beige is punk!

Mariko Tamaki

2009-03-10T11:14:00.000-07:00

Mariko Tamaki and I met thorough our fantastic Minx editor Shelly Bond at the Toronto Women in Comic's Symposium. We knew we were old friends the minute we met. She is a true renaissance women who does art, performance art, writes books, teaches and is a champion of pretty much every arty cool thing in the world. She burst onto the comics scene with the book Skim and then wrote Emiko Superstar (which I nominated for a Cybil and it won!)

She is the Queen of the underground and alternative. And while I suck at doing crafts, Mariko doesn't and so she wisely gives us a list that can help us all to do art immediately.

Behold Mariko's top ten list! Crafting!

punk craft essentials:

Safety Pin*

Scissors*

Silver Sharpie

Black Sharpie

Black/pink acrylic wool

Knitting needles*

The Knit Pro Web App - turn any image into a pattern you can knit
http://www.microrevolt.org/knitPro/

Spray Paint - one can at a time will typically do ya

*will also function as weapons

Chris Pramas

2009-03-09T17:46:00.000-07:00

Chris Pramas and I are old friends. We didn't start out that way, we started out as acquaintances. You know, someone you just see around campus and nod to. We met when I was 17 and we lived in the same residence hall at NYU. We moved from nodding to saying hello and small talking after I ran into him at an Adolescents show. In retrospect, I should have hung out with him more at Hayden Hall because he and his friends were always playing D&D all night and that would have been super fun. But I wasn't that cool.

When I left NYU I figured I'd never see him again, but I did, randomly on a trip to Europe and then again when I was in my band Nerdy Girl and I played at ABC NO RIO. After that, we just kept popping up in each others lives and so I feel that we moved into life long friend mode. I can safely say that he is one of the most punk people that I know. Now he runs Green Ronin Publishing. I have Torches and Pitchforks, and the Blue Rose manual, so I'm ready to play at my house any time. But one day I am totally going to go over to his house for a feast and a fine evening of games night!

Behold, Chris Pramas' punk list!

Man, doing it in 10 songs is tough, but here goes.

Iggy and the Stooges, "Search and Destroy"
The Ramones, "Teenage Lobotomy"
The Clash, "1977"
The Avengers, "American in Me"
Crass, "Banned from the Roxy"
Bad Brains, "Big Takeover"
The Dicks, "Hate the Police"
Husker Du, "Turn on the News"
Mission of Burma, "That's How I Escaped My Certain Fate"
The Wipers, "Youth of America"

Well, that goes to about 1982 anyway. :)

Sara Ryan

2009-03-07T15:50:00.000-08:00

Sara Ryan not only writes awesome YA books (Empress of the World, The Rules for Hearts) she also writes comics and makes mini comics (click, flytrap and me and edith head) and is a YA Librarian to boot. She's always got the best haircut, she always notices street art in her hood, and she is always a great person to have dinner with.

Behold Sara's list of people. Which I adore. Because we've all had people in our lives who we knew marched to a different drum.

Three Punks and a Lady

I was shy about doing a list because I never thought of myself as punk in high school. I did put anarchy symbols on my mismatched Chuck Taylors, but musically, I was more of a nerd. (You could have asked me, then, for my top ten filk songs. Or Dr. Demento picks.)

I knew punks when I saw them, though. Here are three:

B.: Wrote "Die P.C." on the street in lighter fluid and set it aflame. (P.C. was code for "Popular Crowd.") The lighter fluid came straight from his parents' barbecue. He turned up on Facebook; now he's a lawyer.

W.: Wore the biggest, stompiest black steel-toed boots. Did sound. Was loud. Now promotes biodiesel.

C.: A cheerleader. One day she went from varsity jacket to studded leather, feathered bangs to mohawk spikes, blue eyeshadow to black eyeliner. Don't know what happened to her. Wish I did.

So yeah, I didn't think of myself as punk, though I admired the fashion. One night, though, I was up especially late and something strange came on TV:

Laurie Anderson - New Music - More Music Videos

They call her experimental and avant-garde and New Wave, not punk, but that song hit my brain the way I think punk hit others: rewiring circuits, expanding what was possible.

Jill Murray

2009-03-06T09:39:00.000-08:00

Jill Murray is my friend. She is a Canadian YA author who wrote the B-girl book Break on Through (which I loved like I love my fave dance movies. It's so good!) She's also the genius behind Y-eh, a Canadian YA Community blog. She's a kind soul, plays a mean game of Carcassone, and can bake vegan cupcakes like nobody's business.

She's brilliantly come up with a top ten classical punk list.

Of Punk, Cecil says "It is an alternative spirit that is outside of the box. It is freedom and bucking the trend. It is rock and roll when it was born. Or crazy post modern music. It is asking questions. And paying attention."

Since I wrote Break On Through, a book about breakdance, you might expect me to focus on old school funk or at least punk funk. But Beige is a YA book, and in my own YA era, I was an intense classical music nerd.

Therefore, in celebration of all that is Punk and Classical, here is my top ten list of great classical punks, as I remember them from high school.

