Flaming Pablum

Manhattan of The Damned

The Damned first played New York City’s CBGB in 1977, the first British Punk band to do so (along with having been the first British Punk band to issue any vinyl). During that maiden voyage, the band were famously captured by erstwhile CBGB door-minder/photographer Roberta Bayley in the photo above, posing with great, snotty aplomb in front of the twin towers of the World Trade Center.

The band ended up playing four April nights at CBGB, sharing the bill with their Buckeye counterparts in the Dead Boys. Here’s a shot of them during one of those doubtlessly volatile evenings, this one taken by Ebet Roberts.

Today, meanwhile, in trawling around the `net, looking for nothing in particular, I came across this uncredited photo from the same era. I’m making some assumptions here but based on the line-up (with guitarist Brian James still in the ranks), I’m guessing this was snapped during that same span of April days. I have no idea who took it, but my question is – where in Manhattan was this photograph snapped?

I’d say the awning behind Dave Vanian on the left is a big clue, as are the terraced apartments behind Captain Sensible’s head. I have a hunch which I’m going to investigate, but where do YOU think it was taken?

The Damned are coming back to New York City (with original drummer Rat Scabies with them, this time) this May, but the next day is my son’s graduation, so I don’t think we’ll be going. We did just see them in October, anyway.

Meanwhile, here’s a taste of one of those shows…

Kneejerked: The Great Dig Dat Hole Swindle

Here’s a super-dupe niche bit of petty, punk-rock pedantry.

A little over a year ago, storied Chicago musician, engineer and iconoclast Steve Albini passed away from a heart attack at the age of 61.

An incalculably revered and respected figure, having helmed the recordings of seminal albums by bands like The Jesus Lizard, Naked Raygun, Urge Overkill, Pussy Galore, Bitch Magnet, Slint, Boss Hog, Pigface, Superchunk, Failure, Murder Inc., Volcano Suns, The Wedding Present, Fugazi, P.J. Harvey, the Pixies, The Breeders and, yes … do please wait for it …. Nirvana, to say nothing about the inimitable music he made with his own bands, namely Big Black, the regrettably named Rapeman and Shellac, Albini was responsible for not only a massive part of the sound of the American underground, but also the sensibility. Preceded by his no-bullshit approach, his bluntly black-humored worldview, his fierce convictions, and his pronounced reputation for outspokenness (which frequently cast him in an unfavorable light), Albini cut quite a profile. In later life, Albini recanted many of his earlier, deliberately polarizing statements and took accountability for unwittingly nurturing a community of self-styled “edgelords.” While it may not have totally absolved him, this was an admirable thing to do.

Several months after Albini’s death, an online entity called Steve Albini’s Closet was established to “distribute the treasures amassed by the late polymath,” with proceeds directed towards Albini’s estate.

Obviously, as a fan of the man, his music, and his legacy, I took a look at the offerings upon the site’s initial unveiling but given that most of the items were asking to fetch some pretty princely sums, I didn’t give the endeavor too much thought. At this stage of the proceedings, I really cannot afford to be spending any more of my money on collectors’ items, much less ones in a format I can no longer play in my home (having given my last turntable to my collegiate son). Our apartment is already clogged to the rafters with too many of my vinyl LPs, compact discs, DVDs and friggin’ CASSETTES (I have a hard time parting with these things). I simply can’t go accruing more.

Regardless, Steve Albini’s Closet has continued to roll out bits of ephemera that get dutifully snapped up by record nerds and Albini acolytes conceivably across the globe. I stopped looking.

As if on cue, two comrades of mine – named Ted W. and Jordan M. – went out of their way to highlight a particular new item from Steve Albini’s Closet, namely a test pressing of the one and only album Kneejerk by Dig Dat Hole, the noise-rock trio that pre-figured Cop Shoot Cop. Asking for a cool thousand dollars for this rare slab of vinyl, Steve Albini’s Closet describes the item thusly:

(Ruthless test press ‘87) unissued LP RECORDED BY STEVE of this band who served as the bridge between Shithaus and Cop Shoot Cop condition: NM/-

Well, I don’t really want to rain on anyone’s parade nor make anyone feel stupid about their purchases, but I have it on fairly solid authority that that’s incorrect.

