We must explore!

Punk Rock Colleague & Historian and Professional Consultant

Hudley Flipside

The Naked Grace.

These times are asking us to go within. Over the generations we have taken this journey within. By choice, by accident and spiritually. Through drugs, side effects from prescribed medication or by magic.

A song can amplify this reality. A writer can share the experience. Songs filled with lyrics are poetry put to music. The images come forth and touch us. These three songs came to mind today when I was out in the garden pulling tall grass from the rich soil. It all came together. The dark earth holds things. Pulling on the grass and releasing the soil is a forward effort of movement. The dark moist earth has a relationship with our psyches.

I believe that unless we willfully take this inward journey as an individual it will be forced upon us. On a personal level or a generational level is how it goes. Anytime we suppress our shadow, blame others, or spread hate it is bound to a generation. Are we not observing this right now? Songs can help us. I need them like I need flowers in my garden or kitty cats to hug.

Here are three songs that explain this journey variable. From the 1960s Catch the Wind by Donovan is a peaceful song. From 1985 Dead Man’s Party by Oingo Boingo is an amazing song that shares some interesting historical mysteries. Lastly from 1983 The Forbidden Zone by Charged GBH, one dose and you take their hand into a strange journey of a musician’s psyche.

♦Donovan is an unusual songwriter and folk singer that touches upon the light side of our psyche. He reminds us to remember the beauty in life. It is around us and in us if we go looking for it. Our psyches do often look back at us. We can reflect on this soft beauty from time to time.

“When sundown pales the sky

I want to hide a while

Behind your smile

And everywhere I would look, your eyes I’d find.”

♦Oingo Boingo’s song is remarkably interesting and worth listening to intensely. As a young punk back in the late 1970s I had an Oingo Boingo badge on my jacket. I was approached by a couple of punk chicks who mocked me and belittled me for wearing it. A time when the first signs of punk cultism started to show its ugly face.

“I was struck by lighting, walkin’ down the street

I was hit by something last night in my sleep

It’s a dead man’s party who could ask for more

Everybody’s comin’, leave your body at the door

Leave your body and soul at the door.”

“For English occultist Aleister Crowley, who was a painter himself, the artist ranked above the magician on the totem pole of illumination, and he considered poetry and art as precious tools for transforming one’s innermost psychic visions.”

~ Chapter Spencer Kansa, Pg. 92 Wormwood Star, The Magickal Life of Marjorie Cameron.

♥A wild journey inward to the shadowy psyche is found in the book City Baby from Highgate to Hawaii… Life, and GBH by Ross Lomas.

“This went on for hours. More and more of the same. It was incredibly intense. God and Jimi and Anne Carpenter and the devil and the fucking taxi driver, fighting over my soul right up to the point I passed out in exhaustion.”

~ Pg. 120.

“Take my hand and we’ll explore,

The forbidden zone.

When you’re in your own tree,

But don’t know if anybody’s home.”

Jimi Hendrix was playing guitar while Anne was a nun of salvation, this may show us that his journey was amplified by many elements as a fight for his soul. When the shadow opens to us it is always a powerful trip. Ross is stronger for his experience. A bite like this prepares us for outward tragedies as we are facing today.

The Saints Are Touring Again.

Punk Poem by Hudley April /2020

A great dream last night

Those best feelings

of hanging with your favorite band

Touring as they were

Family and friends were nearby

Chris Bailey was sweet

His lovely sly grin shone my way

as he looked at me

a rich heavy Irish accent

formed few words

“I’ll see ya tomorrow!” I said.

Adoringly glowing a depth of love

and mutual respect

John and I left the band

until tomorrow’s show.

We walked by waving

At Nathan Jones

We walked by a

large window coffee shop on the Blvd.

There Ed Kuepper sat alone.

Having a cup of coffee and a smoke.

Standing in front of a backstage club,

I looked at the band’s list.

Many names flew by

Under crew – stage

I saw Holly Cornell.

John pointed it out

Feeling a joy

Only a favorite band

could give ya

We will be there

early tomorrow.

To help and see the band.

