Mr. Dang, Bloody Elbows, Mr. Crap, Hudley, Pee Wee Gutter, Mr. Fuck and Mr. Garbage…..Mr. Shit declined to participate in our Flopside Crew Party dress party… old fart.
Nearly all men can stand adversity, but if you want to test a man’s character, give him power.
~Abraham Lincoln
The United States, the State of the Union Address… some don’t care and some are going to boycott the event. Others will watch like us at FLOPSIDE Comics. The theater of the trumpsurd!!!
So Mr. Shit came up with this in his sleep.
We listened as he snored and talked in his sleep. Mr. Shit said…
“The State of the Union Address… the Address… a dress.”
We listened.
“The dress… the dump is a dildo… Trump.”
Mr. Shit gave us a cleaver idea while he was deep in his sleep and talking in his sleep! He is an elder punk with dementia. Mr. Garbage listens closely to his wisdom and said it clearly to Mr. Fuck,
“A dildo and a dress…”
We smiled and then went to have a round of coffee. Today we will put on our best party dresses and listen to the addresses….
No man has a good enough memory to be a successful liar.
“Those who tune in with its powers will be mavericks who will drag us into the new era…”
~ Uranus the planet insight quote.
Here comes one of those narrowing openings. A flash from my past. All initiated by a song. Youngest told oldest son to play some Bee Gees. Oldest son was driving so he did. The song came on and while sitting in the back of the car it happened.
Lynn 1977. She took me to see Saturday Night Fever in Westwood, CA. The late night showing of the film. A long drive at night. We had the night fervor of youth and freedom flowing through our blood. It was a fantastic time to be young.
Disco, new wave, rock and punk were merged tight as the proverbially creative spark upon the music scene unknown.
Punk Rock Historian, Colleague and professional Consultant
Hudley Flipside
Pat Fear and Other Stories
A few years on, the narrator describes a composed evening at home, enveloped in a soft blanket beneath the gentle illumination of the living room lights. The steady background hum of the news provides a familiar atmosphere during this tranquil time.
A moment of levity occurs as the narrator observes Secretary of State Antony J. Blinken unexpectedly playing guitar at the White House—a noteworthy illustration of how even prominent public figures engage in moments of lightheartedness.
As the broadcast continues, the mood shifts: the familiar figures of friends Bill, Dennis, and Mike appear, their presence lively and encouraging the narrator to “fight for their rights.” This visitation is both reassuring and thought-provoking, merging humor with deeper personal reflection.
The experience prompts the narrator to consider the enduring nature of friendships, as memories of shared conversations and laughter resurface, fostering an environment filled with nostalgia.
This interplay between camaraderie and introspection highlights the continuity of influence that friends exert, transcending physical absence. In this comfortable setting, the convergence of past dialogues with current experience underscores the lasting bonds between those present and those departed.
The evening thus becomes a period characterized by both reminiscence and contemplation, affirming that the pursuit of rights encompasses not only advocacy but also the celebration of relationships that continue to shape individual lives.
My talk today is a comparison essay about three characters from the early punk rock scene. A punk rock GHOST Special!
Dennis Danell, the original bass player for the punk rock band Social Distortion, Pat Fear, the eminent singer and guitarist of the mockery punk band White Flag, and Mike Conley, the vocalist of the renowned punk band MIA, are notable figures in the punk rock scene.
I call them the PUNK HUB MASTERS
To move my essay into the realm of where I am looking from, I will be using a concept from my favorite psychologist Carl Gustav Jung. Now for a short Jungian psychology concept.
“The specific role of the archetype in synchronization-phenomena seems to be to serve as or constellation hub of a situation across time, and to be the factor of [inner order] that gives this distinctive set to the situation.”
Punk rock is a phenomenon which created a situation of order as a constellation or hub. A hub is a focal point a center around which other things revolve from which things radiate. I am applying this concept to the origin of punks and to punk rock…
We were nobodies of the underground, sitting on a youthful explosion, that was a riptide of good-fella punk friends. The early individual punks found each other through the hubs we created. Back in the late 70s and throughout the 80s, as you know the punk scene created a network of hubs that worked independently from each other yet depended on each other to sustain the punk scene. Examples of hubs were Fanzines such as We Got Power or Flipside Fanzine.
