the Geto Boys and play with his pet salamander. I don't remember why we stopped being friends. At one point during this Ramones show some dude started smoking weed and Jared said “it smells like my dad’s office in here.” This was the first time I moshed.
The Toasters, Spring Heeled Jack, Jiker - 7 Willow St, Port Chester, NY, 1997 My dad and my uncle Kevin took me and my friends to this show because they’d loved ska in the 80s and because I was a child. I was scared they were gonna try and hang out with me but they just drank at the bar the whole time. I liked the Toasters a lot and they played my favorite song "Mona" which I had daydreams of learning how to play on guitar and then playing at the 8th Grade Talent Show because then my 8th grade crush Zoe would fall in love with me finally. I had never heard Spring Heeled Jack, but I bought their t-shirt before they even played because I liked that they used the rebel alliance logo from Star Wars. I was in the middle of a really tough campaign in the Star Wars tabletop roleplaying game that my friend Tony was DMing. He didn't come to the show because he didn't like music and soon after this I stopped hanging out with him because I got into doing drugs and being punk and Tony just wanted to play Final Fantasy which I thought wasn't cool anymore. I think he’s a doctor now. Jiker were from Connecticut and pretended to be from Canada.
The Specials - The Globe Theater, Stamford, CT, 1997 I won two tickets to see the Specials from Tunnel One the ska radio show on WNYU, which was every Thursday night right after its punk counterpart Crucial Chaos. I listened to both religiously and there’s probably still a box of cassette tapes I dubbed of both shows sitting in my parent's basement. I went to the show with my dad. We got to the venue SO EARLY to claim our prize and this fucking like, nineteen year old intern at the door wouldn't let me in because I wasn't eighteen. My dad was like, "I'm his dad," but the dude would not budge. I cried in the car and my dad took me to an Indian buffet as a small consolation and then I think we went to see Face/Off.
H2O Matinee - 7 Willow St, Port Chester, NY 1997 I remember looking at H2O album covers and imagining what they would sound like and then being really surprised at this show that they sounded just like the Bouncing Souls. Biggest disjuncture between aesthetic and sound this side of the Grateful Dead. During the afternoon before this show I smoked an entire pack of Kamel Red Lights because I was trying to become a smoker but didn't know how to do it yet and so I just smoked them all in a row. At one point I was talking to my friends Adam and Tre (in 1997 everyone had a friend named Tre) and I felt like I was gonna have a puke burp. I’m a long-winded storyteller, so I put my index finger up to my mouth to gesture "one second" so they wouldn't stop paying attention to me while I burped up some puke and then swallowed it and then kept talking. But instead of having a puke burp I had a whole puke! It came out at a really high velocity and filled my cheeks and then burst out my mouth. My finger split the stream, so it hit both Adam and Tre in the chest. I have a really clear memory of finishing puking into a urinal and some whack straight edge dude telling me I was lucky I looked so pathetic right now with my mohawk all crumpled up in the urinal water, because it was the only thing that saved me from him kicking my ass for getting a little spritz of barf on his new Adidas.
