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█████████ · 01.08.2008, 12:11 PM

Anarchy Rules: The Dishes Stay Dirty

By PENELOPE GREEN
Published: January 3, 2008

THERE are certain things you can count on in a punk house. A killer name: Anarchtica, Scribble Squat, Collective A Go-Go, Firebreathing Kangaroo. Lots of bikes and skateboards. Homemade tattoos. A tattered photocopy of “Soy, Not ‘Oi!’,” the vegan anarchist’s “Joy of Cooking.” Guests are always welcome in a punk house, if they follow the rules: “Don’t be a jerk!” reads a guest policy sign in one.

The punk house might be a trailer, a van, a warehouse or a bus. There are lots of treehouses, and more than a few squats. The old anarchist’s dictum — all property is theft — is part and parcel of the punk-house mindset, which is lovingly chronicled in a new book of photographs by Abby Banks, a 29-year-old artist. Ms. Banks found all 42 of the houses collected in “Punk House: Interiors in Anarchy,” out last month from Abrams Image, the art and pop culture imprint of Harry N. Abrams, in the same way: by phoning a few friends.
The punk house is a curious and sometimes beautiful habitat, the expression of a music scene and do-it-yourself culture that went underground decades ago, in an attempt to opt out of just about everything that smacked of the mainstream: cities, clubs, bars, alcohol, processed foods, agribusiness and the record companies, for example, not to mention all media larger than a photocopied zine. With its roots in old-fashioned counterculture communes (like Findhorn in Scotland, but really messy, and with a thrash-hardcore beat), the punk house is a multifunctional dwelling: typically a place for like-minded males in their 20’s to live and to make and hear music. This is not to say that there aren’t all-female punk houses (there are) or ones with girls living among the boys. As with punk itself, the punk house eludes a tidy definition. “Punk Is (Whatever We Made It To Be)” is the title of a song from the Minutemen, a punk band in the early ’80s.
As Thurston Moore, a member of the art-house alt-punk bank Sonic Youth, who helped Ms. Banks find a publisher for her work and contributed an essay to the book, said recently: “It’s just a completely liberated aesthetic.”
You won’t find many punk houses in major urban areas because, as Mr. Moore explained, “you don’t go to the media eye of New York or Los Angeles to achieve success.” Furthermore, it is nearly impossible to live a punk life in areas with costly real estate.
Bands on tour don’t play gigs at the Meadowlands or even the Knitting Factory; they’re more likely to appear in basements and living rooms. There’s a preponderance of acoustic guitars: big amps might spook the neighbors.
Mr. Moore’s own successes are more commercial. In his essay for Ms. Banks’s book, he writes of his experience walking into a legendary punk house in Minneapolis wearing a nice winter parka and sneakers, whereupon he was promptly sneered at. “I didn’t know they let subversives in here,” sniped one resident wearing a leather jacket stamped with the Dead Kennedys logo.
Though she was once in a thrash-punk band called Vomit Dichotomy Ms. Banks has never lived in a punk house, but she has an enormous appetite for the aesthetic. “It’s self-expression in the living space, not just on their bodies,” she said, noting that punk-house interiors are logo-centric. As with T-shirts or tattoos, they contain lots of writing — hortatory, descriptive, diaristic — on walls, door jambs, stoves and toilets.
“I’m so goth I’m dead,” is inscribed on a wall of a punk house in Minneapolis. “Dead witnesses tell no tales,” is on the back of a toilet in another.
Ms. Banks grew up in a tidy 1920s bungalow in Claremont, Calif. Her mother is a city planner; her father a psychology professor and an aerobics instructor who was seriously into all kinds of music, including punk. “It was more than acceptable in our house to blast the Ramones,” she said. Ms. Banks’s own room was embellished with layers of stickers, fliers for shows, and blue paint. When she sent her mother a copy of the book, Ms. Banks reported, “she said, ‘Every room looks like your room!’”

She’d always made art but never a photograph, until one day after art school, when she had an epiphany. She’d been drifting, she said, working as a maid and dog walker for David Foster Wallace, who lived two blocks away from her mother’s house in California. She had friends at The Fourth Street House, a punk house in San Pedro. There was a show there one day; dueling bands were playing the kitchen and the living room and passing the mike back and forth.