You can check the whole list as an iMix

1- Bach was never a rebel, but Canadian pianist and Bach obsédée Glenn Gould was. Eccentric, disheveled and, ultimately, reclusive, he made a legend of himself by playing Bach’s meticulously structured pieces to the beat of his own smashed metronome. Many of his recordings are way lo-fi; listen closely and you can hear not only coughing and chair shuffling, but even Gould himself humming along.
Track: The Well-Tempered Clavichordier, Book I, BWV 847: Prelude No. 2 in C Minor, from the Film "CD 318" 32 Short Films About Glenn Gould (Original Motion Picture Soundtrack), Glenn Gould, Johann Sebastian Bach

2- Mozart was the original music pirate, far deadlier than Napster. Armed with perfect pitch and photographic memory, he went into a church, listened just once to piece of sacred music that was forbidden to copy or reproduce, went home and wrote the whole thing out by hand, directly from memory. Then he partied too hard and died tragically young, while working on what Peter Shaffer’s Amadeus tried to argue was essentially his own Requiem. Here it is in all its tragic glory.
Track: Requiem in D Minor, K. 626: 1. Introitus: Requiem, Academy of St. Martin in the Fields Chorus, Sir Neville Marriner & Sylvia McNair, Wolfgang Amadeus Mozart

3- Pianos in Mozart’s time were delicate tinkly things. Then Beethoven came along. Deaf and ragey, he used to play them so hard the legs would break off. It’s thanks to him that modern pianos are the steel-reinforced affairs they are today. To that end: the movement of the moonlight sonata you’ll never hear on a relaxation CD. Presto Agitato, indeed!
Track: Piano Sonata No. 14 in C-Sharp Minor, Op. 27, No. 2, "Moonlight": III. Presto Agitato, Louis Lortie, Ludwig van Beethoven

4- Overreaching Chopin was into body modifaction. Forget tats and gauges; Chopin reportedly slept with corks between his fingers in an attempt to stretch them. Some of his fingerings are almost impossible to reach if you have ladyhands. He also introduced the concept of the artist interpreting the tempo and mood of a piece, so its not necessary to go all Glenn Gould on Chopin’s ass. He wants you to play it like that. Here’s a sonata you will no doubt recognize as your favourite funeral march.
Track: Sonata No. 2, Op. 35, in B-Flat Minor, Marche Funèbre: Lento, Evgeny Kissin, Frédéric Chopin

5- Tchaikovsky was SO EMO. The poor St-Pertersburgian was gay in a pre-Harvey Milk time and place when you Just. Weren’t. So he was repressed and depressed and spent a lot of time in the country trying to get over himself. Even other moody composers would note Tchaicovsky’s extreme melancholy. Just listen to The Nutcracker. It’s everybody’s favourite Christmas Cheer ballet, but deep down, I suspect it’s the darker, more minor currents of the score that not only serve Hoffman’s twisted original tale, but keep this classic pressed deep into our tortured little psyches, to be dragged out with grandma’s moth-eaten heirloom ornaments year after year. Listen to this pas de deux. Can you hear the yearning? It’s pretty much all *I* can hear, but maybe that says more about me than Piotr Ilyich.
Track: The Nutcracker, Op.71: No. 14a Pas De Deux: Intrada, Orchestra of the Kirov Opera, St. Petersburg & Valery Gergiev, Peter Ilyich Tchaikovsky

6- Paganini: throat cancer, syphillis, mercury poisoning, multiple disinterment, Devil’s Music. ‘Nuff said? The man was all about solo virtuosity to the point where no orchestra ever got to hear the real point of the exercise— the violin solo— until opening night. So he was basically like that tempermental lead guitarist no one can work with but you can’t fire him because people keep paying to see him and besides, he draws out all the hot chicks you’re afraid to talk to. Here’s a “Caprice”— which is classical music speak for “a little piece of nothing I dashed off, like, dude, these things just come to me in the shower, on the can, wherever.”
Track: 24 Caprices for Violin, Op.1: No.5 in A Minor, Ruggiero Ricci, Niccolo Paganini

7- Mahler was a late-Romantic composer, but not nearly late enough for the Viennese, who never got used to him in his own time. Known for his indiscriminate minglings, he wrote what he felt and blurred genres to fit his broody purposes (like putting singing in symphonies. TOTALLY uncouth). Constantly on the run from dissatisfied orchestra boards, (the late romantic version of starting a bar brawl and then skipping town) he reportedly said. "I am thrice homeless, as a native of Bohemia in Austria, as an Austrian among Germans, and as a Jew throughout the world. Everywhere an intruder, never welcomed." Here’s Symphony #5 in C-sharp minor— notable because contrarian Mahler even disagreed with the key signature for his own symphony. (He didn’t think it should have one.)
Track: Symphony No. 5 in C Sharp Minor, Part III: 4. Adagietto: Sehr langsam, Maurice Abravanel & Utah Symphony Orchestra, Gustav Mahler

Then there are the early 20th century Russian/Soviet composers. When you’ve been labouring under a decadent monarchy for centuries, you don’t usually turn to anarchy as a first alternative for the people. A whole crop of new nationalist composers out of Moscow devoted their music to revolutionary dissonance and bigging-up the proletariat. They nevertheless constantly ran afoul of their various emerging governments even as they rose to international stardom.

8- Don’t go looking for the world in bloom and love in the air in Stravinsky’s Rite of Spring. It’s about ritual sacrifice.
Track: The Rite of Spring: XIV. Sacrificial Dance (The Chosen One), Kirov Orchestra & Valery Gergiev, Igor Stravinsky

9- Prokofiev’s ballet score for Romeo & Juliet— a classic today— was, in its time, so noisy and avant-garde that the prima-ballerina Galina Ulanova at first refused to perform it.
Track: Romeo and Juliet, Op.64: Montagues and Capulets, Berliner Philharmoniker & Claudio Abbado, Sergei Prokofiev

10-“Degenerate modernist” Shostakovich kind of split the difference between Stravinsky and Prokofiev, producing a more moderate balance between extremes. Nonetheless he had ongoing problems with the government, which banned his music twice in the 30s and 40s.
Track: Suite from the Opera "Lady Macbeth of the Mtsensk District", Op.29 (a): III. Allegretto, Russian Philharmonic Orchestra & Thomas Sanderlin, Dmitri Shostakovich

* * * *

The Secret Headquarters

2009-03-04T08:14:00.000-08:00

The Secret Headquarters in Silverlake, CA is not only one of my fave comic book shops in the world, it's also my local comic book store. Inside it is gorgeous. There are wood shelves that make it look kind of like a haberdashery, or Bruce Wayne's secret library. They also hold original art shows there. I bought myself a little Johnny Ryan drawing a couple of years ago.