Imagine it all coming together again. No

( Sorry to say Covid-19 hit and this event was canceled. 2020 )

Amazingly we are still alive. Punk Rock Bowling with the celebration of 40 Years of the Circle Jerks and Charged GBH this spring. I am besides myself with joy to be attending. Yes, all the bands seem interesting, yet my history also includes Madness.

Madness:

When I was a 19-year-old punk I was looking for a 45 by Prince Buster entitled Madness. This stirred me on a strange journey to a Los Angeles record store. They never could locate that 45 for me. Then the band came touring. At least the name of the band was right. Playing the Whisky A Go Go.

I remember dancing to the band with Kick Boy Face from SLASH MAGAZINE (my first Punk Rock correspondence.) (Slosh and Flopside) It was grand beyond grand. Imagine it all coming together again.

Punk Rock Bowling 2020

Some of my best punk memories.

GBH:

Ross’s bass guitar case. GBH 1980s

I am standing in this image next to Ross’s first bass guitar case. He gave it to me. He bought a new one. I lost it. Yet, my mom had put it in a special place.

After her death we cleaned out the basement and their it was. How happy that mom preserved some wonderful punk history.

I still have it and will give it “will it” to my sons. I love it like punk rock. I hope I am not sucking on Ross’s “tits” when I say I love him too.

Thanks for thinking of me back then. All the best and looking forward to Las Vegas for a week of punk and beyond bliss.

Circle Jerks:

FLipside Fanzine — Circle Jerks Cover by Edward Colver

City Baby from Highgate to Hawaii, Life and GBH by Ross Lomas. One of my most popular posts in ten years…

Dec 6th -We Read at Stories Books and Cafe In Echo Park

Photo by the great Gary Leonard

Keith, Hudley, Chris, Annette and Iris) Group shot taken last month after our fun (and a little drizzly) reading at Stories Books and Café.

Chi Chi Hawa Harmony

“Hello, baby, hello
Open up your heart and let your feelings flow
You’re not unlucky knowing me
Keeping the speed real slow
In any case I set my own pace by stealing the show
Say hello, hello.”

Chi Chi Hawa Harmony

Chato from Painted Women / The Mustanger and the Lady (The Brandiron)

~ Dusty Richards

You don’t catch a Painted Lady—you join her journey.

Now Our Civil War

“Thus, it is our fate to manage within our nature the complexity and the competition of two opposing tendencies: that which stands with life and love (the Dionysian) and that which is greedy, power hungry, and ego-driven (the Titanic).”

~Aguilar, A. Marina. Alchemy of The Heart: The Sacred Marriage of Dionysus & Ariadne. Chiron Publications. Kindle Edition.

Civil War ~A war between opposing groups of citizens of the same country.

Hiawatha, Thomas Paine and Abraham Lincoln are examples of sensible leaders of humanity and bright governance. Which we lack now, and profoundly so. I must say that we are now in the mists of a civil war. Has anyone called it out yet? I will. At times like these I rest on the wisdom of leaders who are just and wise. A call to their spirit of wisdom is needed.

Will we stand aside and be enablers of this abuse on “we the people,” children, emigrants and the innocent? How can we do this? It is time to see this for what it is. A civil war.

Hiawatha

“As the smoke from many family fires rises tonight and spreads above the forest, let us remember,” he reminded the Iroquois, “that this smoke comes from many fires, and no one fire is better than another. Though one fire may burn brighter and another more faintly who is to say which is wiser? You know as well as I that there are times and seasons for both. Remember always that the truth springs from many hearts and takes many outer forms, no two ever the same. One in the Great Spirit, we shall have no one ruling shamans, for such traditions are warrior traditions and not the traditions of the Ongwhehonwhe. Let such customs be buried with our weapons. Let them lie forgotten beside the tree that is no more.”

~Hiawatha – Return Of The Bird Tribes.