Also, every punk band had its own hub. Record labels, music recording studios and record store hubs. The major places to make the scene!
Such as Licorice pizza, ZEDS, Tower Records and Moby Disk Records and our own Whittier Record hub Lovells Records. Without forgetting the college and underground radio program hubs where the innovative music played. These were the greatest of supportive hubs such as Pat Hoed’s Adam Bomb (KXLU), Stella Stray POP and Rodney on KROQ.
The major hub that brought us all together was an amazing force known as gigs. The garage to Club 88, the Masque to the Whisky A go go and beyond. Where the fans, bands and promoters met! The focal point here was the paper flyer. These papers were handed out at gigs. Unique band flyers with local and logo band art. Mostly Xerox copies. Xerox machines a revolutionary major hub for the punk scene. The US Mail and the ring ring telephone press buttons or circular dial extenuated the positive communication hub…remember? Punks spent a great deal of time alone…creating, practicing, and thinking in our own hubs! Coming together via shows, the phone, and the mail.
This is where the hub masters such as Denis, Pat, and Mike were found. They shined there. They masterly brought all the HUBS together. These three punks were genius hub masters. Networking was their punk underground gift, and they are authentic examples of the early punk rock phenomenon. Dennis, Pat, and Mike are a part of the Southern California punk scene.
They influenced a generation of fans and often are not known or acknowledged for their influence. They infected my little hub of a bedroom converted into a fanzine office. I often felt overwhelmed working on Flipside and under a big wave of stuff always about ready to crash. These guys showed me the skills of synchronizing things together. Making it seem easy.
Punk Hub Master: Dennis Danell
Punk Hub Master: Dennis Danell
I first saw Dennis when I was living with my sister in Fullerton Orange County. It was 1978. I was working at a local Dry-Cleaning Business as a cashier. Staffing on Flipside Fanzine on the side. He was riding a sting-ray bike sporting a spike haircut.
At that time, he was unique. We were speaking the same language. I looked similar with my partial shaved hairdo with orange hair color. A year later we met at the scene and became friends.
Dennis taught me loyalty of friendship. I witnessed his expansive heart that made his band stay tight. This is the work of the hub master. Dennis still visits me in my dreams.
Always polite, honest, and his happy Dizzy self. He had the ability of synchronizing punks together in a charming way. He will not ever be taken for granted. He was at the right place at the right time.
I will read some quotes from Flipside 20 A Social Distortion interview. I feel these short quotes embrace his character.
“Dennis: We wanna sound like no one else, We wanna sound like us!!”
“Dennis: Tommie’s chilly burgers. I ate one of those and didn’t have to eat for 2 days and I was shitting for 3 weeks!”
Dennis Danell (rip), Mad Dog (rip), Mike Ness and Tony Reflex
OC Kids image by “The man from MONK” (rip).
Hub Master: Pat Fear.
As you know Pat was a force to deal with. He lived in Riverside which was not far from Whittier Ca where Flipside Fanzine was based. Flipside put out a few music vinyl fanzines on Flipside / Gasatanka Records. Pat was the hub master and helped bring it all together. Was it only a few years ago I argued on Facebook about his hate for Sahara Palin? I would ask him to slow down and redirect his energy.
White Flag played a show with the Simpletons around 2008. They played a Saints Song, Demolition Girl. A nice dedication to me. Yet that was Pat… he always tried to make his friends happy. He was humorous in an irritating and funny way. He had the gift of inclusion. He is a constellation hub across time which brings us all here together today.
I will read some quotes by White Flag Tape 6 Flipside Music Fanzine. I will try to read them the way White Flag said them. Pat Fear’s high degree of sarcasm.
This is a White Flag moment.
“What is the purpose of White Flag?”
“To create an illusion of creativity. Because we are too good to be believed.”
“White Flag is a band that’s done everything done before… but better.” “There are two kinds of people in the world, people who are in White Flag and all those who wish they were.”
“White Flag is more than just a band it is a concept of how to live your life.”