Back in the summer of 2020, an enigmatic YouTuber named E3 uploaded the entirety of the so-called Adult Contemporary Mix of Kneejerk, augmented with an interview with Tod [A] and Phil Puleo (then of Cop Shoot Cop, formerly of Dig Dat Hole) with a fanzine called Ugly American. In it, they discussed the whole arc of that band and that album. I re-purposed same for a post here, and – as you’ll read – they quickly shot down (pardon the pun) the notion that Albini had anything to do with the recording of the original Kneejerk.

So, for the individual that dropped $1K on that test pressing thinking Steve Albini had a hand in it, … I'm sure it's a simple misunderstanding, but I’m afraid to say that you’ve been had.

ADDENDUM: In the wake of posting this, I reached out to Tod [A] (who I only just saw a couple of weeks back during our trip to Istanbul) to see if he could provide any more clarity. Tod writes....

Steve Albini definitely did not record the Dig Dat Hole Kneejerk LP. If he had, it would definitely have sounded much better. Jon Spencer gave us Steve's contact and we were in the process of planning a release of the record on Steve's label Ruthless, when Steve informed us that he was too busy with Big Black stuff, and probably would not be able to do a good job with the release. At the time, this his us like a 2X4, but looking back, I respect his honesty. 

Soon afterwards, Dig Dat Hole moved to NYC and morphed into Cop Shoot Cop.

There ya have it. 

Here's a taste of Dig Dat Hole, recorded for WFMU in 1987..

Poached By Bots? 10 Things You Could Do as a New York City High Schooler in the `80s That You Can't Do Today: REDUX

In early November of 2023, I was inspired by a conversation with a friend about how different the New York City of 2023 was for kids than the city of the early-to-mid 80’s had been for us. I quickly typed up a list of ten activities, places and things that routinely ate up my time as a petulant, acne-speckled teen (see above) that were (and remain) simply unavailable for teenagers today, and titled it – wait for it -- 10 Things You Could Do as a New York City High Schooler in the `80s That You Can't Do Today. You can read that by clicking right here.

This morning, meanwhile, upon firing up ye olde YouTube, I was presented with some content presumably tailored to my habits by the platform in question. On the top of that stack was the video below. Struck by the comparable theme to my aforementioned piece from 2023, I pressed play and was … well, nothing really surprises me anymore, but … suffice to say I was disappointed. Re-cast as if by some clumsy replicant, this video limply mines my original content, albeit thinly re-written by AI and given an incongruous and unconvincing voiceover.

Check it out below, but as the saying goes …. accept no substitutions for the real thing.

“NYC Tonight!”: GG Allin’s Final Gig, 32 Years Later

An inauspicious occasion to be sure, but this week marks the thirty-second anniversary of the death of GG Allin, who overdosed on heroin on June 28, 1993, after a typically tumultuous final performance at the infamous Gas Station -- aka the Space 2B Art Yard -- on East 2nd Street and Avenue B.

I’ve written about this fabled show probably too many times here, despite having not attended it. My friend Aaron went, though, and even appears in the notorious video of same – shot by Lower East Side legend, Clayton Patterson -- which I’ve posted here periodically. Like Chantal Akerman's "News from Home" (albeit in this way only), the GG Allin Gas Station footage frequently pops up on YouTube, only to be brusquely taken down in very short order. If you’re not up to watching it (which is perfectly understandable, if not advisable), it documents the fateful day, starting with an abortive soundcheck, a brief, brutal performance rife with the Geeg’s signature brand of ribaldry, and culminates in an ersatz riot that spills out onto the byways of Avenue B and the surrounding environs. Not exactly “The Last Waltz,” but you get the idea.

As mentioned in several other posts here over the years, while my pals and I were frequently tempted to go see GG Allin & The Murder Junkies play, the very real possibility of being physically assaulted by the star attraction, let alone getting messily pelted with greasy fistfuls of the man’s own freshly produced dung, always kept us away. If you have a hard time picturing that outlandishly unseemly scenario, might I recommend watching Tod Phillips’ grimly hilarious 1993 documentary, “Hated: GG Allin & The Murder Junkies.”