01.08.2008, 12:11 PM	#7
█████████ expwy. to yr skull Join Date: Nov 2007 Posts: 1,736	Anarchy Rules: The Dishes Stay Dirty By PENELOPE GREEN Published: January 3, 2008 THERE are certain things you can count on in a punk house. A killer name: Anarchtica, Scribble Squat, Collective A Go-Go, Firebreathing Kangaroo. Lots of bikes and skateboards. Homemade tattoos. A tattered photocopy of “Soy, Not ‘Oi!’,” the vegan anarchist’s “Joy of Cooking.” Guests are always welcome in a punk house, if they follow the rules: “Don’t be a jerk!” reads a guest policy sign in one. The punk house might be a trailer, a van, a warehouse or a bus. There are lots of treehouses, and more than a few squats. The old anarchist’s dictum — all property is theft — is part and parcel of the punk-house mindset, which is lovingly chronicled in a new book of photographs by Abby Banks, a 29-year-old artist. Ms. Banks found all 42 of the houses collected in “Punk House: Interiors in Anarchy,” out last month from Abrams Image, the art and pop culture imprint of Harry N. Abrams, in the same way: by phoning a few friends. The punk house is a curious and sometimes beautiful habitat, the expression of a music scene and do-it-yourself culture that went underground decades ago, in an attempt to opt out of just about everything that smacked of the mainstream: cities, clubs, bars, alcohol, processed foods, agribusiness and the record companies, for example, not to mention all media larger than a photocopied zine. With its roots in old-fashioned counterculture communes (like Findhorn in Scotland, but really messy, and with a thrash-hardcore beat), the punk house is a multifunctional dwelling: typically a place for like-minded males in their 20’s to live and to make and hear music. This is not to say that there aren’t all-female punk houses (there are) or ones with girls living among the boys. As with punk itself, the punk house eludes a tidy definition. “Punk Is (Whatever We Made It To Be)” is the title of a song from the Minutemen, a punk band in the early ’80s. As Thurston Moore, a member of the art-house alt-punk bank Sonic Youth, who helped Ms. Banks find a publisher for her work and contributed an essay to the book, said recently: “It’s just a completely liberated aesthetic.” You won’t find many punk houses in major urban areas because, as Mr. Moore explained, “you don’t go to the media eye of New York or Los Angeles to achieve success.” Furthermore, it is nearly impossible to live a punk life in areas with costly real estate. Bands on tour don’t play gigs at the Meadowlands or even the Knitting Factory; they’re more likely to appear in basements and living rooms. There’s a preponderance of acoustic guitars: big amps might spook the neighbors. Mr. Moore’s own successes are more commercial. In his essay for Ms. Banks’s book, he writes of his experience walking into a legendary punk house in Minneapolis wearing a nice winter parka and sneakers, whereupon he was promptly sneered at. “I didn’t know they let subversives in here,” sniped one resident wearing a leather jacket stamped with the Dead Kennedys logo. Though she was once in a thrash-punk band called Vomit Dichotomy Ms. Banks has never lived in a punk house, but she has an enormous appetite for the aesthetic. “It’s self-expression in the living space, not just on their bodies,” she said, noting that punk-house interiors are logo-centric. As with T-shirts or tattoos, they contain lots of writing — hortatory, descriptive, diaristic — on walls, door jambs, stoves and toilets. “I’m so goth I’m dead,” is inscribed on a wall of a punk house in Minneapolis. “Dead witnesses tell no tales,” is on the back of a toilet in another. Ms. Banks grew up in a tidy 1920s bungalow in Claremont, Calif. Her mother is a city planner; her father a psychology professor and an aerobics instructor who was seriously into all kinds of music, including punk. “It was more than acceptable in our house to blast the Ramones,” she said. Ms. Banks’s own room was embellished with layers of stickers, fliers for shows, and blue paint. When she sent her mother a copy of the book, Ms. Banks reported, “she said, ‘Every room looks like your room!’” She’d always made art but never a photograph, until one day after art school, when she had an epiphany. She’d been drifting, she said, working as a maid and dog walker for David Foster Wallace, who lived two blocks away from her mother’s house in California. She had friends at The Fourth Street House, a punk house in San Pedro. There was a show there one day; dueling bands were playing the kitchen and the living room and passing the mike back and forth.
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