X

In highschool I had an old X "Los Angeles" tape I used to listen to a fair amount, but it wasn't until I saw their movie "X: The Unheard Music" that I really got some insight into the band's brilliance. Here's part of a review of the movie from the Chicago Tribune that came out when the movie was released back in 1986:

As unconventional as the band it portrays, "The Unheard Music" is an impressionistic, subjective semidocumentary. Writer-director W.T. Morgan spent nearly five years making the film, beginning shortly after the release of the group's first album, "Los Angeles," and ending prior to the release of its most recent album, "Ain't Love Grand?"

"This is not a documentary," Morgan said in a recent interview at the offices of Skouras films, the company releasing "The Unheard Music." "For me it's more a punk art film with lots of music. It's an attempt to try to cover the subject from a lot of angles, sort of like (Picasso's) 'Guernica.'

"It would be a disgrace to do this as a typical documentary. This story needs a treatment as radical as the story itself. A lot of punk music is a reaction to boredom, to the musical pollution they play on the radio. I feel the same about films today; it's wallpaper, no danger or adventure."

The band toured the same year. This poster is from their show at The Moore Theater in downtown Seattle, the first time I saw X live. They were excellent! And it's funny the Red Chili Peppers opened... at the time they were most known for the "Real Men Don't Kill Coyotes" song and video and Flea showing up in the movie "Suburbia," who could have known they'd get so big?

Jawbox

Silver Spring, Maryland is basically known for two things, being really close to Washington D.C. and as the home of melodic punk superstars Jawbox. Jawbox was formed in 1989 after Government Issue broke up and J. Robbins was looking for a new band. Housemates Kim Coletta and Adam Wade joined with Robbins on bass and drums for the first incarnation of the band, which self-released their first single and album ("Grippe") on their own DeSoto Records. Bill Barbot joined the band as a second guitarist for the band's second album, and later when drummer Wade left to play for Shudder To Think, Zach Barocas took over on drums. Tons of records and tours later, the band became a Dischord Records staple before jumping to a major label in 1994. At the time there was a lot of finger pointing and the word "sellout" was definitely uttered, but the band weathered on touring and releasing albums on Atlantic until they eventually broke up in 1997. These photos I shot when the band played Rkcndy in the mid-'90s.

Robbins and Barbot went on to form Burning Airlines.

Bad Religion

Bad Religion's 1988 album "Suffer" is credited by many to be the album that resurrected the California punk rock scene. While I don't know about that, I do know it had a profound effect on my life. It's one of those records that completely blew me away from the lyrics to the energy of the music. "Suffer" was packed with tight crunchy hardcore punk songs, fantastic melodies and backup vocals, insightful ideas, and pissed off spirit that still gave listeners hope. For me it was a kick in the pants at a time when I needed motivation. Listening to Bad Religion not only made we want to destroy things, but it made want to rebuild them, better and stronger than they were before. "Suffer" surely marked Bad Religion's comeback from their glory in the early '80s, the followed it up with "No Control" in 1989 and "Against the Grain" in 1990, both great albums, then I think to some extent they fell into a rut by releasing too many albums in quick succession that sounded too much alike, it watered down their impact. But in the tail end of the '80s and early '90s, I absolutely loved this band!

This flyer was from a fairly weird show Bad Religion played on the "Against the Grain" tour, most likely in January of 1991. I think it was the only show ever held in this venue in downtown Seattle, which had a huge gymnasium type room with hard wood floors and a 4 foot stage. My friend Charlie and I got a ride to the show with this guy Dan Brougher we used to know and we hung all out during the first band in his car gulping down 40s to gear up for the show. We were big Coffin Break fans, we we went in for them. Then Skin Yard played. Now, I liked Skin Yard a lot, but they were not a straight up punk band. They played more what I'd call heavy psychedelic punk... which seemed odd to sandwich between Coffin Break and Bad Religion, but somehow it worked that night, I think they turn their ups to eleven and played faster and louder than usual. Then Bad Religion played and they totally destroyed. My god. They played so many songs off their early albums in rapid succession it was amazing. Seeing as most of their songs clocked in under two minutes, I got to hear most of my favorite songs of "Suffer" and "How Could Hell Be Any Worse?" (their first LP). I wouldn't be surprised if their was over 30 songs. It was a fantastic show I remember to this day, some 16 years later.

The Recordbreakers

The Recordbreakers live at Pho Bang!

Kathleen Hanna of Bikini Kill in a pussy cat sweater

This is a photo of Bikini Kill live in the mid-'90s, I think at Seattle's Velvet Elvis Theater. I remember the show because of Kathleen Hanna's scary cat Christmas-type sweater. She made comments about pussy power that were pretty funny in relation to the sweater, then eventually said she was going to take it off, but apologized to the crowd ahead of time that she was wearing a sports bra instead of something sexier. Ha!

IMIJ

IMIJ was a Seattle band around in the early '90s that took their name from Jimi Hendrix, spelling his first name backwards. The singer's name was Shannon and they had sort of a punk, funk, rock hybrid going on... they'd play with similar bands like Sweaty Nipples occasionally, but mostly with Rathouse bands like The Gits and Hammerbox. I'm not sure if they ever put an album out (I could find one mention of "In Gods You Lust" in a profile of the drummer online, but no other confirmation of it, I'm gonna do some digging with ex-band members). They did have a song entitled "Friday" on the compilation LP/CD "Power Flush: San Francisco, Seattle & You." I probably saw the band live probably half a dozen times and remember partying with the singer outside of a punk show or two, she was even louder than me. These photos were from when the band played live in June of 1992 at the University District Street Fair.

Band members: Shannon on vocals, Cris Omowale on guitar, Lonnie King on guitar, Cedric Ross on bass and Davee C on drums

Zeke

Zeke, live in I think Tom's backyard in the late-'90s. Nothing like punk rock, skateboarding, beers and a bbq all happening at once!