Thomas Paine

“Can we possibly suppose that if governments had originated in a right principle, and had not an interest in pursuing a wrong one, the world could have been in the wretched and quarrelsome condition we have seen it? What inducement has the farmer, while following the plough, to lay aside his peaceful pursuit, and go to war with the farmer of another country? or what inducement has the manufacturer? What is dominion to them, or to any class of men in a nation? Does it add an acre to any man’s estate, or raise its value? Are not conquest and defeat each of the same price, and taxes the never-failing consequence? Though this reasoning may be good to a nation, it is not so to a government. War is the Pharo-table of governments, and nations the dupes of the game.”

~ pg. 178 Chapter II, Of the Origin of the Present Old Governments. ~ Thomas Paine

Abraham Lincoln

“That we here highly resolve that these dead shall not have died in vain – that this nation, under God, shall have a new birth of freedom – and that government of the people, by the people, for the people, shall not perish from the earth.”

~ Abraham Lincoln

A Letter to Bernie Taupin, Alfred E. Newman and Gahan Wilson.

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.

Dear Teachers,

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, Allan Jaffee or Jack Davis went on to inspire me in my own fanzine days.

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

Jack Davis Mad Magazine original!

In the Pit: Experience found guilty via an individual’s fingerprints

26757457_1340892842683774_706547628002770944_n — https://www.facebook.com/AlisonBraunPhotography/

I see how the term Punk Rock is always trying to be defined by many. Yet the real-life definition is not an out their term to read about in academic journals because it is based on the foundation of experience. It is viewed by the action of individuals. As shown by Pudd’nhead Wilson, (1894) the novel by American writer Mark Twain; Punk Rock is as unique as a person’s fingerprints. Mark Twain is the grand Punk Rocker. Think about that.

Punk Rock is based on the foundation of experience and is unique as a person’s fingerprints. That is clear enough. It is not who you know, or what shows you go to, or if you wear the right clothes or sport the wildest haircut. You are a punk rocker who likes to camp out in the wilderness. It is when your deep-down dreams affirm to you that you are a punk rocker, then you know. It does not matter what others think of you either. It is a happy curse of creativity and inward ambition.

W.P. Witcutt authored a book on William Blake entitled Blake, A Psychological Study. He produced a term that explains the artist and visionary William Blake but also what a punk rocker is. A punk rocker has “introverted intuition.” Blake had introverted intuition. Blake took his deep-down creativity and brought it out upon the world in often wild, unique, and creative ways. Yes, he was a punk rocker.

Beatniks identified themselves as: Jane Doe, Beatnik, artist, writer, wife, mother. I too can say I am. Hudley Flipside, Punk Rocker, writer, artist, wife, mother. Alison Braun can be identified as Alison Braun, Punk Rocker, photographer, wife, mother (She may wish to add to the list).

When she took these pictures, being a female was not always the way of the land. Lots of guys in bands, as promoters and running record labels to communicate with and finding another female was not so easy. At least one who was a punk rocker living the life.

Creatively Alison Braun’s photos show unique skills of capturing a time and place in our punk rock history (1981 to 1990). This is especially important for surviving punk rockers to preserve, document and tell our stories. It is a healthy natural flow of our collective unconscious experiences. To take that deep-down creativity and bring it out upon the world again is grand! I am incredibly happy to see punk rock on an individual scale like this.

The Avengers, the Dils and the Alley Cats.

In memory of Jimmy Wilsey

Sunday May 26, 2019.

The Avengers, The Dils and The Alley Cats + many special guests (A Celebration of the Life of Jimmy Wilsey) at Echoplex

Before the show I went to an Italian Restaurant nearby. I sat at the bar and had a Guinness and a plate of pasta.

Part of my DNA

It will be the time to join with punk comrades and celebrate our originators and characters of the early California punk scene. The Avengers, the Dils and the Alley Cats.

Before The Avengers went on a DJ at the event played The Saints – (I’m) Stranded. The sound went on and I swear the earth moved as the song grabbed my spine… an earthquake…. it was a Saints’ Hallelujah “amber” moment.

Just got this from a friend… a nice treat that makes life bearable. (signed copy and 2024 November The Saints Tour)

Once someone dies, their life becomes a story, infinite, Like a song forever more.