“We look like women, talk like men, and play like mother fuckers. (Twisted sister quote.)”
Pat wrote a theme song for our video fanzines. I would like to share a short description from our catalog describing the beginning of Flipside Video Number Two,
“Now if you want to see the good old video monster in action you just got to catch this video. So, if you get it, and put it in your VCR, you might just die. Because the opening Flipside Video Number Two is the band White Flag. Gutsy and pure, Pat Fear will knock your block off while he plays guitar for the opening theme song called “Flipside” with backup singers including some Redd Kross members and one Bangle member …”
“I’ll Blow You a Kiss in the Wind” by Tommy Boyce & Bobby Hart … seeing Steven McDonald from Redd Kross, who does a brilliant cover, I imagined Pat Fear singing the song on top of the dinning table before us… giving a ghostly performance!
I enjoyed seeing many gathered thinking about a unique wild guy who brought friends and colleagues together today!
Also .. Pat Smear affirmed what I knew but don’t hear often enough that Becky Barton (Donna Rhia) was the first drummer of the Germs. “Where is she now?”
A very enjoyable afternoon/ evening! Thanks Tony!
The Old Spaghetti Factory, October 22/23
Tony. B Band the Adolescents, Cake ( Carlos Numez) 1990s Flipside Fanzine crew, Pat Smear the Germs and beyond, David Markey We Got Power Fanzine and beyond, Don Bolles the Germs and out of this world beyond.
Hub Master: Mike Conley
It was great to promote many bands and enjoy time with friends Mike and Nick. The whole band MIA.
Mike originally came from Las Vegas and then stationed his band MIA in the Orange County beach area. He brought punks tighter together. He did this at parties, gigs or at the Flipside House. He could wheel and deal the punk zone. Back stage Mike would make me laugh. He would follow me around saying,
“Want a cocktail, Hudley,” while rolling his eyes round and around. Just like Groucho Marx.
In 2008 when editing my memoirs about the punk scene I came across some Mike comments in a Flipside Fanzine Interview with his band. Unbelievably I received a call at that moment from Nick Adams, a member of MIA, telling me of Mike’s demise. A week later at his funeral his oldest daughter told us a short story.
She said that when they were traveling in his car her dad always had the music on too loud. She told him he could use headphones like everyone else. He never did. That is punk.
An excerpt from My Punkalullby.
Recently, at a benefit show for the passing of Mike Conley of M.I.A., a slam pit broke out at the Detroit bar in Costa Mesa. After about 19 years my natural feelings of irritation and perspiration filled with moisture above my brow. In the past, the slam pit became a testosterone-filled ring of jock bodies circling round and round before the stage. Bouncers and bands tried to control it. They could not stop this wildfire. I grew to hate it. Yet, the recent show again proved me wrong. There were some women but mostly men dancing around having a great time. Yes, their firm bodies now had become a little soft around the edges, as one middle-aged guy stopped and said to me, as if Mike Conley for one moment materialized,
“…enjoy this moment, it is the best time of your life!”
This guy was beaming with youthful glee.
~ From the Pogo to the Slam Pit, by Hudley Flipside
Flipside produced one of MIA’s albums entitled After the Fact. I will read lyrics from a song that Mike wrote. A Quote from the Song, Whisper in the Wind,
“In my eyes you’ll see a thousand memories, He said stare into my soul, All of me you shall know, Live your life full, live your life free, Tomorrow’s but a vision, Yesterday is a dream…”
Mike had the quality of inner order. A quality of depth and control that was not always easy to access.
This concludes my essay on three punk rockers of the early Southern California Punk Scene. Denis, Pat, and Mike were extraordinary. They were our friends! SCREAMING,
There are lots of pros and cons about the past solar eclipse. I think it is cool. I did not go to see it. There are plenty of beautiful images online to see. I can think of eclipses in my life though. One of them was Joe Strummer. His voice had an eclipse on my feelings as a youngster. As for many others, he changed our lives! Their first 1977 LP The Clash pushed all the right bottoms and was special for many underground characters. His voice woke me from my slumber. I experienced them at the Santa Monica Civic on their first US tour, Wow!
