At the punk show

Punk band, Anti-flag. 2004.Crowd participation. ALWAYS!!!. Gillette Stadium, home of the New England Patriots, 2004...No football today, punk rock!!!....... Saw them in Providence, then Boston, then Foxboro in a one year period '02-'03. My son was 16, me 45, and a fan from birth of REAL music......here's my history.......(example: bought Black Sabbath Vol.IV album at 12 yrs. old in 1972 because I saw the plastic cover torn off and saw the inner LP liner picture of the band pictured playing live on stage. The long hair covering their faces REALLY made me interested because of the mysterious seriousness they had. I also bought 'Made In Japan' by Deep Purple which still today is my fave LP of all time.) But previous to that at 11, I heard the song from Woodstock,.... I'm Goin' Home.... by Alvin Lee and was blown away at the rockin', heavy duty, driving ,aggressiveness of that 11 min. jam song!...All this time everyone listened to TOP40 but I was connecting and finding and buying music that was SO new and unique....and HARD ROCKIN"!!!!........I also was intrigued with Little Richard, Jerry Lee Lewis, Chuck Berry, Elvis, but that's a different story ;) ...........When I got into Made In Japan, by Deep Purple, at 13, mind you!!! :),. After hearing this I was HOOKED!!! and blown away! .... Also I remember being 12, in 1971, or '72 going to the store with my Dad. I wanted to sneak away to look at the LP's. I was in search of the song, Bitch, by The Rolling Stones. Brown Sugar was the hit single but the song, Bitch ,sounded SO intertesting and bad to me. I HAD to own it. I read in the newspaper about the controversial title of the flipside to the hit song Brown Sugar.....I heard Brown Sugar but not Bitch!I I remember being so scared to ask Dad to buy it because 'Bitch'

was a swear word and we were Catholics and that could stop the sale..But I made it by with limited questions and got it! .... After that I bought Black Sabbath, Masters Of Reality, etc., and radio stuff,Grand Funk Railroad, Neil Young, Thin Lizzy, even Credence Clearwater Revival and just ate up that hard rock sound...I even stumbled and bought Van Halen's 1st LP even before I ever heard of them, because the pics on the cover , I knew were rockin hard!!!!! I LOVED the LP!!..INCREDIBLE guitar, polished, like never heard before......so I got into all this new, hard music, even Lynryd Skynrd and Blackfoot, The Outlaws, etc.,southern rock, ..I loved this stuff !! The only music I didn't like , believe it or not, was,The Who or Led Zeppelin, TOO commercial, I thought..I always listen to the underground!................ oh yeah, also, I liked a lot, Robin Trower, he was a HUGE rockin' influence, acid trippy rock guitar, loved it! Not Beck or Clapton, they were commercial;).....I also stumbled onto Ted Nugent when I was 18 in '77. Killer rockin'!!!!! back in the day....damn! wasn't disappointed! Saw him in 'late '70's with the Cat Scratch Fever Tour. 1979. I think?...........Geez, soooo many influences I've had,........well anyway, my son always loved hearing my 'war' stories about Club Baby Head and Lupo's of Providence, in Rhode Island in '80-'85, the slams with Dead Kennedys, Circle Jerks, Angry Samoans, Skatenigs, GG Allin, Anti-Nowhere League, Bad Brains, Lords Of The New Church, Dr. Know, Bad Religion, Flipper, Black Flag, Minor Threat, Youth Brigade, MDC, Fear , TSOL, The Dead Boys, and sooo many more!! ...oh yeah, the locals, Mission Of Burma(homies, Boston punk), also Bostonians, Jerry's Kids, Gangreen, The FU's, The Proletariat, The Atlantics, The Reducers(CT), Dead City, The Outlets, Sorry....and also the big groups came around,The Exploited, Husker Du, Jim Carroll Band, even Ministry (dance style '85), also, ...later on, in my 30's,Ministry, '92, brutal...at Rocky Point, Warwick, Rhode Island..... then you drift into the club and you see Body Count ('90), RUN DMC('86), Clash ('85), ...Corrosion of Conformatity in '85, did anyone know they were around that far back?!!!!...Punk metal sound........ Also, to mention, Ramones in 1979 in East Providence, RI, @ The Center Stage was the FIRST club appearance I participated in slam dancin'.....On that night I saw The Probers, DC10Z, Rash of Stabbings, first ever local punk!!! ....Actually seeing The Ramones started the whole craze. The first 'slam' I was in, was at this show in '79. I was aware and read about the shit that was goin' around with The SexPistols and the new punk scene. I LOVED it!!!! I slammed every since this time ('79) until the last real slam I did, FULL show, hurt and drenced in sweat, The Deftones at Lupo's in 2004. 45 years old and did I say I slammed the FULL show?!!!...........As for my punk rock history and my first show with The Ramones in '79 as I mentioned, (I also saw them a total of 14 times later), I also saw The Plasmatics, '82, Discharge, ' 84, UKSubs '82, Suicidal Tendencies '84, and of course, 90's Boston local, Dropkick Murphys, and Providence's Amazing Royal Crowns..still good stuff.....soooo much punk I saw. '81-87, The punk scene was alive and well with the clubs in the city ,The Living Room and at Club Babyhead, and Lupo's and Simon's, in Pawtucket ...Punk rock was all over, loved by the bands,a great scene support, gritty Prov.-style fans. I remember one night I saw The Plasmatics in '82 in Providence, at The Rhode Island Auditorium,on the bordering city of Pawtucket, RI, a mile an a half away, the SAME night !, Black Flag played at Simon's, July 4. Simon's was a tiny club but had a GREAT stretch with bands like Fear, Dead Kennedys, Black Flag and SO many other bands of the time who traveled for the first time on the road, cross country to play to the East coast punk rockers.....California style punk was always the leaders in pissed off attitudes playing super aggressively .... The scene at the clubs was ALWAYS in control though, no poseurs, just locals protecting our territory, our club, just fun stuff, slammin' all night, entertaining the crowd circled around us tightly always very afraid to get in the circle.Basically,The Living Room was run by me and my friends crew. We ruled! Protected Providence crowds who flocked in curiously, college people. We were the locals, we made sure the Boston punks didn't get dirty. We were Prov. security....but LOVED to slam...geez, I vividly remember being at the show by the Bad Brains filming their video for ,'I and I Survive', which has played on MTV It was a great night live at The Living Room......in the vid you can see my friends, not me though, I was always busy in the circle, the pit, slammin'. Never saw the band because was ALWAYS heavy-duty slammin'!!!!. Head down and had a mission!!!........but now, older, but STILL A PUNK.....Never too old to know where the place to be is ....in the pit!!!!......... Punk life forever. 1979-2007.....Saw Ramones in 1979 and saw last week Rise Against, 28 yrs. of punk rock!............as they said in '76, 'Punk Will Never Die".......truth.

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