I don’t know if I will get to all 11 from my catalog but at least I got to two more. From the original catalog I did in the 1980s. I wanted fans to at least get an organized sense of what we had to offer. I find it delightfully youthful and fanatical as a 65-year-old woman to read these. We were all into the punk scene and loved it madly. I was about 25 when I made this up.
(I am not a professional DJ haha).
“But how do you thank someone
Who has taken you from crayons to perfume?
It isn’t easy, but I’ll try
If you wanted the sky
I would write across the sky in letters
That would soar a thousand feet high
“To sir [s], with love”
That crazy Godzilla Punk Rock Night Club in Sun Valley is where I first saw GBH’s – Leather, Bristles, Studs and Acne spray painted on the wall.
I was then in search and found the vinyl and became a fanatic. 44 years now for me.
The album City Babys Revenge is one of the best sounds of punk rock! The band and songs are phenomenal. A forty-year celebration. I got the vinyl from Zed Records of Long Beach and played it loads. Yet seeing (Charged) GBH live was just the best experience I had as a young punk bird. They still thrill me as an old crone owl.
A hardy band that still tours around the world and I think they are indestructible. I really do!
On Fallbrook and Victory in the San Fernando Valley
Punk Rock Historian and Professional Consultant
Hudley Flipside
Life is so contrary and beginning and ending all the time. The stars seem stable, as they dance their astrological dance. The moon and sun and seasons are very dependable but not the storms or the opposite whispers of joy and enlightenment we may find. This earth will always be a contrary place sweetened with continuity and music.
Yesterday before the rain, Sara and oldest son walked over from their apartment. They are counting their steps. Later they left and we decided to join them halfway on their journey home. A longer walk than my usual mile per day.
It was easy all the way until we said goodbye and then we walked slowly onward, and we headed home, husband, youngest son, and I.
Would we get something to eat?
“No, it is past 6 PM and I don’t like eating much after then.”
That is what they get for always asking what MAMA wants.
On the way with Sara and oldest son I noticed a broken book on the ground. The pages danced below our feet for a long while.
I picked up three of the pages as a focused random moment of finding something wandering and enlightening me from the dirty street of trash. On this dark cold evening of winter.
A man was covered with such trash in the middle of the sidewalk next to the shopping mall and restaurants. He was pretending to sleep as cars raced by and we walked around him.
I sadly declared.
“He is going to get mighty wet when the rain hits?”
Husband quickly responded,
“He is most likely waiting for the shopping mall to close down. I am sure he has a safe place there.”
My feet got sore, and my back ached and howled as we headed home.
Now today I read the book pages tossed on the ground like leaves in a storm.
One thing that stood out were the lyrics for a song.
The pages are filled with words about music, slavery, finding a voice and hope. Someone was looking for their roots, history, and family.
I thought about my own family history. I think this is a push to get going with my own pages filled with words about music, slavery, finding a voice and hope. Hope from lyrics. A song inspiring us to dance to the hopeful dream of music.
As the dancing pages on a dark and dirty street.
“This is an invitation across the nation
A chance for folks to meet
There’ll be laughing, singing and music swinging
Dancing in the street.”
I saw something unexpected today. Billy Idol got a star on Hollywood Blvd. and Mr. Henry Rollins was the presenter. I saw the photograph on a site. Now and then I do like to reflect on my punk rock glory days.
I think upon these two characters that influenced us by their music or words in a big way. I knew them, as many of us did, as youths with deep and high ideals that I once respected.
I met Billy after he left Generation X.
He visited Hollywood. A group of us youthful rebellious punks were talking about music. We were in the back of a liquor store waiting for some beer because we were not 21 yet. Someone was WHEELING AND DEALING with the booze scheme. Billy and I were talking about the Beatles and how much he loved them. He then cried on my shoulder stating to me that he missed his mates back home.
The beer arrived and a friend of mine whisked him away and that was the only time I met him. Over the years when I see him or hear his music, I often reflect back upon that sweet young kid who was kind of lost.
Henry was a wild youth too. He was kind of funny and thoughtful when I first met him. Yet as time went on our friendship soured. I think it was due to a subscription to Flipside Fanzine he never received because his letter fell behind my desk. Maybe the critical reviews I did of him in Black Flag were thought to be unfunny. His lack of humor made it easy to accelerate into doom.
Funny how a guy from England and a guy from DC can be standing on the grounds whereas young punks, who grew up here, used to run wild on those same streets. Then no need, or sense of fame or fortune.
Once equals as friends and fans of the punk scene, they got bigger, and we got smaller. Yet I think I am happy with my place in the world, and I hope they are too.
The sweet and bitter is what punk rock left me. As a punk rock fanatic,
That’s the way it crumbles, cookie-wise
~ The apartment (by Billy Wilder, 1960)
The holidays and my dad’s birthday all bring up memories of my family that I grew up with. It has been about ten years since both of my parents died. They both lived a long, good life. I think it is good to think about loved ones and remember them. It is a seasonal thing too.
My dad was a WWII Vet. He discovered veteran benefits where he could travel really cheap anywhere around the world. So, Mom and dad did just that. They traveled everywhere.