Thirty-two years later, you’d be exceptionally hard-pressed to find any evidence of the messy shenanigans of that day on that particular strip of Avenue B. The Gas Station was razed in 1995 to make way for a brutalist eyesore of a building with a Duane Read in its ground floor. I used to periodically suggest that the troubled ghost of GG Allin probably haunts its back aisles. The building itself, meanwhile, according to my excellent bloggy comrade EV Grieve, changed hands, last year, for the princely sum of $43 million dollars. Street Easy describes the current iteration of the building this way…

194 East 2nd Street is a full-service elevator building with a 24-hour doorman, elegantly re-designed lobby, hallways, and common areas, a new high-end fitness center with an infrared sauna and yoga/pilates room, and a tenant’s lounge with a billiard table.

The rest of that block is now peppered with sports bars and brunch destinations that cater to young, monied aspirationals and cloying, self-styled influencers, who are just as revolting, to my mind, as some might have found GG Allin & the Murder Junkies, but to each their own, I guess.

Once again, if you’re genuinely curious, you should seek out the full Clayton Patterson footage (currently to be found here), but someone synopsized the day’s events in this homemade music video for an early GG Allin track (when he was a bit more genteel behind the mic) called, somewhat presciently, “NYC Tonight.”

Frankie Goes to … The Mill

Here’s an odd one.

As recently as this past April, I posted a little entry about a long-vanished midtown attraction called The Mill at Burlington House, although I originally invoked it on a comparatively ancient post about same from 2015.

Today, meanwhile, I fielded a comment from a reader named Charles, who wrote…

I found film footage of this attraction while watching a Frank Sinatra movie called Contract on Cherry Street in 1977. I was wondering what opening scene about 2:30 in the movie this was shot in and came across your blog.

Sure enough, in one of the opening segments of the film, The Mill at Burlington House is used as a location.

Released in 1977, “Contract on Cherry Street” stars Ol’ Blue Eyes as a hardscrabble detective also named Frank who is trying to take on the Mob after his partner is killed … or something like that. In the scene in question, Frank meets his undercover informant, the ridiculously named Jack Kittens, to get some dirt on an automotive fencing ring. In fittingly clandestine fashion, they meet on the conveyer belt of The Mill.

Watch from about 02:30 onward…..

In all honesty, the movie looks like a bad, half-baked cop show from the `70s, but who knows? It might be great, not least for period-specific NYC locations like this one.

Big thanks to Charles for sharing!

Talking Türkiye

Well, I am indeed back from our travels in Türkiye. In the past, after I’ve come back from trips to, say, Ireland, Beirut, France and other places, I’ve shared a bunch of pics. Unfortunately, the service provider that hosts this blog has been suffering from an ongoing image-hosting issue, presumably the same issue that routinely causes images here to break for no reason. It now takes forever and a day to successfully upload a single picture, and now – after multiple attempts – I’m throwing in the towel. You’ll have to make do with the pic above of the majestic interior of the sprawling Blue Mosque, and the one of me below, standing outside it like a smug American tourist.

If you happen to be friends with me on Instagram and Facebook, you can see my pics there, if you’re truly curious, but there simply isn’t enough time in the world, bandwidth on the web or patience within myself for me to keep fighting with the failings of my aforementioned so-called service provider.

In a nutshell, however, Türkiye is just an amazing place to visit, and I cannot recommend it zealously enough. We basically spent a week in a boat (or, gulet) off the Southern coast, and then a week in the massive metropolis of Istanbul, a teeming city of 13 million that makes my native New York City seem quaint, orderly and entirely manageable.

If you get the chance …. GO!

Parsing “The Things All New Yorkers Should Know (But Most Don’t)”

There are few things that irk the snots out of me more than “content” created by self-appointed “New Yorkers” (whether the term credibly applies or not) who volunteer tips, pointers, “insider” info and “life hacks” about what’s what in New York City.

Nine times out of ten, these things have been produced by whistle-headed whippersnappers who’ve spent all of about six months living here and think they know the score. I’ve railed at self-styled influencer folks like Brett Conte, Cash Jordan, Elana Taber, Shelby Church and Sarah Funk about this kind of stupid shit, although I’m always quick to mention that each of these individuals entertain vastly greater audiences than this here silly blog. That doesn’t mean they’re right, though, now does it.

Then, of course, there are periodicals like Time Out that routinely post these clickbaity listicles about the best and/or secret locations, services, shops, bars, theaters, retail outlets and amenities that “only Real New Yorkers” know about. And if they are actually right about any of them, all they’re doing it is spoiling it by evangelizing them.

