RED CROSS, circa 1981 or ‘82, with the Jeff/Steve/Tracy/Janet “Born Innocent” lineup doing “Standing in Front of Poseur” and “Linda Blair”.
Tag: Redd Kross
There is an unparalleled sense of teenage joy & punk rock lust that comes screaming off the grooves of all the early 80s RED CROSS material, particularly their masterpiece LP, “Born Innocent”, one of my favorite records ever.
There’s a bootleg I bought in 1993 or so that serves up 6 fantastic demos from the same era, including one (“It Doesn’t Matter”) that didn’t make it to the album. Some of the versions – “Solid Gold” for instance – are barely recognizable, and they rule all the same. Here’s “Every Day There’s Someone New” from that same session.
AWAY FROM THE PULSEBEAT fanzine front and back cover, 1988.
This morning I listened to a podcast version of a old KXLU show from 1988 hosted by “Adam Bomb” in LA, whom I believe was actually Pat Hoed from the band The Nip Drivers. He “interviewed” ANARCHY 6, the best phony hardcore punk band of all time, which featured the Redd Kross McDonald brothers ripping it up Circle One/Suicidal style.
The interview wears thin pretty fast, although they said some pretty great stuff. They were playing the tiny Anti-Club later that night, and mentioned that it was “the first Gary Tovar show ever held at the Anti-Club”. Tovar and his Goldenvoice concerts were putting on mega-spectacular hardcore shows at the time at the huge Olympic Auditorium and sometimes the Santa Monica Civic.
They also opined that “you have to look fast to be fast”, and so to play hardcore, you’d better cut your hair, hippie. To the best of my knowledge, the show at the Anti-Club that night was the only show the band ever played, and I actually drove down w/ my cousin from Santa Barbara and went to it. It was hilarious.
The band backing up the McDonald brothers were Phil and Dave from SIN 34. They played about 15 minutes, skanked a bunch on stage and in the pit with the rest of us, and at the end Steve McDonald’s bandana was torn from his head and his long hair came spilling out. They kept making jokes I didn’t understand about “breaking Julie out of jail” (Julie being Julie Lanfeld of Sin 34). And they did the song you see here, their only documented online performance, from the movie “Lovedolls Superstar”. Totally, totally ‘core.