I can always trust them to guide me to some interesting reading and the two David's are super fun to talk to.

So today, for your David P gives us a top ten essential punk comics for your reading pleasure.

C,

Okay here's a list from me. Alphabetical order, and by no means the "ten most essential punk" really...

Best,

D

1) Calvin & Hobbes (Bill Watterson did what he wanted all the way through to the end.)
2) Cerebus (One story, 300 issues, totally self-published and promoted.)
3) Dark Knight Returns (Don't deny it.)
4) EC Comics (Anything before the hearings.)
5) Lost Girls (FTW)
6) Lynda Barry (A cartoonist doing what she wants.)
7) NON (Jordan Crane's self-published anthology of stuff he likes/liked.)
8) Robert Crumb (Especially before he started to release sketchbooks.)
9) Will Eisner (He was consistently on the forefront of everything comics. Dropsie Ave. is in my top 5, easily.)
10) Yoshihiro Tatsumi ("Created" a whole style of cartooning in Japan.)

Carolyn Kellogg

2009-02-27T16:50:00.000-08:00

Carolyn Kellogg, who is also known at times as Pinky, has a killer sense of style (you should see her apartment), organizes a swell literary doo (the last one was at the HMS Bounty for the LADWP), has a proufound knowledge of LA History and all things noir (I swear she can quote Dashiell Hammet). Also, her hair is bright red.

Hello, awesome!

We first met on the telephone when she was interviewing me when she was a music journalist and I was moving through the world in the capacity of my former life as an indie rocker. (the band was Cecil Seaskull /Nerdy Girl. Music available on iTunes/emusic)

I knew we were kindred right then because our interview lasted two hours! When Carolyn moved back from NYC to the great LA and we became fast friends in real life and have been ever since. We've both moved from mostly music into more literary careers, but you can still find us out at the occasional punk / rock show together.

She currently handles blog duties at the great LA Times Jacket Copy Lit Blog as well as doing book reviews for them. She's also working on her first novel.

Behold Carolyn Kellogg's annotated top ten essential punk songs!

Congratulations on the paperback release! Chalk that one up in the win column.Thanks for asking! Here's my very personal list. Like Douglas Wolk, I'm including YouTube
videos.

10. Space Oddity - David Bowie

Raised on a diet of crappy soft rock radio, my high school years were
a period of musical terror and discovery. Had Bowie recorded decades
earlier? Yes. Was his individuality -- musically, personally -- a
revelation? Yes and yes.

9. Working for the Clampdown - The Clash

When I first heard The Clash, I thought they were dissonant, abrasive
and scary. But I couldn't stop singing them at my horrid job in the
cafeteria's dishroom.

8. True Men Don't Kill Coyotes - the Red Hot Chili Peppers

As a was wee high school sophomore, I camped out in the local record
store to watch MTV; it was the only place in town with cable. I saw
this video once, and thought the band was not just unlistenable, but
insane. And I never forgot it.

7. Dirty Water - the Standells

Every band that came to my New Hampshire school played "Dirty Water."
I didn't know it was by the Standells, or that their 60s amateur
sixties garage rock was a punk progenitor. I just knew I got real
sweaty when I danced to it.

6. Rock Lobster - the B52s

Before the B52s became a neutered pop radio novelty act, they were a
bizarro ensemble from a small town in Georgia. They didn't know what
rules they were breaking when they wrote the overly-long,
strangely-trilling, kooky-break-in-the-middle Rock Lobster. And I
danced like mad to it too.

5. Oh Bondage Up Yours - X-Ray Spex

I moved to LA for college and became a semi-regular at a dingy noodle
shop called the Atomic Cafe in Little Tokyo. The owner's daughter had
stuck punk posters up over the stains in the ceiling and stocked the
jukebox with punk 45s. This one was, it was said, impossibly rare. I
played it every time.

4. Garbageman - The Cramps

My freshman year I had this thing with this guy, and over the summer
he sent me tapes. I listened to them again and again, and because they
were tapes I couldn't skip over songs that sounded harsh and
abrasive.And soon the Cramps sounded exactly perfect.

3. Freddie's Dead - Fishbone

By my sophomore year of college (aka my first year as a dropout) I was
going to shows, and I saw a lot of Fishbone. Manic madness, a brass
section, hard metalish guitar and funk and (less fortuitously) ska,
Fishbone pioneered a genre too schizophrenic for anyone to follow.

2. Los Angeles - X

I also saw a lot of X, the least-google-able band name ever. I saw
them play their last show ever before they called it quits, then I saw
their first reunion show. Like their on-again-off-again bandness, X's
sound was always splitting apart, male and female vocals gorgeously
discordant, with rockabilly roots like the Cramps and the wildness of
that X-Ray Spex single.

1. Thelonious Monster

Try, in this video is not my favorite Thelonious Monster song; Union
Street or Walk on Water might be, but neither is on YouTube. This was
the problem with Thelonious Monster -- known for having a wall of
sound (and too many guitarists to count), the energy and chaos of
their live shows was never adequately recorded. People would tell you
that it was singer Bob Forrest's drug-enhanced unpredictability that
kept the band back, but with better, maybe more insane sound
engineers, they would have had much more of a shot. At least this
video, with its poor audio transfer, captures some of the band's mad
spirit.

Libba Bray

2009-02-23T15:24:00.000-08:00

What can I say about Libba Bray? That she's awesome? check. That she's brilliant? check. That she's a great writer? check. You know her from her amazing Gemma Doyle series. (love!) But she also has an awesome book that includes string theory and a garden gnome coming out called Going Bovine. And she has an amazing story in the Geektastic anthology I co-edited with Holly Black. She's a playwright. She's got the heart and humor of a BBC television series. She know how to do the timewarp. And she speaks the language of punk fluently.

Behold her list!