I’ve wrestled with the “real New Yorker” quandary here many times, usually with regards to whether being a native New Yorker like me gives one an edge (ultimately, I’d suggest that it doesn’t). My point was that when you compose your own list in your head of folks who seem to personalize the concept of a “New Yorker” – whether because of their lifestyle of their vocation or their outlook or whatever – very often you’ll find that those individuals actually moved here from somewhere else to re-invent themselves. So much for being a native. Also, there are plenty of actual native New Yorkers who are complete fucking assholes who don’t know shit from Shinola about being an actual New Yorker – and, yes, I’m obviously talking very specifically about that orange pile of abject sewage, Donald Trump. But I digress.

Why am I bringing all this up again, you ask? Well, recently, the Curbed section of New York Magazine (who I do love but have had issues – pardon the pun – with before) posted a magisterial piece, “The Things All New Yorker Should Know (But Most Don’t).”  The presumptuous title alone is enough to set my teeth on edge but this one is actually pretty good. Some of my favorite pointers therein are below, and I endorse all of them.

The Chateau Diana sold in every bodega is actually “wine product,” and it’s disgusting! Avoid. 

Always Use the 81st Street Entrance to the Met (and when it’s particularly mobbed, walk in — very carefully — through the parking garage on 80th Street.)

Don’t see ‘Shen Yun.’

Always avoid Terminal 5. It’s still a pain to get to and has bad acoustics. -- this is fucking Gospel!!!

The best outdoor concert venue is Forest Hills Stadium. Every seat has a direct view, and there is excellent food.

Just go to the Knickerbocker for dinner. Call 212-228-8490 and ask for a booth.

You can get Prince Street Pizza delivered to the Scratcher bar, on East 5th Street, and forgo the line.

For restaurant reservations: Always call first. You should resort to OpenTable or Resy (or, God forbid, Tock) only if a restaurant doesn’t have a posted phone number.

The famous mutton chop at Keens is actually lamb. It’s fine — but not so good that you should avoid a steak if that’s what you really want.

The Conservatory Garden is the most tranquil part of Central Park.

If you’re lost in Central Park, find a lamppost.The first two or three numbers on it will tell you what cross street you’re closest to.

Find the whole article here.

October `79: John Peel Discovers Killing Joke

While his name looms forever large in the annals of furtive music-nerd lore, we American record geeks and sniveling punk archivists suffered the unfortunate indignity of having to come of age without ever properly hearing the broadcasts of Jonn Peel, the legendary British disc jockey, radio presenter and incalculably influential tastemaker whose stamp of approval put more names on the map than can be quantified. It was Peel, who sadly left us in 2004, that first dropped the needle on debut singles and played demo recordings by theretofore unknown bands, introducing them to a devoted listenership of bug-eyed Peel zealots around the UK. Without Peel’s initial endorsements, the world writ large might never have heard of bands like the Sex Pistols, The Smiths, The Fall, The Undertones (a particular favorite of his), Joy Division and – oh yes, do please wait for it – my beloved Killing Joke.

A regular reader of mine just hipped me to the below YouTube clip of Peel’s radio show from October 10, 1979. I would have been just about to turn 12 years old on the night this episode aired. This show is significant to me, of course, because it was the first time Peel ever played Killing Joke, specifically the 10” maxi-ep of “Turn to Red,” released on Malicious Damage records (which I’d later track down from the racks of Bleecker Bob’s). Ten days after this show, Killing Joke would actually enter the BBC Radio 1 studios and record their first of four “Peel Sessions” with the great man, showcasing their live chops. Those sessions were available as bootlegs for years before EG records officially compiled them onto a single CD in 2008 that is well worth tracking down.

So, while hearing the three tracks off the “Turn to Red” single isn’t anything new, for a Killing Joke acolyte like me, it’s intriguing hearing Peel mention and discuss his admiration for them. It’s also interesting to hear what else he was playing and promoting at the time, a compelling glimpse of what was brewing in England in 1979. One wonders whatever became of bands like the Purple Hipsters, the Reluctant Stereotypes and Pink Military.

Check it out and enjoy….

Submit to "The Mix!"

A colleague of mine named Bailey aggregates and edits content for my organization’s intranet portal and recently launched a series that showcases various teammates’ musical playlists. She called it “The Mix!”

