Déjà vu in Las Vegas

The Punk Rock Museum revisited

Since the last edition of Message from the Underworld, I drove to Las Vegas, hung out with my brother, went to a bunch of punk rock shows, saw Dead and Company at The Sphere, picked Nuvia up at the airport, hung out at the Punk Rock Museum on our wedding anniversary, attended the Punk Rock Bowling festival and saw a bunch more bands, reunited with my friends Jan & Andrea from Frankfurt and attended their wedding at the Graceland Chapel, and drove back to San Diego yesterday.

I feel like I did everything at least twice and it’s already starting to blur together. It’s the longest trip I’ve taken to Las Vegas and I didn’t hock my car or blow my life savings so I’m grateful to have returned unscathed.

Before I go any further, I need your help for something I’m writing and I need it right now.

Quiztune for the Group

Do you know of an L.A. punk band from the early ’80s called Iconoclast? They sound like this. Did you see them play? Did they sleep on your floor? If so, I want to hear from you!

Ok, on with the show…

Curate the Walls

Today I want to talk about The Punk Rock Museum. This was my second visit to the museum. Actually, my second and third visits since I went twice last week, and honestly I’d go back tomorrow if I was still in town.

Last year I visited the museum shortly after it opened and since then the collection has expanded by at least a third, the museum now features temporary exhibits, a wedding chapel, a tattoo parlor, and one of the most popular attractions—guided tours by punk rock legends—is in full swing.

You never know who you’re going to see at the museum. I went on Friday to talk to two of the founders—Lisa Brownlee and Vinnie Fiorello of Less than Jake. While I was there I bumped into Dez Cadena, who was giving a tour; Rachael Contreras, who was interviewing people for her show; and Chris Petersen, whose sister’s photos are currently featured at the museum as part of a group show.

On Sunday the encounters were even more random. I went back with Nuvia in the hopes of talking to Karl Alvarez and John Reis, who were both giving tours, but I also bumped into our friend Bob Rob Medina; Greg Norton, formerly of Hüsker Dü and now UltraBomb, who was getting a tattoo; and Joey Cape of Lagwagon who was there just because.

What I love about all this that it carries one of the central tenets of punk—lack of separation between the performer and the audience—into the museum space. There’s no one to tell you to move along if you lag behind your tour. No one to tell you not to get too close to the door from the Masque. No one to shush you for being too loud. In fact, there’s a jam room where not only can you pick up and strum guitars owned by punk rock legends, you can play through their gear as well.

One of my favorite spaces in the museum is the Pennywise garage: a recreation of the rehearsal space where Pennywise practiced. The space is lovingly recreated—from the graffiti on the wall to the gear on display. But this isn’t a diorama. The gear works and visiting bands regularly play short sets for whoever happens to be in the museum.

During one of John Reis’s tours, I watched as he took his group to the garage and feigned surprise to find the rest of his new band—Swami and the Bed of Nails—ready to go. Two days later, I saw Ham Apple from Long Beach, CA cover Black Flag’s “Depression” with Dez on vocals.

The Punk Rock Museum is a place where punk history is on display and being made on an almost daily basis.

While I was waiting to talk to one of the co-founders, I sat on a couch next to the punk rock library, but this wasn’t just any sofa. It used to belong to Mike Ness who donated it to the museum along with a glass-topped coffee table where he wrote the lyrics to songs like “Gotta Know the Rules,” “Down on the World Again,” and “Don’t Take Me for Granted.” And there underneath the glass were handwritten lyrics to those songs.

Since I had some time to kill, I opened my journal and started writing a song. In Black Van, one of the main characters is an angsty young songwriter in his early twenties. For the first time in my life, I’m writing punk songs—but through the lens of this fictional character. They’re mostly hardcore songs about scene politics that come off like love songs and love songs that sounds like angry political rants. My character refers to his songs as post post-hardcore hardcore but it sounds an awful lot like emo to me. These songs may not ever see the light of day, but I’d be lying if I told you I wasn’t having a blast writing them, and I couldn’t pass up the opportunity to work on one in The Punk Rock Museum.

While I was scribbling away, John Reis’s tour came through Mike Ness’s living room. .

“What is this,” one of the ladies in the tour quipped, “a re-enactment?”

“Hey, I was here first,” I responded, deeply embarrassed.

I got the message, closed my journal, and moved on.

Up Next…

I have a lot more stories to share about my adventures in Las Vegas but right now I’m underwater with deadlines, deadlines, and more deadlines.

One of those is for my next L.A. Times Book Club newsletter, which will focus on StokerCon and is loaded with horror. The convention will be held in San Diego this weekend and I’ll be there. If you missed my last newsletter about Short Story Month, you can read it here.

I’ll leave you with a ripping new record out of Vancouver that I listened to at least a half-dozen times while driving around Las Vegas. I especially love “The Fear” (Track 7 at the 13:22 mark).

Thanks for reading! Special thanks to everyone who re-upped their paid subscriptions this month. I appreciate all you do to make this possible.

If you’re new-ish here and you liked this newsletter you might also like my latest novel Make It Stop, or the paperback edition of Corporate Rock Sucks: The Rise & Fall of SST Records, or my book with Bad Religion, or my book with Keith Morris. I have more books and zines for sale here. Message from the Underworld comes out every Wednesday and is always available for free, but paid subscribers also get Orca Alert! on Sunday. It’s a weekly round-up of links about art, culture, and killer whales.