Back then it was a tight underground, alternative punk rock scene. Bands were unclassified and their songs unique. I found myself melting into a wild alchemy of youths that had something new to say.

We were finding our voice. All the unknown characters were there. Nobody creates a scene alone. Seeing punk bands during the early Los Angeles punk scene, I was not always aware of all the members in the band.

Instead, the feel of drums, bass and guitar grabbed me into a wild joyful submission. After a few times seeing a band, the lyrics and the vocals brought depth and understanding to any band’s song.

I was shaking to the sounds, wanting to go to all the shows. After getting involved with Los Angeles Flipside Fanzine all the players, in the bands, became focused and clear. I listened to their voices.

I got to know them on a personal level. I went from being a face in the crowd to writing about punk bands and getting to know band members as friends.

The sound of the Avengers was my grounding or anchoring into that early punk scene. Those first days I awoke……

It was fantastic! The Dils I learned about indirectly through other Flipside staff writers.

The Alley Cats was the band, they were the heart of the early punk scene which I got to know the best at that time.

Jimmy was a part of that scene.

I did not know him personally but indirectly. Yet his sound moved me into states of wild frenzy. I am grateful for all the vinyl records that contain that story, song, or sound of our youthful rebellion. Of Jimmy’s youthful rebellion.

Yet a “live” band is always best. It is great to still be here, currently, part of our punk rock history. Thanks to Randy and Penelope for letting me speak today. To show my love and respect.

We were wild and knew all the songs by heart by The Dils, The Alley Cats and the Avengers.

I will be there handing out some badges joining in the event in memory of our youthful rebellion that is still the heartbeat of this crazy continuity of punk rock that still drives our DNA onward.

https://www.facebook.com/events/623081094804740/

Got to sing along, scream along to this one…

RIP Chris Bailey and Algy Ward

2016 Film 20TH CENTURY WOMEN

20^TH CENTURY WOMEN

Photo included in this Film

Black Flag with Keith Morris Singing. Last image of this band in their original lineup.1979

Nice to be acknowledged in closing credits.
Very honored to be a part of the film.

“Black Flag live in the basement of the Church in Hermosa Beach. Greg Ginn, myself, Robo and Chuck “The Duke” sandwiched between Dez Cadena on Greg’s right and Brian Grillo on Chuck’s left.” ~ Keith Morris

My review of Film….

In the film 20th Century Women …women are at the table.

vast…

“Although we are typically in the habit of perceiving our world in terms of solid shapes and forms, Taoism teaches that we can train ourselves to perceive in other ways, and a good place to start is with our own human body. Though we may now experience our body as being rather solid, at a molecular level it is comprised mostly of water–a very fluid substance! And at an atomic level, it is 99.99% space–a vast (and infinitely intelligent) emptiness.” Online source …

Jaded Poem

A little around the edges

A spinning energy in my middle

Older and wiser and stronger

Less inspired by adolescent rantings!

So I want to write and read aloud

I want to travel and ponder the meaning of life.

HEADLESS HORSEMAN ROAD

The 1970s, The San Fernando Valley and The Santa Monica Mountains

Horses and their girls….

Early 1970s

During a tumultuous era marked by global unrest and climate change, I recall a hopeful time shaped by nature, integrity, and innocence. Elton John’s music and Bernie Taupin’s lyrics amplified these experiences.

My autobiographical novella, set in the San Fernando Valley and nearby California counties, follows three years of friendship and horseback riding through the Santa Monica Mountains.

The story offers a journey into the female psyche and evokes memories of an untamed Valley, with “Madman Across the Water” and “Don’t Shoot Me I’m Only the Piano Player” providing the soundtrack as my friends and I sang Bernie Taupin’s lyrics during our rides.

Excerpt from beginning of Chapter Three.

3. HEADLESS HORSEMAN ROAD

A song we were singing ~ All the Nasties – By Elton John, Lyrics by Bernie Taupin

Canoga Avenue from Mulholland to Oxnard was overwhelmingly wild in the 1970s. It was only a two-lane avenue lined with some residential homes, farms, and empty fields. The enormous eucalyptus trees monstered along Canoga Avenue exalting the heart of Woodland Hills.