It has been forty years and he still moves through my heart. All those feelings; to be authentic, real, and alive. To create things uniquely and roughly with your own hands. Forty years of punk rock and I completed my four Punk@lullabys ! My Big celebration! I reached my goal and it worked out as I planned.
It feels good to know that my celebration is more an inward accomplishment for a punk ideology that still pulls through my heart as Joe still does.
“World history occupied a higher ground than one on which morality has properly its position, which is personal character and conscience of individuals. Moral claims which are irrelevant must not be brought into collision with world-historic deeds and their accomplishment. The litany of private virtues-modesty, humility, philanthropy and forbearance-must not be raised against them” ~ Hegel
“Hegel’s idea that such heroes were completely justified in crushing to pieces everything in their path which might stop them from fulfilling their great destiny, appealed enormously to the grandiose sense of mission in Hitler’s breast” ~ Trevor Ravenscropt
Today I will snack on black beans. Cooked up with fresh Anaheim green peppers and onions. Also some fresh cabbage with olive oil , honey and hot sauce. Alongside this are small sweet potatoes baked with honey, salt & pepper and Mrs. Dash’s lemon hot spice.
Reflecting this summer in my cave I am researching and thinking about everything. I have my products for sale and I have many articles, music and many offers for free. It is a good time in my life.
One of the lovely muses to inspire us all… we may snack on for inspiration, image by Hudley
I also snack on learning things. I focus on politicians, artists and astrology. I snack on Facebook and WordPress. I go outside and I snack on the beauty of nature. A share,orportion, of my life I can see what my boys are up to or what the cats are doing. I snack on humor!
I snack on foresight and inspirations of what my fruitful future might be. I also snack on good films and the news. I snack on my career and homemaking skills.
I will avoid unhealthy snacks today of all kinds. Yet, sometimes they are too damn fun to ignore.
I am natty morally these days. I feel the need to draw a line. In a time where chaos and lack of morals seem to slip into my world, I find myself standing taller and shining a little brighter.
I am not telling others what to do. I am letting others know where I draw the line. Like marriage and responsibilities. Maybe it is the full moon. It may not be ok by some that I express my opinions. I will lose friends and acquaintances but I can hang onto myself.
“You are old, Father William,” the young man said, “And your hair has become very white; And yet you incessantly stand on your head— Do you think, at your age, it is right?”
“In my youth,” Father William replied to his son, “I feared it might injure the brain; But now that I’m perfectly sure I have none, Why, I do it again and again.”
“You are old,” said the youth, “As I mentioned before, And have grown most uncommonly fat; Yet you turned a back-somersault in at the door— Pray, what is the reason of that?”
“In my youth,” said the sage, as he shook his grey locks, “I kept all my limbs very supple By the use of this ointment—one shilling a box— Allow me to sell you a couple?”
“You are old,” said the youth, “And your jaws are too weak For anything tougher than suet; Yet you finished the goose, with the bones and the beak— Pray, how did you manage to do it?”
“In my youth,” said his father, “I took to the law, And argued each case with my wife; And the muscular strength which it gave to my jaw, Has lasted the rest of my life.”
“You are old,” said the youth, “one would hardly suppose That your eye was as steady as ever; Yet you balanced an eel on the end of your nose— What made you so awfully clever?”
“I have answered three questions, and that is enough,” Said his father; “don’t give yourself airs! Do you think I can listen all day to such stuff? Be off, or I’ll kick you down stairs!”
Punk Rock Historian, Colleague and Professional Consultant
Hudley Flipside
“Records…..Records….and Records !!!!!” ~ Mike Vallejo
If you lived as a teen in the late ’70s or during the ’80s you were most likely riding the original wave or skating the rebellious cement of the original punk rock scene in some way, shape or form. Mike sent me a CD in the mail, like the good old days, of an early interview with Slash Magazine and Flipside Fanzine on Rodney on the ROQ. I am airing it again today. Mike said it was OK to post this on my blog.
