In the photo : My room. Nike Bruins. Argyle socks from Cohn & Stern mens store. Black Levis ( bleach! ). Necros T-shirt. Necros flyer. Glenn Danzig Who Killed Marilyn sticker. C.R.A.S.S. poster. Beige 1980s telephone. Naked Raygun sticker. Misfits Fiend Club mailing envelope. Misfits flyer. Leather jacket. I still have most of the stuff that’s on the wall, some of which was used for this book.
Here’s one from the archives : from the first time White Zombie played on Letterman, when we dove into the giant bowl of pudding – here’s me, getting Dave’s desk, coffee cup, and pencil all chocolate-y.
Here’s me, aged 15, playing in my first band at the Cubby Bear in Chicago. For a very entertaining 1984 local TV feature on the unique Sports-bar-by-day, all-ages-punk-club-by-night scene at the Cubby Bear, go here. It was filmed at a show by the great Canadian punk band D.O.A., and I remember that day very well. I loved D.O.A., and I couldn’t go because I was grounded.
Mike O’Connell, Chopper Stepe, J.Yuenger. Photo by Vera Videnovich.
Here’s a photo taken by Dave Dude, who was a roadie for Reverend Horton Heat – it’s a cool shot, either infrared ( that was fun stuff, I miss it ), or he used normal film and pushed the hell out of it. Somewhere in America, that’s all I can tell you.
I like this photo, looks like some rock power’s going on. Here’s me onstage, somewhere, sometime. 1993, most likely, because Sean’s still playing her Epiphone bass, and I’m still playing my Jackson ” devil head ” strat, a handsome and fantastic-sounding guitar that I never should have sold. Also in this shot, the slime-green and black STP shirt I made in a rooming house bathroom in Brooklyn. Additionally, there’s this.
It’s hard to remember much about this period. We didn’t live anywhere and we didn’t stop touring, hitting most towns twice, as an opening act and then again as a headliner, every couple of months. If you took this picture, let me know and I’ll credit you.
Here’s me, along with Brant Bjork and Bradley Cook tracking Fu Manchu’s ” The Action Is Go “ album at Grandmaster Recorders in Los Angeles, 1997.
Photo by Tony Tornay
I’m continuing my struggle to organize and consolidate the mountain of crap I’ve got and today saw me starting to open boxes of stuff from my White Zombie years. This was a bittersweet experience for a couple of different reasons, one being that I have a great collection of unique photographs, zines, demo tapes, and souvenirs of every kind — and when the recently released WZ box set was being put together, nobody saw fit to ask me – or Sean, or Ivan, or John T. , or anybody else who was involved with the group – about what we might have.
I’ve already stated my dissatisfaction with the box’s poor design and lack of written content, liner notes and credits, but looking at all this good stuff made me feel shittier about the whole thing.
The other thing, and if you live in New Orleans everything goes back to this, is Hurricane Katrina .. part of the roof of my storage space blew off in the storm and my junk didn’t get rained on directly, but it did get wet. The WZ boxes were on top and got the wettest, and then baked – mostly everything is okay, but some photos got ruined — you can see some damage on the lower right hand corner of the pic below.
This picture was taken by Michael Lavine almost exactly 20 years ago. I know because I met Rob and Sean the day after MLK day, 1989, and almost right after that they called me to come and do this photo session with them – before I had played a note – in fact, this night was when I first met their drummer Ivan. I like to kid myself that I was so cool that they started to integrate me into the band before I even tried out, but the truth is more along the lines of them desperately trying to find anyone with a pulse and some hair to play guitar – and Michael wanting to try out some new lights and needing a subject. I’m sure it didn’t hurt that I’d followed the band closely in the year and a half since I’d moved to New York City and that I sort of ” got it ” … and I certainly did put everything I had into the band from that point on. Anyway, check this out — I’m just 22 years old and I’m trying to figure out how to look tough without a beard. Cute!!
