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I see somebody posted a few weeks ago about an event related to the SF Bay Area punk history, "Gimme Something Better". Just wanted to bring it up again, since there's a review of it in the Chronicle today, and there was also an hour on it on KQED (radio) Forum a few weeks back:
www.sfgate.com/cgi-bin/article.cgi
www.kqed.org/epArchive/R910091000
gimmesomethingbetter.com/
The book sounds really interesting, but I'll have to reserve judgment on it until I've given it at least a partial read. (Just ordered it today.) Its apparently done in "oral history" format along the lines of "We Got the Neutron Bomb: The Untold Story of L.A. Punk" and at least one other book on punk history who's name escapes me. This could be seen alternately as either a way to get multiple narratives of an aspect of recent history, or a lazy-as-fuck way to write a book. "We Got the Neutron Bomb" was actually pretty good, though, so I'll treat this book as "promising" until I have a chance to evaluate it better.
Of the two authors, Jack Boulware and Silke Tudor, I only recognize the latter name, and that just vaguely, from her SF Weekly columns. I hadn't really associated either of the two with the early SF punk scene, but apparently Tudor was part of the Gilman St scene, which by my reckoning represents the third wave of Bay Area punk, and is about the time I'd drifted out of it. (The Will Shatter wake at the On Broadway in late 87, a 1988 Dead Milkmen show, and show by the early-90s incarnation of Flipper are the last three punk shows I have any recollection of attending.)
According to the Chronicle article, the book was originally going to be about the Gilman St scene, but the authors quickly realized that they really needed to cover the prior 10 years. The article also notes that Tim Yohannen is the most quoted figure in this oral history (which must be from some old interviews, because he's been dead a long time). I'm wondering if that part will lead to some disagreement over interpretation of events, since there are lot of people who didn't like Tim Yohannen much.
While I'm semi-rambling here, I'll also put in a plug for an earlier book, "Rip it Up and Start Again: Postpunk 1978–1984" by Simon Reynolds ( tinyurl.com/ybwfwyo ), which is the definitive book on a whole lot of interesting music that came up along side punk during those years (post-punk, early industrial, No Wave, and much else). In particular, there's a whole chapter on San Francisco post-punk – Tuxedomoon, Chrome, The Residents, and Factrix, as well as Flipper, which they also treat as post-punk. This was an under-appreciated scene that had as much influence on my later tastes as anything from the better known hardcore scene of the time, and it was good to see Reynolds giving it some recognition.
More on "Gimme Something Better" when I've had a look at it.
www.sfgate.com/cgi-bin/article.cgi
www.kqed.org/epArchive/R910091000
gimmesomethingbetter.com/
The book sounds really interesting, but I'll have to reserve judgment on it until I've given it at least a partial read. (Just ordered it today.) Its apparently done in "oral history" format along the lines of "We Got the Neutron Bomb: The Untold Story of L.A. Punk" and at least one other book on punk history who's name escapes me. This could be seen alternately as either a way to get multiple narratives of an aspect of recent history, or a lazy-as-fuck way to write a book. "We Got the Neutron Bomb" was actually pretty good, though, so I'll treat this book as "promising" until I have a chance to evaluate it better.
Of the two authors, Jack Boulware and Silke Tudor, I only recognize the latter name, and that just vaguely, from her SF Weekly columns. I hadn't really associated either of the two with the early SF punk scene, but apparently Tudor was part of the Gilman St scene, which by my reckoning represents the third wave of Bay Area punk, and is about the time I'd drifted out of it. (The Will Shatter wake at the On Broadway in late 87, a 1988 Dead Milkmen show, and show by the early-90s incarnation of Flipper are the last three punk shows I have any recollection of attending.)
According to the Chronicle article, the book was originally going to be about the Gilman St scene, but the authors quickly realized that they really needed to cover the prior 10 years. The article also notes that Tim Yohannen is the most quoted figure in this oral history (which must be from some old interviews, because he's been dead a long time). I'm wondering if that part will lead to some disagreement over interpretation of events, since there are lot of people who didn't like Tim Yohannen much.
While I'm semi-rambling here, I'll also put in a plug for an earlier book, "Rip it Up and Start Again: Postpunk 1978–1984" by Simon Reynolds ( tinyurl.com/ybwfwyo ), which is the definitive book on a whole lot of interesting music that came up along side punk during those years (post-punk, early industrial, No Wave, and much else). In particular, there's a whole chapter on San Francisco post-punk – Tuxedomoon, Chrome, The Residents, and Factrix, as well as Flipper, which they also treat as post-punk. This was an under-appreciated scene that had as much influence on my later tastes as anything from the better known hardcore scene of the time, and it was good to see Reynolds giving it some recognition.
More on "Gimme Something Better" when I've had a look at it.
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