Less Than Jake - 7 Willow St, Port Chester NY 1997 I fought like hell with my dad to get him to drop me off around the corner from this show, because I knew there would be a line outside the club and I didn’t want other kids to see that I had parents. I think I was wearing my new Toy Dolls t-shirt I got on St Marks Pl that I used to wear all the time. I didn’t bring a jacket because I knew it would be hot in there, and there was no good reason to go outside once the show had started. As we pulled in front of the club, my father and I both noticed a huge line outside. I was chagrined at the notion of all of these people seeing me get out of his car, he was bothered by something else. He was like, “why don’t you let me wait in line and get your ticket for you? It’s cold.” I was all, “you don’t know anything, there’s not a ticket they just stamp your hand.” And he was like, “well then borrow my jacket,” which was one of those smooth leather jackets like Ross from Friends, so I was all, “ewww no. I hate you. Leave me alone,” and got out of the car. Like ten minutes later I was most of the way through the line, and I noticed this jostling towards the back but didn’t pay it any mind. The commotion seemed to be moving towards me but I didn’t really care and then all of a sudden there was my dad, standing in front of me, holding out a heather grey hoodie that said CAPE COD across the chest. “Here just take this, I don’t care if you lose it. It’s so cold out here this is ridiculous.” I pretended I didn’t know him, spoke through gritted teeth. “UGH! I hate you. I don’t need a sweater. Go AWAY!” And then he looked at me, and said, “alright, see ya later, champ,” and he gave me one of those little playful slo-mo punches in the chin. I was fucking livid. That was the only time he had ever called me “champ” and the only time he ever did one of those stupid chin punches. The whole show was ruined because between bands, when all the different cliques of kids would stand around in circles and smoke cigarettes and goof off, any time one of those groups of my peers would erupt into laughter, I’d imagine all the kids giving mock chin punches and sarcastically calling each other “champ.”
25 Ta Life Matinee - Coney Island High, NY, NY 1998 Me and my friend Sandy both bought the Black Star CD at Kim’s right before this show. Rick Ta Life had his whole face bandaged up and looked really scary. I think during one of the opening bands I jumped in the pit and earnestly tried doing some kung fu moves even though I was a little scrawndog. All the other dudes there looked like the Bushwackers from WWF. While 25 Ta Life was playing, me and Sandy started smoking a blunt at the back of the club and the bouncer freaked and threw us out. He said we were lucky we were just getting booted from the club and not getting our asses kicked by the throngs of terrifying edge dudes moshing like 100 feet away from us in an unventilated room. I think we split a 40 in Tompkins Square Park after that.
The Casualties, The Krays, LES Stitches - Tramps, NY, NY 1998 I took some codeine pills and drank a 22 of Ballentine and then slept under the Casualties merch table through this entire show.
LES Stitches, Blanks 77 - The Continental, NY, NY 1998 This show was on the first night of Channukah. I gave Mike Blanks a Poison's Greatest Hits tape I stole from Sam Goody that afternoon as a Channukah present. He thanked me and told me I should come to Jersey in the spring when he has a pool party in his mom's backyard, but then I never heard from him again. Me and Juan snuck in whiskey and drank in the bathroom. We also shoulder tapped grown ups to buy us beer from the bar, which everyone was willing to do. All the members from Blanks 77 and LES Stitches got in a rockette line arm-in-arm and sang the “12 Days of Christmas” a cappella but changed the words to be about booze and drugs. I just remember all of them saying "...and a vodkaaaaa craaanberryyyyyy." I thought it was really cool and grown up at the time, but in retrospect it seems so corny.
US Bombs - The Continental, NY, NY 1999 This show was during my week of seeing MTV celebrities everywhere. First me and Juan pushed over Jesse Camp on St Marks place for being a poser. It was probably one of the meanest things I've ever done and I think about it sometimes and feel bad, but we were 15. Then I was on the subway with my friend Milo and I was like, "dude, that's John Norris" and he went over and karate chopped him on the shoulder and came back and was like, "doesn't seem so tough to me," and I was like, "no, JOHN Norris, the MTV News guy. The karate guy is CHUCK Norris." Then at this US Bombs show the singer from Smashmouth and Carson Daly from TRL were there. All the punks kept trying to elbow Carson Daly in the face whenever he would get anywhere near the pit. My friend Andrew said he pantsed the guy from Smashmouth, but I didn't see it happen because I was outside with Tre and these two kids we met standing in front of the McDonald’s smoking a blunt and freestyle rapping.