Being that I’m somewhat unsolicitedly outspoken about my musical tastes, Bailey recently asked me if I’d submit one. I don’t think this was actually prompted by any curiosity on her part or on behalf of the company, but rather the need to simply generate content. Regardless, I was happy to oblige, as waxing rhapsodic about my favorite music is something I can barely stop myself from doing. Where most of my fellow employees simply submitted five to ten favorite tracks, with a nominal explanation of each, I, somewhat predictably, composed a stately list of …er…30 songs, appended with florid blurbs about each track.

To her credit, Bailey did a dash of tasteful editing to excise a few of my more colorful turns of phrase, but completely jettisoned my intro. But being that this is my blog, here’s the full, unexpurgated version in all its repulsively self-indulgent glory. If possible, try to enjoy…

Okay, because I’m just the type of insufferable music geek of the laboriously long-winded variety that people regularly avoid at cocktail parties, I’m going to try to keep my usual bug-eyed fervor in check and limit myself to one (1) song per artist and one (1) sentence about each selection. Let’s see if I can pull that off.  But you’re getting 30 of them, so buckle up … and I could very easily keep going. 

“Eighties” by Killing Joke – I am prone to speaking about my devotion to all things Killing Joke with a religious fanaticism that borders on the disquieting, so suffice to say that this song is as important to me as oxygen itself. 

“She Sells Sanctuary” by The Cult – An absolutely (and indisputably) perfect song, from beginning to end.

“Song to the Siren” by This Mortal Coil –  A bit of a cliché, now, for folks of a certain age and sensibility, but it stopped me dead in my tracks the first time I heard it (as intro music to Robert Plant solo gig at the Nassau Coliseum in the late summer of 1985), and I’ve been rapturously enchanted with it ever since. 

“Garbageman” by The Cramps – Good grief, I don’t know that I can encapsulate the sheer majesty of this song in a single sentence, but if you can’t appreciate the brilliance of this signature anthem by the Cramps, I can’t say we’ll ever be able to meaningfully communicate with each other. 

“Down on the Street” by The Stooges – Hyperbole aside, this opening cut from Funhouse, i.e. the single greatest rock’n’roll record of all time, lays waste to any claims to the contrary. 

“Wiggly World” by DEVO – Too many options from my beloved DEVO to choose from, but today it’s “Wiggly World,” because it simply makes me genuinely happy. 

“Chameleon Man” by Cop Shoot Cop – To my ears, this clanky tour-de-force by New York City’s own Cop Shoot Cop (who acrimoniously broke up in 1996, sadly) is practically the early-`90’s noise-rock answer to “Bohemian Rhapsody,” and I love every caustic nanosecond of it. 

“Rise Above” by Black Flag – Another predictable selection, maybe, but it’s still as stark, blunt, and galvanizing as when it was first recorded. 

“To Hell with Poverty” by Gang of Four – Angular, post-punk funk with a serrated edge (courtesy of the late Andy Gill’s guitar) and a political conscience, “To Hell with Poverty” is both a furious proletariat anthem and an explosive dancefloor banger.  

“Bomber” by Motorhead – This is the live version from Motorhead’s No Sleep `til Hammersmith, which swaps out the studio version’s comparatively relaxed, bluesy strut in favor of a frantic, amphetamine-fueled sprint. 

“Science Friction” by XTC – Early punky track by XTC from when they were still clangy and hiccupy, as opposed to their latter more celebrated work, which was more lush, thoughtful, and bucolic. 

“See Her Tonight” by The Damned – Literally every track off the Damned’s seminal debut LP (the first of the British Punk bands to release one) is crucial and brilliant, but I’ve always particularly loved this spikey ode to romance over revolution. 

“Dark Entries” by Bauhaus – Sort of the Goth equivalent of “Pretty Vacant” by the Sex Pistols, “Dark Entries” was one of the first singles the fledgling Bauhaus ever wrote – notable in that the ominous, repeating riff (courtesy of guitarist Daniel Ash) is essentially just a simple sequence of minor-key scales. 

“Life’s What You Make It” by Talk Talk – Most only know them for their early iteration as skinny-tied synth-popsters, but every album released by this band is absolutely spectacular, with this single being the midpoint between their radio-friendly era and their significantly more experimental phase. 

“Electric City” by Firewater – From the NYC band’s sixth album from 2008, The Golden Hour, which was written and recorded with local musicians while songwriter Tod Ashley was traveling through Thailand, India, Pakistan, Turkey and Indonesia. 