All their five children grown up and independent, mostly. They took off.
As a teenager in High School, it was kind of strange not having mom and dad there. Yet, my older brother or sister reluctantly helped out.
In the late 1970s and through the 1980s mom and dad continued to travel.
I was running a punk rock fanzine at the time. I gave them some issues to give out to any punks they met up with. This image is from Germany. Mom with a local punk rocker. It must have been around 1984.
These are a handful of Babes that keep giving. They have influenced generations by their singing, music, and right and left hand creative endeavors.
Alicia “Alice” Armendariz ~ Alice Bag from The early LA Band The Bags
Annette Celia Genevieve Zilinskas ~The Bangles, Blood on the Saddle…
Julie Lanfeld-Keskin ~ Sin 34 (RIP)
Kim Morris – Bass and vocals The Thingz
Susan Janet Ballion aka Siouxsie Sioux~The Creatures, Siouxsie and the Banshees
We are living through kind of depressing days. I think it is a nice time to share humor and look to some darn strong women!
Babes that keep giving.
I love the term BABE. It means so many things. Here at FLopside Comics Mr. Fuck and Mr. Shit mean it in a HIGH FIVE way. Lovers, girls, and best friends. Yet they also use the word ‘dude’ the same way when referring to their friends that are girls.
Girls, gals, women, females, dames, dolls, and broads.
Mr. Shit does not use proper English and prefers to use “that” instead of “who”… it is a slang thing… yet Babes Who keep Giving he said,
“Is fucking OK too.”
“Most people were in bands, if not they did magazines, records, owned stores did artwork etc… it was a scene that begged to be contributed to, and ripe with contributors… X-8 and Tory were in Low Budget, who made their Hollywood debut playing over the Dils at the Whisky, Larry Lash was in a weird Quick sort of band, Pooch was in a progressive (!) band, and I was their friend, couldn’t play anything, but still wanted to be involved [Al Flipside].”
Los Angeles Flipside Fanzine Issue #1 August 28, 1977.
I am not a musician. Sure, as a kid I played my parents old player piano. I could hear a song and I then played it on that old lovely musical hardwood black upright piano. My mom got me an acoustic guitar when I turned 16. Along with it was a record to learn chords. I did not follow it through.
I appreciate the lyrics and the sound. I have a knack for listening to the song in a way that is so satisfying to me and as my life went on, I found others like myself. Journalists, fanzine writers and ‘scenesters’ who supported a growing musical world. I will leave the real musicians and their creative genius to themselves. I sure love to hear and feel their songs though.
My dream last night took me to a multilevel club. It had a front door and back door; it had a bar and an outdoor patio. It was very easy to access. I had booked a one-day event to perform. I had my old guitar with me at all times. A guitar a band member gave me, and we had cut out the “Quaker Maid” milk symbol from a large ‘sheet metal sign’ to place on the front of my guitar.
Why I pulled that old guitar I had from the 80s into my dream seems strange to me. I also had my old fender amp.
There was a small stage in the bar where I practiced. Realizing I did not have a clue what I was doing. Yet when I touched my sweet maid, it made a loud punk sound. I thought this to myself while dreaming,
“I am going to go on stage here and play for my friends. Not having a clue what I am doing, I will just improvise … like I always do,”
The first person who greeted me at the door was Shawn Stern. He was drinking a beer and seemed very happy. Then as I walked through the club. The club was peppered with many characters, and I thought to myself,
“I will play a chord from my sweet maid and then read something from an editorial from an old issue of Flipside. Maybe this can be a spoken word event with improvised guitar sounds?”
Outside on the patio I sat with a couple of gals who were talking about another show. I was cool with that and then walked in Cliff Roman.
“The guys at that show were wearing TUXEDOS.”
He had a upside down smile on his face when I smiled at him as I was holding my sweet maid. Cliff was wearing all black with a big oomphy black sweater.
I realized I was at a club without my mask on. It felt so good to be out and about again. No fear and happy to be hanging out at a club again with others.
Then I awoke. I don’t go out to events now. It seems like I still do in my dreams…
Chiron, is a small Solar System body in the outer Solar System, orbiting the Sun between Saturn and Uranus.
Orbital period: 50 years. Discovered: October 18, 1977. Radius: 84.314 mi Aphelion: 62′ 0″ Orbits: Sun Angular diameter: 0.035″ (max) Discoverer: Charles T. Kowal
Some say that punk has been around a long time. It has in one form or another. Yet the flavor I am referring to is a unique form, known as Punk Rock, that formed around the cusp, a little before and after, 1977. The median of young punk at that time being the age of 19. As most born in the year 1958.
The small solar system body discovered at the time is Chiron known in mythology as “the wounded healer.” Los Angeles Flipside Fanzine formed at that time. Punk bands with this flavor formed too. The Saints, The Dammed and The Ramones. Sex Pistols etc. Around the time of 1977 to 1987 is the decade of the creation of this unique flavor of punk that continues today.
Now (charged) GBH, the Circle Jerks and Social Distortion are celebrating their 40-year anniversaries around that time median.