Tons of Shows at ABC No Rio - Just about every Saturday from 1997-2000 I didn't watch any bands at all. Me and Juan bought 40s across the street and drank them in the backyard. I thought I looked like such a grown up but looking back at pictures of myself I can't believe those bodega guys ever let me buy any Hurricane. I probably played dice with Win the Skin for cigarettes. Maybe I stole a bottle of liquor from my parent's basement. Sometimes we smoked a dusted blunt. One time I puked cheese doodles down the sleeve of my leather jacket mid-makeout then kept making out. One time I came home after drinking almost an entire fifth of vodka and my dad asked me if I was drunk and I slurred “no” and he asked why my breath smelled and I said, "uhhhh, I just ate a buncha New York City hot dogs, pops." No Rio was basically the place they go in Pinocchio where all the kids smoke cigars and grow donkey ears. I stopped going when I was like 18 because I had "grown up" which meant I stopped caring about stuff and started listening to Social Distortion all the time and combing vaseline into my hair and hanging out at the pool hall thinking I was so mature. That was a pretty dark time in my life and I can't really appreciate Social D at all anymore because I blame Mike Ness for almost turning me into an apolitical rockabilly.
The Banned - CBGB’s, 2000 I don’t actually remember anything about this show at all but I asked some of my friends from back then for details from the time [redacted] smashed the toilet at CB’s with a sledgehammer. I remembered it as an act of retribution for some wrong that had happened to me at the hands of the club staff—we were always getting kicked out of there and swearing revenge on the skinhead bouncers—but apparently he just smashed it because he found a sledgehammer. I think I’m confusing it with the time I almost got arrested at [redacted] College and [redacted] got mad and smashed the windshield of an unattended cop car with a pickaxe and then kicked over an entire row of police motorcycles, but that was like, in 2002 or 2003. Anyway, the men’s bathroom at CB’s had a row of about five or six urinals along the right hand wall, and then at the back, there was a toilet, with no stall around it, on a small raised platform, probably about six inches high, like a stage. The show where [redacted] smashed the toilet had been put together by some friends of ours in the band The Banned and they were bummed that the toilet got smashed on a night where they felt responsible for the club. Apparently they knew [redacted] had did it and while they were playing, BJ, their bassist, who was older than all of us, like probably 24 or 25 when we were 17, got on the microphone and was like, “so, I just wanted to say that some ASSHOLE smashed the toilet in the club for NO GOOD REASON. Shitty behavior like that makes places like this that are willing to let us have shows think twice about booking our bands again and it is a DICKHEAD MOVE.” Then he paused for a few seconds and said, “[redacted], why don’t you get up here and sing this next one with us?” I think he was trying to do some Fugazi “I saw you eating ice cream” older punk uncle thing but [redacted] was so drunk he was just pumped to go sing a song. I don’t remember any of this, though it was recently recounted to me. What I do remember vividly is walking down the stairs and seeing [redacted], alone, standing on that riser, raising a sledgehammer over his head like Thor the Great God of Thunder and then just slamming it down on the toilet and the whole thing shattering and water going everywhere, which was pretty cool and definitely worth a semi-stern talking to from some older douche. And also, whatever, fuck CBGBs, right?
Social Distortion or maybe Mike Ness solo? - Irving Plaza, 2001 This show was right after 9/11. It was sold out but my Uncle Scott (RIP) was friends with the sound guy and got me on the list. I was really excited but when I got there the show was cancelled because Mike Ness had a sore throat. I had spent a while gussying myself up to look cool. I was wearing Chuck Taylors and my crisp dark blue Levis and this awesome plaid shirt I lost many years later at a weird New Age birthday party in Providence and my leather jacket and my hair was looking just right. I was standing around outside smoking and thinking about how cool I looked and all of a sudden looked around and realized that everyone else standing around looking cool and feeling disappointed that the show was cancelled looked JUST LIKE ME. Except they were all like, 40 and their pompadour hairstyles were augmented by receding hairlines. I felt an acute sense of embarrassment that I had spent so much time cultivating my rough and tumble rebel aesthetic only to look like a Rocker Dad and that was one of the final straws in me deciding to be really punk again.