Imagine from Flipside fanzine taken by Larry Lash
Mike sells more than just records and seems to have a lot of music and things that document the early punk scene. I also purchased a CD from him of The Jam playing the Whisky A Go Go. A thrill for me to find. I am delighted to receive this CD. My mentors speak! I was most likely listening to this on my parents’ old WW II German Telefunken radio. WOW!
Enjoy and thanks Mike Vallejo! A friend indeed.
The last audio 7 ends abruptly. I wrote a letter to Kickboy-face after hearing this live back when it was on the air. He wrote back a week later. Also I danced with him at the Whisky A Go Go live to Madness. It is strange but this captures pre Elks Lodge Riot... we all know how that turned out!!
X-8- A Flipside Crew Trip to San Francisco ’79. photo by Peter Landswick (AL, Hud, Pete and X-8)
Rodney on the ROQ Los Angeles Flipside Fanzine and Slash Magazine.
I know that the nasty Slash characters played a song trick or two on Rodney… did you catch it… an utmost synchronicity for me…
The, another, big protest is happening today. Here at the Daily “FUCK” Gazette, watchers of the absurd and asinine, Mr. Fuck has made a sign and Mr. Shit drew a little doodle for yoodle…. we are with you, the mighty “WE THE PEOPLE.”
“As we fight the corpocracy, the fuckupracy of this world… their lies, their abuses that try to gobble us up into oblivion!!” ~Mr. Dang
Trump wants more money but no words of “OUR NATION IS AT WAR”…. nothing new in the scheme of lies told by our presidents… at least this guy, Army General Tony Thomas commander of U.S. special operation forces, has the balls to tell the truth.
Last year under Obama’s eye of fine etiquette and diplomacy, he silently bombed the hell out of other countries… and Trump is lying about it still.
We at Flopside COmics oppose war and bombing other countries but we love the truth when we hear it!!
“Make whoopee the Marlon Brando way, not war the American way”
~ Mr. Shit (he has dementia but I think you get his drift…)
“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
Marching down memory lane. I have mentioned this stencil before. I was inspired by a book by Tim Lyons about generational astrology. What really rang true for me was his knowledge of Chiron. At the time I was living in a little apartment with my family in Van Nuys California.
I had to do something to express my excitement. So I created a stencil on available cardboard with my trusty X-Acto knife (that I still have ). This image is the last I have of Chiron.
I lost the stencil. It does not matter if you view this image from the perspective of mythology, astrology, or depth psychology, it is a key that I found to healing and regeneration. I love Chiron.
I was amazed to see a small and pretty doorway with a Gothic arch in the middle of the wall, for I could not make up my mind whether this doorway had always been there or whether it had just been made. (8) ― Hermann Hesse, Steppenwolf
“In eternity there is no time, only an instant long enough for a joke.”
― Hermann Hesse, Steppenwolf
He opened the door to the “theater of the absurd!”
Times when creative inspiration filled his veins with contradictions of contrition; terror and bliss, hate and love, mediocrity and profoundness! Today, he is outside the door wondering,
“… do I have the will to go through that door again ?”
Laws control the lesser man… Right conduct controls the greater one.
~ Mark Twain
As I research this Bannon character, who is about to take over the White House, or become the new Chief of Staff, I see a man with honorable and dishonorable credentials! He is playing the country against itself. All the nasty shadowy things come forth as hate power and helplessness. He plays democrats and republicans against the other. We are being scorched to some unknown place ahead of us.
I have been invited to create a postcard and send it, in opposition of Bannon. Yet, by reading about him I have learned so much more about politics. I cannot say his goals are strangely honorable or dishonorable. He seems like a Hannibal Lecter sort of motivated politician. He seems to want to tear down the system as it is. What value or danger is awaiting “we the people” is not clear to me? He has scorched us.
I will send my postcard. Yet, the contradictory ways of Bannon are strange. But are they? He uses technology and knowledge to manipulate us. His propaganda is meant to awaken a response in us. Edward Bernays knew this by way of Freudian psychology. Not a new game in politics, corporations, or religion.
My postcard will also state an open question to him.
“What is your goal for “we the people?” Are we to be scorched only? You have scorched those in power now! Are you just a Dr. Jekyll -Mr. Hyde evil genius like the newspapers say?”