“Straighten Out” by The Stranglers – It’s virtually impossible for me to settle on a single track by The Stranglers (I very nearly chose “Five Minutes”), but “Straighten Out” amply encapsulates everything that’s entirely remarkable about them, to my mind. 

“Black to Comm” by the MC5 – They never officially released a studio version (this is a live version from the Michigan’s Saginaw Civic Center in 1970), but for my money, “Black to Comm” is the MC5 at their very bombastic best, and it is impossible for me to sit still when this plays. 

“Adrenochrome” by The Sisters of Mercy – An early single by the reluctant Goth overlords, “Adrenochrome” exemplifies their initial, doomy aesthetic, all dueling riffs underpinned by the mechanized pulse of a deliberately spartan drum machine, Doktor Avalanche. 

“People Who Died” by the Jim Carroll Band – Wrongly lambasted as tasteless (I had someone stop talking to me after I played it on my college radio station), “People Who Died” is actually aheartfelt (if adrenalized) lament, capturing the late Jim Caroll’s mournful rage at the hopelessness and destruction that surrounds him.

“The Hardest Walk” by The Jesus & Mary Chain – I really could have picked practically anything off of Psychocandy, but this one’s always been my favorite, completely encapsulating the band’s equal affection for sweet pop melody, harrowing feedback and echoey noise. 

“Those Eyes, That Mouth” by Cocteau Twins – Most folks might opt for a selection off Heaven or Las Vegas, but for me, it’s all about “Those Eyes, That Mouth,” which a crystalline synthesis of everything that makes this peculiar Scottish trio so mysteriously beguiling. 

“Daily News” by The Exploited – The less delicate side of Scotland, as submitted for your disapproval by Edinburgh’s tirelessly angry, kingpins of second-wave British Punk.

“A Million Miles Away” by The Plimsouls – Rarely has the signature chime of the 12-string Rickenbacker guitar been so effectively employed as on this underground hit from the early `80s, which some might fleetingly remember from the film, “Valley Girl.”

“Look Sharp” by Joe Jackson – While ultimately too sophisticated a musician to be mistaken for a proper punk, Jackson nevertheless demonstrated that he could more than simply keep up with times on this title cut to his debut LP.

“Tupelo” by Nick Cave & the Bad Seeds – From Live Seeds, Nick Cave recasts John Lee Hooker’s classic about a Mississippi flood and the birth of the King of Rock N’ Roll as a doomy narrative about the coming of the antichrist. 

“Dum Dum Boys” by Iggy Pop – Spurred on by David Bowie behind the production console, Iggy pays grim homage to his former bandmates in the Stooges.

“Notes & Chords Mean Nothing to Me” by Redd Kross – Hawthorne, California’s own McDonald brothers deliver a scathing manifesto the decimates the preconception that you must be accomplished into order to play music. 

“Nostalgia” by the Buzzcocks – Picking a single song to sum up the brilliance of the Buzzcocks is a fool’s errand, but this has always been my favorite.

“Baby Turns Blue” by the Virgin Prunes – Rising from the same circle of friends that spawned U2, Dublin’s Virgin Prunes took proceedings in an entirely different direction on their debut LP, If I Die, I Die, perfecting a bold, post-punk sound that was sinister as it was surreal.

“Sleeping With Your Devil Mask” by Robyn Hitchcock & the Egyptians – From Globe of Frogs, a perfect slice of Robyn at his bizarre best. 

Screaming on the Expressway

There’s a billboard you can spot from the Brooklyn-Queens Expressway, not too far from the sprawling grounds of the Calvary Cemetery, that’s mystified me for quite a little while, now. Ostensibly, it’s designed to catch the eyes of commuters coming and going towards the city on what becomes the Long Island Expressway, a little further along. I first caught a glimpse of it a year or two ago while on a crowed Hampton Jitney bound for my mom’s place out in Quogue, and did something of a double-take, but we passed it so quickly that I couldn’t tell if I’d imagined it or not. Ever since, I’ve continually tried to take a closer look at it to verify my suspicions. Yesterday, on our way back from visiting my mother, I managed to whip my camera out at the right moment and take a picture of it.

Here’s that billboard now. Click on it to enlarge. 

...and here's an even clearer shot I found online...