Mar 28, 1977, Chiron enters Taurus. Feb 18, 2019 Chiron enters Aries. “Chiron teaches us the philosophical perspective, and the perspective that our wildness, which may put us outside the status quo, may be our wisdom.” ~ Tim Lyons
The current 40-year celebration is based on the beginning close to the cusp of 1977. The originators and wild ones who moved with this flavor of punk rock.
Back then were not our glory days but more the beginning when we all had to create our hubs, bands, media, promotions, record labels, and fanzines. We were isolated and dependence on each other was the key to our survival. The news did not mention us unless cops charged our shows. Our ways were strange and unique. We did it all ourselves. Dark rooms, silk screens were what we did. Flyers are how we communicated.
I always had a way into this flavor of punk. It is in my DNA. Like most of us original characters we are now writing about those days. As a bard and punk journalist, it is only natural for me to do this.
Recently I received a review on Amazon calling my Punkalullaby memoir as being “Trite and Boring.” I thought of many ways to respond to the criticism, but I did not. It was a long process for me creating and then sharing my story. I think that review is more about the reviewer than my story. If that person took the time to read it. He would have found a woman’s psyche addressing the world with her wild woman ways. It is about characters, music and the growth of a punk scene. Punks who grew up together.
I don’t see the past as my glory days. Yet, I did make some darn good friends. I think that 1977 was a unique time that brought a lot of misfits tighter together. This is all about our experiences and friendships which both need to be held up high and respected.
This is the key of our punk scene. Its foundation and flavor of punk rock, music wise that is. Chiron is an embellishment, a signature in the heavens that once announced our coming. That it all is valid and has deep meaning. So, do our lives.
“Shine on shine my little star
Up above the world honey that you are
Shine on now you don’t give me no love
Hit me like a death ray baby from above.”
“Eternity interrupts. It is as if there is a plane where there is clock time and then eternity puts its hand in for a minute and you have an archetypal experience. You have a feeling of what Jung said was “the infinite, “and then very often the watch reacts to that.”
~ The Palace of the Cat: The Cat Marie-Louise Von Franz.
This is a short story about a friend. I find the best friends are not the ones that you make yourself but are the ones that find you. They stand the probability of time. They happen without planning and endure without much effort. She was like that. I first met her online on Facebook. We had common friends of friends. She was also interested in music as well as William Blake and Carl Jung. She showed up at my first speaking event at Whittier College.
Later she told me about a Punk event at UCLA college that I applied to and was accepted at. She was there for me and I shared many stories and my creations with her.
I think I inspired her to go to Pacifica Graduate Institute offering degrees in the clinical psychology, counseling, mythological studies and depth psychology.
At this time last year 2018, she offered me an extra William Blake calendar. I accepted it with honor. Every day I looked at the calendar and thought of her. Happy to have such a friend. Remarkable I am taken back by the last image of the calendar of The Archangel Michael Foretelling the Crucifixion. She passed away this December 2019.
I am a weird Christian mystic in many ways. I learned that the crucifixion is symbolic of a person’s day of release from their physical body.
As friends, have our souls not spoken to each other?
I think so.
“They looking back, all th’ Eastern side beheld
Of Paradise, so late thir happie seat,
Wav’d over by that flaming Brand, the Gate
With dreadful Faces throng’d and fierie Armes:
Som natural tears they drop’d, but wip’d them soon; [ 645 ]
The World was all before them, where to choose
Thir place of rest, and Providence thir guide:
They hand in hand with wandring steps and slow,
Through Eden took thir solitarie way.
~Book 12 Paradise Lost; Milton.
To see a world in a grain of sand and heaven in a wildflower Hold infinity in the palm of your hand and eternity in an hour.
~William Blake
Al Jaffee, King of the Mad Magazine Fold-In, Dies at 102
“Allan Jaffee (born Abraham Jaffee; March 13, 1921 – April 10, 2023) was an American cartoonist. He was notable for his work in the satirical magazine Mad, including his trademark feature, the Mad Fold-in. Jaffee was a regular contributor to the magazine for 65 years and is its longest-running contributor. In a 2010 interview, Jaffee said, “Serious people my age are dead.” ~Mechanic, Michael (September 24, 2010). “Cartoonist Al Jaffee, the Original Mad Man”. Mother Jones. Retrieved October 10, 2012.
These are the Benadryl days.
Too much listening to Elton John and remembering my crush on Bernie Taupin. Foggy dreams. Dreams where the threads of remembering can’t be pulled down into this world. A changing mixture of memories swirling around me that I have experienced in real time. Remembering my, heart heart ~fun fun, days as a youth and teenager.
As sitting under the pool table in the boy’s room reading Mad Magazine and Playboy. Alfred E. Neuman or cartoonist Gahan Wilson went on to inspire me in my own fanzine. Where I created images or doodled between the pages.
Magazines are now becoming obsolete. Newspapers stands too except for the billionaires that do resurrect some. A fight that is not going to win.
To my teachers that came from those awesome perverted magazines.
Love,
Hudley Flipside aka Holly
The Seminary of Praying Mantis Publishing 
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