“You fear the world too much,’ she answered gently. ‘All your other hopes have merged into the hope of being beyond the chance of its sordid reproach. I have seen your nobler aspirations fall off, one by one, until the master passion, Gain, engrosses you. Have I not?”
To flourish with the same electrical sounds around us every day can become an adventure wrapped in strange amusing memories.
Reggie and the large tuning fork !!
Such as today when I used the lady’s room at my favorite store. A large fan vibrated throughout the small tilted covered bathroom. The sound reminded me of a scene from the horror film Phantasm (1979). In the film a youth named Mike Pearson finds a room in a mortuary where there are two large round metal polls. The room that contains the polls is bright. The polls vibrate and flourish relentlessly. A strange overwhelming loud pitched sound is heard. That is the same sound as in the lady’s room I visited today.
I once turned on our old dish washer every night. It sounded like the Alien UFO Machines in the remake of War of the Worlds. Images of long legs, tripods, squirting blood and the horror stimulated my scary dreaming. The sounds of the dish washer. Oh man, were a constant reminder every night of War of the Worlds. The old dish washer did not flourish. Now our new dishwasher sounds fine. No more scary dreams…. too bad.
“…Hey! Hey! Hey! Hey!
I find comment ’bout my looks irrelativity,
Think I’ll go and have some fun,
‘Cos it’s all for free.
I’m not searching for a reason to enjoy myself…,”
– Yardbirds
How I looked in the dream last night !
Had one of those dreams of being back at the scene of the 1980s. A club morphed into a Golden Voice show! The tight feelings were there of knowing all the bands and the characters and players! Jim Kaa of the Crowd was talking in my ear when brother Gus showed up. We are not talking these days, but in this dream, we approached each other for a forgiving hug when I turned into myself. How I look now.
I asked myself if I had the password to get into the show? I said it does not matter because I am in and not going anywhere!
Lots of guys from bands were roaming around! I was consciously aware enough to dig being back in the middle of things. Running around and being part of what was happening…like everyone else there! My scene, my friends, something to offer and cover! Al approached me; we then were at an adjoining Chinese restaurant. We were shooting the breeze! I was wondering where the bar was ’cause a cold beer sounded good to ease my social tension!
Al Flipside had a new computerized contraption that took pictures, recorded bands, and interviewed bands; ready for documenting the whole scene. All from a large black computer book!
He was on the cutting edge and creative as usual. As we were eating our noodles a band came on! Al said he had to go see about a band. I told him go ahead I will watch over your noodles until you get back!!
I awoke from the dream with a missing feeling of belonging once to a music scene that was overwhelming wild and unpredictable. I was spoiled then! My heart will always mourn those days of youthful rebellion!
I video taped this today. A singing bird and even the sound of man… airplane in the background… it is in the contrast that one feels the value of life.
What is man made and what is created by nature and where the two meet !
Reading by Hudley 3/17/2026
We live in “the best of times and the worst of times.” Darkness and light play a game upon us all. Terrorists initiate fear in us all. It is a time to focus on what is enduring in life as the planets, the stars and Spring. The changing of the season is remarkable, accurate and even mathematically perfected. Humor, poems, and music move us to be less hateful and to show empathy proudly. As the wind blows on a warm Spring Day take the time to see the ritual of life.
Today I am thinking about Bernie Sanders and a little peace bird, a synchronicity, which can lead our footsteps towards a tickling of heartfelt humor and baskets of embracing hope. We need to follow our footsteps of synchronicity,
I authored this poem for my father years ago. It is about birds. Not human footsteps but the continuity of singing bird steps.
A bird song…
Today I heard the sound of a singing bird.
What type of bird I do not know?
A sparrow or maybe a blue bird sings
This lovely song of summer and spring.
I’ve heard this singing many times before
As an infant I heard the singing near
My parent’s pool
As a child I also heard the singing
While sliding down a grassy hill.
Now as an adult of forty
I remember all the times I’ve heard the singing
The same song but from different birds
This lovely song of summer and spring.
In California I’ve heard
Their tunes hundreds of times
I’ve changed so much since
The first time I heard the birds singing ‘tell now,