Hey Cec Balls,

Wow. This was tough. How do you define punk? Is it the snarl of Johnny Rotten or the in-your-face politics of Henry Rollins? Is it the art-house punk of Television or the verging-on-goth of early The Damned? Do I leave off Suicidal Tendencies, The Minutemen, Husker Du, and Wire? Very, very tough. But I did my best to choose songs I absolutely love, even if it means foregoing some others I also love.

So. In celebration of the most excellent BEIGE, here is my list of eleven fave punk songs. (Because this goes up to eleven.)

Everything the Clash ever recorded ☺
Anarchy in the U.K.
I Wanna Be Your Dog/Iggy Pop
Los Angeles/X
Sheena Is a Punk Rocker/The Ramones
Blank Generation/Richard Hell
Horses/Patti Smith
Neat, Neat, Neat/The Damned (My favorite Damned song is “In Dulce Decorum” but that’s really from their goth phase, not punk)
California Uber Alles/Dead Kennedys
A tie: Why Can’t I Touch It? What Do I Get?/Buzzcocks (Although “Oh Shit” runs a close third)
See No Evil/Television

Abby Denson

2009-02-17T16:36:00.000-08:00

Behold Miss Abby Denson's song and film list!

I met Abby Denson at a comic book convention. Cause she does comics. Like Dolltopia and Tough Love. Also, she just did a Spider Man, (Spider M'am) and she rocks. I mean, really rocks. With a band. More than one band. But also, she does the great food round up of delicious NYC sweets called The City Sweet Tooth. I always want to taste everything she thinks is good. Basically she's a modern renaissance girl. And I love that in a lady! If Abby and I lived in the same city, we would surely go out and cause delicious trouble together, with guitars and chocoloate and our mighty pens.

Abby not only sent me songs. She sent me punk movies you should see, too. Fill up your ipods and Queue up your netflix lists!

Abby's Essential Punk Song List!

Anything by The Ramones

X Offender - Blondie

I Can’t Do Anything - X-Ray Spex

Cherry Bomb - Runaways

Your Pretty Face is Going to Hell – The Stooges

Jet Boy, Jet Girl – The Damned

Love Comes in Spurts – Richard Hell & The Voidoids

Where Eagles Dare – The Misfits

Sonic Reducer – The Dead Boys

Rock n’ Roll Cleopatra – Jayne County

Bonus! Abby's Essential Movie List for Punks!

Times Square

Ladies and Gentlemen, the Fabulous Stains

Liquid Sky

Rocky Horror Picture Show

Beyond the Valley of the Dolls

Polyester

Breaking Glass

The Decline of Western Civilization

Smithereens

Rock and Rule

Rock and Roll High School

Greg Miller

2009-02-13T12:09:00.000-08:00

Greg Miller, is like a guru to me. He, along with his partner in crime Beth Lapides, run the amazing Uncabaret Lab. They do magic with people on stage who are telling their stories, getting to the CORE and workshopping their fabulous stand up/ one person shows/ crazy diatribes.

And they do it in a totally punk way. Because it is UNcabaret. And we all know that anything UN, or ANTI , or NOT is alternative and because that expands the mind and makes you think. Thinking is tres punk.

You should probably totally take their workshop.

Here is Greg Millers totally punk everything list.

Because sometimes we have to remember that there is more to being punk than just music. There's punk comedians. And artists. And movies. And authors. And spirits. And revolutionaries. And you know everything else.

More than ten. Trying to get away from base 10 anyway - Greg

Tom Paine
Andy Dick
Kenneth Anger
Sex Pistols
Clash
Mae West
Lenny Bruce
Tristan Tzara
Van Gogh
Ramones
Emma Goldman
Ken Kesey
Abbie Hoffman
Kathleen Hanna
Roseanne
Iggy Pop

Stephanie Kuehnert

2009-02-10T18:00:00.000-08:00

Stephanie Kuehnert is a punk rock chick. She hung out with Riot Grrls, wrote a bunch of zines, she works at a legendary club in Chicago and she wrote a kick ass book called I Wanna Be Your Joey Ramone. She has a great blog where she has a great thing that she does called Women Who Rock Wednesday's.

Behold, Stephanie's Essential Punk list!

thank you for asking me for my punk essentials list! It was hard to come up with one and some of what I consider punk may not be punk, but whatever. I tried to do 13 cause that is my lucky number, but ended up having to do 17, I hope that is okay :) - Stephanie

1. Story of My Life by Social Distortion
2. Death or Glory by the Clash
3. Radio by Rancid
4. Pretty On The Inside by Hole
5. Negative Creep by Nirvana
6. Second Skin by The Gits
7. I Am A Revenant by The Distillers
8. Bastards of Young by The Replacements
9. Gimme Danger by Iggy and The Stooges
10. Son Of A Bitch by Civet
11. Oh Bondage Up Yours! by X Ray Spex
12. Unity by Operation Ivy
13. Black Masks and Gasoline by Rise Against
14. Pints of Guinness Make You Strong by Against Me!
15. Rebel Girl by Bikini Kill
16. Radio by Alkaline Trio
17. Apparently I'm a PC Fascist by Propagandhi

Douglas Wolk

2007-07-20T15:57:00.000-07:00

Douglas Wolk is a pop culture critic. He writes about comic books and he even has a new book of essays out about them called Reading Comics. He also did an ultra cool 33 1/3 book on James Brown Live at the Apollo. I met him at CMJ when I was in Nerdy Girl. We hit it off, and Douglas used to send his friends the COOLEST mix tapes. He really just knows music. And it was cool when in my new incarnation as comic book writer, he came back into my life again!

So I am delighted to share with you Douglas and his very multimedia essential punk!

Thanks, old buddy!