Based out of Deer Park, Long Island, the North Shore Neon Sign Co. is evidently one of the region’s busiest suppliers of neon signage, and their handiwork can be seen all over Times Square. That’s all well and good, but that doesn’t explain the sign. Were their slogan — “We Hang to Live” — not odd enough, take a look at that accompanying graphic. I’m not quite sure what it’s supposed to be, but it looks a little like an inverted Christmas ornament. But look closer and folks of a certain sensibility might see something familiar. Am I wrong, or isn’t that the signature logo of The Screamers?

For the non-music nerds, the Screamers were one of the original bands to emerge on the Los Angeles punk scene in the late `70s, alongside iconic names like The Weirdos, X, FEAR and The Germs. Sort of the West Coast’s answer to New York’s Suicide, the Screamers completely eschewed guitars in favor of drums, electric piano, synthesizers and the voice and disarming stage presence of lead …er… screamer Tomato du Plenty. While the band has since garnered a reputation as a formidable influence, marked by their confrontational performances and stylized presentation, they never released a proper album. They’d made plans to release a video-only collection of music, but the finished product never came to fruition. Here in 2025, there are bootleg live recordings, demos and a few of those video performance clips floating around, but they never signed a record deal and never released a proper record. The band broke up, and Tomata moved around a lot, but passed away in San Francisco of cancer at the age of 52.

None of that explains why the band’s logo — designed by one Gary Panter, and modeled after the face and head of spiky haired Tomata — now adorns this North Shore Neon billboard.

This is not the first time the Screamers logo has been appropriated, though. Billy Idol approximated it in the animation for his video for …aptly enough.. “Scream” in 2005, but this is a little further flung than that.

Anyone know?

One clue: the artist responsible for the logo, Gary Panter, according to his website, lives in Brooklyn.

Here's what remains of the Screamers...

"Why Would I Bother to Read Something Someone Couldn't Be Bothered to Write?"

It’s been the hottest of topics, in the past couple of years, and it recently occurred to me that I’ve never really weighed in on it here, so maybe now is that time. So, here goes…

FUCK AI.

Seriously, I have nothing but contempt for it. Apart from the odd bit of amusing bullshit (i.e. hyper-exaggerated images of Morrissey gorging on cheeseburgers, etc.), I’ve yet to see a meaningful use for it. The end results are usually either disjointed, jarring, disquieting or flat-out horrifying.

It reminds me, in an odd way, of the advent of Twitter. Here was this remarkably efficient and sophisticated means of communication that could disseminate information to a veritable nation of recipients instantaneously, but it ended up being used in the stupidest and shallowest of ways, pandering to the lowest common denominator, and summarily addicting and dumbing down the populace to grim new depths in the process. 

On a practical level, while I’m sure AI can be utilized for myriad functions for the betterment of life (like, say, solving problems and curing disease), I personally feel it’s entirely counterintuitive in the realm of creative expression. No one needs it to compose music, write poetry and make art, and, again, the end results are usually off-putting.

A year or two back, my department was looking to hire someone for a new position, and we were fielding loads of applications. At one point, my manager received something and asked me to give it an eyeball. “Her resume is impressive,” she prefaced, “but this cover letter …. I think a robot wrote it.” I scoffed, initially incredulous that anyone would honestly go to that length. But upon reading the thing, I suddenly agreed. While it was ostensibly correct in terms of grammar and punctuation, it was worded in a such a stiltedly oblique manner. I had a very hard time imagining an aspiring twenty-something professional genuinely expressing herself in this way. “Don’t hire that one,” I said, “she clearly didn’t write it.”

I fully realize that the written word is not everyone’s forte. Hell, some might credibly opine that it isn’t mine, either. But, to my mind, resorting to Generative AI sources to convey whatever it is you’re trying to get across is just … well, there’s no other word for it than “cheating.” Do the work. Figure it out. Just because we all have these tools available to us now doesn’t make it right. I realize I probably sound like an octogenarian literature professor admonishing a student for reading the Cliffs Notes summarization of “Pride & Prejudice” instead of Jane Austen’s original magisterial prose, but you’re really only doing yourself a disservice. Use these tools as a crutch, and you’re only making yourself stupider.

I recently stumbled upon this great article on the subject, and I agree with it wholeheartedly.

But, y'know, how do YOU feel about it?