We chased wild rabbits bareback where the city of Warner Center now suffocates the land.

Stealing pumpkins late at night from the many pumpkin patches was a scary treat for us kids around autumn. Now Kaiser Permanente stands tall over ghostly pumpkins which linger there only in my mind.

Ruff and I rode our horses after school which did not give us much time. We had to make it back home around dusk. This gave us a couple of hours to ride. We had it in our minds to visit down an old dirt road up near Canoga Ave., moving south towards Mulholland.

We noticed this dirt road a few times on our rides up to Mulholland where it seemed endless trails awaited us, but now was not the time.

The dirt road branched off to the east and seemed a long one. The everyday valley trees mixed and mingled along the road with large rough trunks and heavy-handed branches. A small forest. We got off our horses to look around.

Click on Image to Order…

Flipside Fanzine # 2, tight scene of nobodies going nowhere?

Your patina is showing…. before I edited and cleaned up the issue for printing…..

My ‘initiation woman’ who abducted me into the punk scene was Donna Rhia but she no longer was playing drums with the Germs. I am not going to amplify the loss of Lorna Doom because there is enough on social media already.

I guess she was a part of the tight scene of nobodies going nowhere but lost and having fun. It was so exciting back then which is what keeps me going on the subject…

Courtesy of Hudley Loss Angeles Flipside Fanzine number two. (1978)

RIP

Sting like a jelly-fish

“In the night of death, hope sees a star, and listening love can hear the rustle of a wing.”

~ Robert Green Ingersoll

Today while walking into Ralph’s supermarket, I saw the familiar old lady under yellow plastic. She was holding a white tissue to her red nose. She sat in her wheelchair at a prime target getting her ‘a little sympathy’. She got mine. I went into the store and purchased a $1.95 Starbucks house coffee medium. I am still amazed that a ‘cup of joe’ costs so much now. I remember when it was 25 cents.

“I like watching Noir films,”

I said to the barista.

“It is a wonder in those films that a ‘cup of joe’ only cost five pennies. Twenty-five cents got you a cup of coffee, a ham sandwich, and a piece of pie.”

The barista smiled at me as I got the coffee. I put in some cream and sugar and then headed towards the old lady in a wheelchair.

“Here is a cup of coffee, you look cold.?!”

“I don’t drink coffee it is bad for you.”

“Really, I thought it would warm you up. Coffee is not as bad for you as you may think.”

“I have never had any.”

She looked down to her right at a dirty bag of oranges.

“It is all right I had an orange…I am fine.”

I was a bit upset. I never thought that she would reject a cup of coffee on such a cold and rainy day.

“Lady sometimes beggars can’t be choosers?!”

I realized that I could not reason with the lady. She had her right to say no. So, I walked on remembering what an old myth taught me. All about a woman’s psyche.

As Persephone went on her journey, she was advised not to give anything to those needy people who asked for something along the way. It was important for her to hold on to her strength and parts of herself that were precious.

I failed the test today. Then that sorrow thread pulled in me. I call it the thread of sorrow.

I think that our current society does not embrace their share of sorrow. That is why we have so many drug addicts and alcoholics. A social epidemic.

We all need to hold on to or embrace our threads of sorrow.

It can pull hard.

It can be an echo that mocks.

It can sting like a jelly-fish.

When we run from our share of sorrow,

ignore it,

or get lost in our addictions hating it,

it only manifests in our world as a monster shadow.

Creating hate, chaos, and terrible politicians.

That is why I love Jazz because it speaks to the human heart and soul.

It embraces its share of sorrow.

Anthropomorphism

Here is my latest praying mantis caricature. A holiday greeting from long ago ancient times.

Attis brings Liberte’

At the darkness time of the year, the longest night, the winter solstice… here comes some ancient anthropomorphism… and praying mantis is here to make life so meaningful.

scorn and unbelievable

Watercolor Rendering by Hudley

(Azoth-1613-Basilius-Valentinus-Beatus-Georg-rebis)

Ritual is good. Songs bring in the seasons. In this dark time ‘song ritual’ help to ease the scorn and unbelievable with something sane and consistent. The skins of my large white beans are shedding away as they boil in the pot. There are times when I feel like these large white beans.