X-Ray Spex: I Am a Poseur (no embedded version available)
Poly Styrene was way, way ahead of her time--angry, funny, smart, really loud, and a better lyricist than almost anyone ever. X-Ray Spex basically self-destructed after one album, Germ Free Adolescents, but everything on it is great. Also see the intro to their first single (which I notice is perched at the top of your iMix, Cecil): Polly announcing "Some people think little girls should be seen and not heard, but I think--OH BONDAGE! UP YOURS! ONE TWO THREE FOUR!"

The Raincoats: Fairytale in the Supermarket

Raincoats bassist Gina Birch's original video for their first single--I had no idea this even existed. In a way, it's too bad that YouTube's compression makes Vicky Aspinall's violin sound like squeaky crud. In another way, that's not so bad: the Raincoats were never as cranked-up as their scenemates, but the most punk thing about them is the way they lunge at you to catch your attention--"listen to me, damn it, LISTEN to me!"

Devo: Uncontrollable Urge

A live version that's way too quiet--crank it up, please--but it gets across the two big things about Devo that get lost by reducing them to, like, "Whip It": 1) The point of the band was that they felt totally, profoundly, agonizingly alienated from mainstream culture, and from the pre-packaged way they were supposed to experience reality and emotion. 2) They were freaking hilarious.

Wire: Another the Letter/The 15th

A live 1979 performance of two songs from the German TV show Rockpalast, by the band I probably listened to more than any other in my late teens. "Another the Letter" is the great one here, stripping the already-pretty-minimal studio recording down to a one-chord rocket-blast. I'm pretty fond of the way that the four of them, even on stage, look and sometimes sound like they're in totally different bands...

Flying Lizards: Money

Punk as prank, or rather as getting into the "normal" way of doing something and eating it whole, from the inside. You can also read that as "not even trying to do anything right," if you like. The self-titled Flying Lizards album (on which this appears), by the way, is fantastic and mostly nothing at all like "Money"; it can be found in used record stores everywhere, thanks to having been bought by people who thought the rest of it would be more like this.

The Clean: Tally Ho

The greatest band in the history of New Zealand. This was their first single; they still get together every five years or so for a tour, and miraculously keep getting better over time. Here's what they sound like now...

Delta 5: Mind Your Own Business (no embedded version available, and actually I think this is somebody's homemade clip)
One of the most perfect songs ever written: a loping loop of a groove, eight flawlessly indignant lines, a neatly affectless unison-then-not vocal, and two guitar breaks that are pure spattering havoc.

The Fall: Totally Wired (live)

The band that will outlast us all, live in New York in 1981, monomaniacal flame-jets in their eyes, on the verge of falling apart, even though they're mostly just hammering away at one note. I love Mark E. Smith's top-of-the-dome spasm of obscenity two minutes or so into this clip... trying to keep track of the Fall's enormous discography and still-ongoing career can be exhausting, but the 1979-1982 period is pretty impeccable.

Melt-Banana: Monkey Man

Oh, right, the other thing about punk rock? It's fast a lot of the time. This is somebody's ridiculous homemade video for the phenomenal Japanese hardcore band Melt-Banana's cover of Toots & the Maytals' "Monkey Man"; I'm sure there exist faster songs and recordings, but Melt-Banana give the impression that they're actually playing so fast they can't stop.

The Thermals: No Culture Icons

You can argue that all punk is about punk--I don't think so, but this is, for sure: the Thermals' first single, it's also their manifesto, a declaration of what they demand and what they're rejecting. Low-fi, low-tech, high-minded in a really good way--a testament to what punk rock is good for in the 21st century. And one of my favorite things about living in Portland is getting to see them play a lot.

many thanks, & I hope you'

Ed Brubaker

2007-06-03T12:49:00.000-07:00

Ed Brubaker writes comics. You may know Ed from his stint on Captain America, which had a lot of press when issue #25 came out. He's written Uncanny X-men, Catwoman and The Authority just to name a few other titles. But I know him and I love him because he wrote a monthly series called The Deadenders that made me long to write comic books because it was so YA. When Shelly Bond called me to ask if I was interested in maybe writing a graphic novel, I told her that one of my fave Vertigo titles was The Deadenders. Turns out Shelly edited that.

The Deadenders is where it's at. Go get it.

So, flash forward to my new life in comics and color me so excited when I got to meet Ed at Wizard World LA. Everyone else in line had their copy of Captain America Issue #25 in their hands to get autographed, but me, I had my copy of The Deadenders.

Ed was kind enough to give me not only his punk list, but his YA list, too.

Because he rules.

Cecil -

Here's my list, but this is all off the top of my head, and could change tomorrow. I think these are the ones that made me care back then, though:

The Once Over Twice - X

Away From the Numbers (I know it's the ballad, shut up it's still punk) - The Jam

Courage - Minutemen

Celebrated Summer - Husker Du

I'm So Bored With the USA - The Clash

I Wanna Be Sedated - Ramones

Beverly Hills - the Circle Jerks

Look at the Rain - Meat Puppets (this is more from their post-punk era, but it's a punk song)

I Love Livin' in the City - Fear

I still like most of those songs, I think.

Here's my top ten YA books, which is easier:

Nobody's Family is Going to Change - Louise Fitzhugh

Great Brain at the Academy - John D. Fitzgerald

You Must Kiss a Whale - David Skinner

The Farthest Shore - Ursula K. LeGuin

The Snarkout Boys and the Avocado of Death - Daniel Pinkwater

Young Adult Novel - Daniel Pinkwater

The Egypt Game - Zilpha Keatley Snyder

From the Mixed-Up Files of Mrs. Basil E. Frankenweiler -- E.L. Konigsburg

The Long Secret - Louise Fitzhugh

Harriet the Spy - Louise Fitzhugh

Simmone Howell

2007-05-25T18:01:00.000-07:00

Simmone is from down under, we've never met, but she wrote the YA novel Notes From The Teenage Underground. I liked it so much, I blurbed it. I said ""Notes From The Teenage Underground is a refreshingly honest, straight-to-the-heart story of a girl finding her own artistic vision. This is like a primer for any teen that is serious about doing art."

She gives us her Punk essentials Aussie style!

Oz punk ish
(or songs that made me lose it when I was young and wore too much eyeliner)

xsimmone

shivers - boys next door

Immortal first line: I've been contemplating suicide ...

jack the ripper - nick cave & the bad seeds

This is all stomp and primal: I got a wooooman she rules my house with an iron fist she screams out jack the ripper everytime I try to give the girl a kisss)

true love - marching girls

First found on the Dogs in Space soundtrack. Awww, cute.

aloha steve and danno - radio birdman

Rob Younger - knows how to pony

she's crackin' up - cosmic psychos

she's a dish - hard ons

my pal - god

My friends and I were in awe of joel silbersher who was only 16 when he was in God. Wikipedia says he is "like history, short and violent"

slave girl - lime spiders

(I'm) stranded - the saints

psycho - beasts of bourbon
(Tex Perkins! He's still got it!)

Brian Wood

2007-05-10T22:50:00.001-07:00

Brian Wood is my new friend, but he feels like an old friend. I met him last year at the San Diego Comic Con at the Vertigo / Minx family dinner. I felt Brian was a kindred spirit from the get go and it was confirmed to me the next night when I went by myself to the bar to hang out, only I didn't know anyone in the comic book community yet, and so I was feeling shy and lonely and stupid. Basically, I was pretty much hugging the wall, sipping my beer, and not talking to anyone, just like a wall flower, when Brian walked up and rescued me from myself by introducing me around.

He writes great comic books, DMZ is simply astounding. Demo is so great that it was named an ALA Great Graphic Novels For Teens and a NY Public Library Book for the Teen Age. And he also has Supermarket. His next series, Northlanders, is about Vikings, so I already know, sight unseen, that I'm going to be ga ga over it.

Other things I know and like about Brian Wood:

He's got the nicest, coolest & cutest family.

He designs the best t-shirts.

And, more importantly, he has great taste in music.

Cecil:

my top 10, avoiding the obvious ones already listed:

Transmetropolitan by The Pogues
Sacred Love by Bad Brains
Clampdown by The Clash
Blueprint by Fugazi
America by Sick Of It All
How To Start a Fight by Murphy's Law
Rebel Girl by Bikini Kill
Slip It In by Black Flag
Blank Generation by Richard Hell
Good Guys Don't Wear White by Minor Threat

here's a pic of me and brian at NY Comic Con

BEIGE is out today!

2007-05-08T08:06:00.000-07:00

Learn a little bit about Beige and why I wrote it!

Holly Black

2007-05-07T00:18:00.000-07:00

How do I love Holly Black? Let me count the ways... she's fantastical, she writes exquisite books ( Tithe, Valiant, Ironside, The Spiderwick Chronicles, ) she likes coffee, she has a great laugh, she's smart as hell, and I adore her. She is a little Goth, a little Punk and more than a little bit awesome.

She even liked BEIGE so much, she blurbed it. She said, "Subversive and raw and surprising."

I love her list. I'm cranking it to 10 right now.

Cecil,

Here are my essential ten punk songs. Okay, I was a little liberal with my definition of punk, but I hope they will do.

Love, Holly

1. Whip in My Valise - Adam Ant
2. Clash City Rockers - The Clash
3. Teenage Lobotomy - Ramones
4. The Killing Jar - Siouxsie and the Banshees
5. The Man Who Sold The World - David Bowie
6. God Save The Queen - Sex Pistols
7. California Uber Alles - Dead Kennedys
8. Shadow Play - Joy Division
9. I Want to be Your Dog - The Stooges
10. Waiting for the Man - Velvet Underground

KL Going

2007-04-24T18:33:00.000-07:00

KL going and I have met briefly, twice. We are both tiny little ladies with books that have the love of rock in them. So I thought I'd email her and ask her if she had a list. KL kindly pointed me out to her soundtrack for her awesome book Fat Kid Rules The World.

She says Hey Cecil... This is the perfect question for me to answer because I didn't know a lot about punk before I wrote Fat Kid. My discovery of it was partly what sparked the idea for the novel. I was like, hey this is so cool I need to write about it! So, punk primer I can definitely do. I came up with a soundtrack list for Fat Kid which I posted on my web site. I'd still choose most of those, maybe a few different ones less related to that book.

Behold her kick ass list!!!!

Fat Kid Rules the World Soundtrack

1) The Stooges - Search and Destroy
2) The Sex Pistols - Pretty Vacant
3) The Ramones - Outsider *
4) The Buzzcocks - What do I Get?
5) Beatles - Yellow Submarine **
6) Lou Reed - Perfect Day ***
7) Nirvana - Come As You Are
8) The Fall - Totally Wired
9) The Urinals - Ack, Ack, Ack, Ack
10) Nirvana - Pennyroyal Tea
11) The Eyeliners - Party Till the Break of Dawn
12) The Clash - White Riot
13) Iggy Pop - I Got a Right ****

Michael Ian Black

2007-04-16T19:38:00.000-07:00

When I had to drop out of NYU when I was 18, it was a real heartbreaker. I came back once to visit a few months after I'd left. All my good friends were busy living their fabulous dorm lives without me, so I stopped by Michael Ian Black's room, cause we were pals in a comedy sketch group called The New Group together (with Showalter) and he was fun to pal araound with. We had one of the best conversations that you could have in college, you know, about life, the universe and everything, and I really appreciated it and his perspective on everything. Flash forward to a million years later and Black is kicking butt and taking names and being funny as hell (as always) all over the place. He's also poised to join the kid lit ranks with an upcoming picture book, and you can bet your sweet ass that it's going to be terrific.

I give you, Michael Ian Black's punk mix. Go and get it.

Music you want, eh? Alright, I'm rifling through my brain here trying to come up with something decent for you.