Today during my heart-focused breathing I was surprised to feel a pinpoint of joy dance upon my heart. Faces of love smiled before me and I was grateful. I cried for those released from this Earth, this planet.

What a mystery it all is. I talked to my oldest son. He said he was listening to a tape about the Ten Hermetic Keys of Hermes Trismegistus.

The mental origin of the world and of man.
Corresponding harmonics.
Dynamics of alternation.
Bi-polarity and complementarity.
Cyclic repolarizations.
Cause and effect.
Gender.
The astrology of the Ogdoad.
The magic of the Ennead.
10 The alchemy of the Decad.

This caught me off guard. So, I looked it up. I showed him my watercolor that contains this in a kind alchemical way.

Who’s Soul did Frankenstein’s monster have?

“‘…from that moment [he] declared everlasting war against the species, and more than all, against [Frankenstein] who had formed [him] and sent [him] forth to this insupportable misery.’”

Shelley, Frankenstein, Chapter 16, p. 12

Once upon a time I found the novel by Mary Shelley, Frankenstein, the new Prometheus. I became friends with Frankenstein’s monster. He was not the film version because I looked to the quality of his brilliant soul.

I authored a short story entitled, Who’s Soul did Frankenstein’s Monster Have? I put the story in a folder and took it with me wherever I went. I was inspired and torn by my insight.

I felt I may have understood something no one else ever dared to wonder about. This was back in the 1980’s. Then, as busy, and as careless as a young punk might be, I lost the folder at a Mexican restaurant up-town Whittier, CA.

This loss haunted my nights. Back then backing-up-files was not so easy. This may have been before floppy disks. I did not make a copy of my short story of a monster’s revelations.

I did keep the little doodles about the story which I will share today. I did not misplace the folder. Someone took it and still, has it?

As one gets older time seems to bend backwards. It comes towards you so you can say hello again to those times of youthful inspiration.

I looked through all of my plastic boxes to find these images in my art closet. So glad the doodles were safe and not lost.

Reading from Chapbook, An Underground Bard.

Someone asked me if I was a poet. I said no I am a filmmaker. Yet in truth I am a poet, an underground bard.

While sitting at Kaiser Hospital a man asked me if I was a Poet.

I had on my “Fear the Poet” T-Shirt which I received from the Professor and students from Whittier College with a card after giving a talk about Punk Rock.

I told the man I am an underground bard, Poet. Then he said,

“What happens when you are no longer underground.”

I did not answer him.

Yet I think often upon his question.

I am content.

Reading link

On my mind when i woke up….

I know what I write here. It is the pun-rock curse. A fan, promoter band thing. As a fan it was my dream to meet the bands and the promoters. The intimacy and friendships that formed are endearing for me. There was a time and place about eight years ago that I brought two bands together. Rikk Agnew Band (cult of ‘58) and The Black Widows (carry a big stick). It was a time when the San Fernando Valley was beaming with a few hot spots or punk and alternative music hubs. My one promotion time right after a 10-year Flipside Fanzine flopped. My mom had just died and I had two boys that needed me at 8 and 16 and I was acting like the teenager… for a while. Eight years ago is fast growing time for two boys. Life is new and exciting. Eight years for a 52-year-old is slow and precious. I introduced A Pretty Mess and Rikk Agnew and Panic Movement to a good night of old-time buddies and new ones. I was trying to bring together many aspects of the scene at that time and place that I loved. I like small shady clubs and intimate encounters. It was a happy night of loud live music. I was delighted and still think about that night often. I see that the Rikk Agnew Band and The Black Widows will be playing at Cafe NELA coming up this month. Sweet. I guess seeing this event brought back a few fantastic memories. So much has changed but this is so surreal & feels good to my old punk rock bones.

https://www.facebook.com/events/2180430575536192/?notif_t=event_calendar_create&notif_id=1535937037942310