Essential punk list:

I'm going to start with the obvious, but I don't see how you can have an essential punk mix without:

1."God Save the Queen," the Sex Pistols.

From there, you should probably skip across the ocean and include:

2. Anything by the Ramones. They're all pretty much the same song, so you can just pick one and listen to it for two and a half minutes, which is most likely longer than the actual song.

Now you've got your seminal British and American punk bands covered. Now I think you want to skip ahead a few years and head west to California for a little Black Flag. I suggest

3. "TV Party," by Black Flag. It's angry and loud and catchy and features a very young Henry Rollins

If you want to go to the other extreme of punk, but stay in the same geographical location, check out

4. I'm Not a Loser" by the Descendents. There is no Green Day without these guys.

Back on the East Coast, Washington D.C. was kicking out the punk rock jams. Who can forget:

5. "I Don't Wanna Hear It" by Minor Threat. Vintage D.C. punk, which gave birth to:

6. Fugazi, who epitomized the whole "never sell out" D.I.Y. spirit of punk rock. Their album "13 Songs," is one of my favorites of all time. They are not, however, my favorite band. That honor belongs to:

7. Husker Du. Minneapolis based thrash trio, who imploded in the early 90's after releasing a ton of great music. A lot of aficionados love their early work: "Land Speed Record," "Metal Circus," and especially "Zen Arcade." But my favorite album is "Candy Apple Grey," which was their first major label release, and the beginning of the end for the band. Most punk rock song on that album? The opening track, "Crystal."

For just obnoxious political punk, you might want to check out

8. "California Uber Alles" by the Dead Kennedys. A good band with an even better name and an even better named frontman: Jello Biafra.

Two bands with still better punk names: The Circle Jerks (best song: "Wonderful") and the Day-Glo Abortions (I can't remember any of their songs, but the name really sticks with you.)

Michael

Francesca Lia Block

2007-04-03T18:51:00.000-07:00

Francesca Lia Block is a legend in the YA world. Her books are lyrical punk magical fairy tales and they all ooze Los Angeles, Music and Cool.

Dear Cecil

revised. i saw your list and my yoga teacher played dancing barefoot for sun salutes today
sometimes i think of patti as almost pre-punk goddess of it all so i left her out. wrong.
xo

francesca

I present to you all the swell put your top down and drive down the highway with your iPod blasting list of the amazing Francesca Lia Block.

x by los angeles
wild in the streets by the circle jerks
sheena is a punk rocker by the ramones
creatures by the adolescents
goo goo much by the cramps
we got the beat by the go-go's (original superfast version --not on cd)
new york new york by nina hagen
secret agent man by agent orange
dancing barefoot by patti smith
lust for life by iggy pop

Santiago Durango

2007-03-09T16:50:00.000-08:00

For this blog I've been asking my most kick-ass punk friends. Julia Durango is punker than she thinks. Also she has punk sons. And a punk ex. She is the fabulous picture book author of such great books as
Cha Cha Chimps, Yum! Yuk!, Dream Hop and Pest Fest. She also is a member of the blog Three Silly Chicks.

When I asked for her list she wrote me this:

Miss Cecil. I hope you don't mind that I asked my ex-husband, Santiago Durango, to make a list for you (since my essential punk list would have contained 10 Clash songs, which seemed much too boring for your purposes).

Here are some wikipedia links about him and his bands (cult faves here in Chicago during the 80's):

Santiago Durango
Big Black
Naked Raygun

These days Santiago spends most of his time being a very good father and trying to impart solid Punk Rock values to his (and my) sons. I believe he is doing an admirable job.

xoxoxo,
Julia

So without further ado, the fabulous list of Santiago Durango.

Ye Ole Skool Punk.

1. "Now I Wanna Sniff Some Glue" and "Beat on the Brat" by the Ramones.

2. "Anarchy in the UK" "God Save the Queen" and "Pretty Vacant" by the Sex Pistols.

3. "Stab Your Back" "New Rose" and "Neat, Neat, Neat" by the Damned.

4. "White Riot" and "London’s Burning" by the Clash.

5. "Boredom" and everything else ever released by the Buzzcocks.

6. "Oh Bondage, Up Yours" by X-Ray Spex.

7. "Grip" and "No More Heroes" by the Stranglers.

8. "In the Sun" by Blondie.

9. "Sonic Reducer" by the Dead Boys.

10. "Born to Lose" Johnny Thunders and the Heartbreakers.

11. "Walked In Line" and "Love Will Tear Us Apart" by Joy Division.

12. "Don’t Dictate" by Penetration.

13. "We Are The One" by the Avengers.

14. "Do Anything You Want To Do" by Eddie and the Hot Rods.

15. "Child Star" by the Diodes.

16. "Hate Breeders" by the Misfits.

17. "Pay to Cum" by the Bad Brains.

18. "Pogo Dancing" and "Into The Future" by the Vibrators.

19. "Blank Generation" by the Voidoids.

20. "Mannequin" and "Dot Dash" by Wire.

21. "Warhead" and "Stranglehold" by the UK Subs.

22. "Bad Man" by the Cockney Rejects.

23. "Jealous Again" and "Nervous Breakdown" by Black Flag.

24. "Ice Ice Baby" by Vanilla Ice (wake up!).

I’ve gone way over. This list doesn’t begin to do justice to all of the great early punk music. Sue me.

Holly Ramos

2007-02-21T13:48:00.000-08:00

If there was a vote for a Queen of the NYC punk scene, pretty much I'd vote for her. She's so cool, she's got the best fashion sense, as in, she's a trend setter. She's a musician who's recorded with the best, has some pretty amazing stories and all around I'm pretty stoked she even knows my name.

10 essential punk songs by Holly Ramos
singer/song writer
former front woman of FUR
former dj of legendary punk rock and roll dance party greendoornyc (vinyl only).
musiclologist

Cecil, i am a purist. in my mind, punk was a very specific sound for a limited time.

1. oh bondage up yours, x-ray spex
2. piss factory, patti smith
3. x-offender, blondie
4. 20th century boy, siouxie and the banshees
5. so messed up, the damed
6. i need lunch, the dead boys
7. i love you, johnny thunders and the heartbreakers
8. kiss me deadly, generation x
9. 53rd & 3rd, ramones
10. another girl another planet, the only ones

Michael Showalter

2007-02-11T09:56:00.000-08:00

When I went to NYU, I joined a sketch comedy group started by Mo Willems. It got too big, so a couple of us branched off and started a New Group, and that is where I met the fabulous Michael Showalter. I remember vividly one rehearsal where he did a sketch that was a guy trying to impress a girl on a date to the supermarket produce section, where they lay in the aisle staring up at the veggies. You probably know him from his excellent turns in The State, Stella, Wet Hot American Summer and The Baxter.

He's brilliant, hysterical, multi-talented and if you've seen some of his comedy, you know that he is a big music lover.

I proudly Present Michael's list (and totally want to sit next to him at 5th period lunch)

(A very New Wave'y) Top Ten Punk Songs
by Michael Showalter

1. Wave Of Mutilation - The Pixies

2. 52 Girls - The B-52s

3. What's The Matter With You - Split Enz

4. Away From The Numbers - The Jam

5. Waiting Room - Fugazi

6. Gates of Steel - Devo

7. Straight To Hell - The Clash

8. TV Party - Black Flag

9. Watching The Detectives - Elvis Costello

10. Message In A Bottle - The Police

Showalter please sit at my lunchtable

Rachel Cohn

2007-02-03T20:12:00.000-08:00

You and I know her as an excellent YA author of such books as Gingerbread, Shrimp and Cupcake and of course as the co-author of one of my fave books of 2006 - Nick and Norah's Infinite Playlist. Her list is a little funky-punky and I adore that!!! I am very glad to call her my funky friend.

Miss Rachel Cohn!

Hi Cecil –

I created an iMix for you. This is the text I used to describe the Beige mix:

I freely admit to totally being a poser when it comes to any true punk cred. I grew up in D.C, so I am all about the funk much more than the punk. I chose these tunes as a sort of primer on some funky tunes and artists I liked back in the day, with some political grooves thrown in there, too. (For some great punk/pop/thrasher - and everything in between - playlists created by teen readers, please check out the playlist creator on NickandNorah.com)

Here’s the list:

Jeff Abarta

2007-01-27T14:10:00.000-08:00

When I first moved to Los Angeles, punk rock photographer Lisa Johnson and Tim Armstrong from Rancid helped me to get a job. That job was at Epitaph Records where I worked everywhere from the marketing department aka "The Green Room" to the mail room and then finally ended up as the temp publicist for a bunch of the bands. This is where I met the fabulous Jeff Abarta -A&R at Epitaph / Anti / Hellcat. He's cool as shit, made me feel right at home and was always fun to talk to.

Here's his swell list

Hey, Cecil:

Good luck with your novel!

This is by no means definitive, but here ya go:

Adolescents - Amoeba
Bad Religion - I Want To Conquer The World
Black Flag - My War
Born Against - Mount The Pavement
Crass - Big Man, Big M.A.N.
Dead Kennedys - Nazi Punks Fuck Off
Misfits - Where Eagles Dare
NOFX - Linoleum
Subhumans - From The Cradle To The Grave
Rudimentary Peni - Blasphemy Squad

Jeff (photo from 1988)

Houston Sams - Stylist

2007-01-20T16:13:00.000-08:00

Houston Sams is a stylist. She's dressed the best and is cool as pie. I've spent many a punk rock holiday with her (Thanksgiving, Christmas, 4th of July) and had lovely times at Spaceland with her back in the indie rock days.

I've added the songs to the iMix with my suggestions for songs (in parenthesis) from her "anything by them" bands, but she's right, pretty much, you can't go wrong by adding anything by them to your mixes.

Big Black - "Kerosene"
Sonic Youth - " Schizophrenia"
Pixies - "Bone Machine"
Transplants - "Tall cans in the Air"

and anything by:

Fugazi - (Suggestion)
Helmet -(Unsung)
Dinosaur, Jr. -(Freak Scene)
Flaming Lips -(She Don't Use Jelly)
Guided By Voices - (I am a Tree)
Bad Religion -(American Dream)

Rock on, y'all!

Welcome! And Bienvenue!

2007-01-17T18:44:00.000-08:00

Hello! My name is Cecil and I write books. My third novel is called BEIGE (Candlewick May 2007).

Anyway, in it a girl named Katy has to live with her punk rock drummer dad in silverlake and she hates music. In the book, a boy named Garth gives her a mix CD (you know what that means!) of a punk primer.

Since the book is about discovering your voice and also finding your inner punk and whatever that means to you, I thought it would be cool to ask my most musically inclined and punk ass cool peeps from all walks of life to give me what their ten essential punk songs for a mix tape would be.

There are some really amazing people giving me lists.

Now we can see how varied and wonderful an essential punk list is! Look! It's different for everyone! And we can all discover (or rediscover) some great songs.

I'll be posting the lists up on this blog. And I'll start with mine.

Cecil's Essential Punk Ladies to Have on Your iPod iMix is here

Patti Smith - Gloria: In Excelsis Deo
X-Ray Spex - Germ Free Adolescents
The Go-Go's - We Got the Beat
The Slits - Shoplifting
Lunachicks - Binge and Purge
L7 - Pretend We're Dead
Laurie Anderson - Walking and Falling
Blondie - Hanging On the Telephone
Siouxsie and The Banshees - Christine
The Pretenders - Tattooed Love Boys
The Runaways - Cherry Bomb
The Velvet Underground & Nico - All Tomorrow's Parties

Cecil at 22