Jerry Roach
Owner, The Cuckoo's Nest
Costa Mesa

I think it's up to the bands and the promoters to stop the violence. At the Cuckoo's Nest, we do it through intimidation. We use a big security force of fifteen to eighteen people at the punk shows, and I'm on hand there myself. I let the kids slam around and have their violence, but if a fight erupts, everyone in the fight is ejected - and I remember every one of them. The next time they come by to see a show, I say, "get lost." A lot of times they'll come back again and beg and promise me they'll be good, and I'll give them another shot. But I say to them: "Next time you cause trouble, a) you're going to get the shit beat out of you, and b) you're never coming back here again, and we're the only place in town booking this kind of music."

Further, I've gotten to know a lot of the punks over the years and they help me out a lot inside. They'll be in there doing the slam and having a good time, and if they see anything getting out of hand, they'll tell people to take it easy or get thrown out. Basically, I think people want to have a good time, but if somebody starts trouble, they're out - out of the club and out the five or six bucks it cost them to get in.

If a band tried to incite violence, I generally will not hire them again. There was a band here a couple of years ago called "the Klan" that came in and stirred things up in a bad way. I banned them and they broke up. Again, I've got the only place in town where a band like that can play. I try not to pervert my power, but I want to stay in business, I want the kids to keep coming, and that means we're going to be heavy handed with trouble-makers.

In three years, we've never had a riot, and I've booked Black Flag a few times, the Circle Jerks, and most of the other top punk bands.

Lieutenant Dan Cooke
Press Relations Officer
Los Angeles Police Department

We require organizations sponsoring shows to provide their own security. Before an event is held, though, we will meet with them and make certain recommendations based on the nature of the group and where the concert is taking place.

As far as the local clubs go, we expect each of them to handle it inside. They all have security people and they can usually calm the troublemakers, or, if they choose, remove them from the club. People want to be able to enjoy the music without having maniacs doing wild, raucous things that hurt other people. We don't want to be there, and I know the kids don't want us to be there.

Now at the sports Arena and the Coliseum, it's different. There we have people inside and out. But at those shows, which are almost always the bigger bands, there's no violence. The problems come from enforcing the drug laws, which we must do. We are very quick to pick up anyone who is violating the law. We will search people if we feel we must, but the kids are warned before they come in.

We are not anti-concert. We go out of our way so that people can assemble for rock concerts or any kind of concerts. But they have to do it on our terms: in other words, violating the law will not be tolerated.

Mark Leviton
BAM Contributing Editor
Los Angeles

First, I don't agree that musicians have a responsibility to dictate or suggest to audiences what constitutes property behavior. Some bands have told their fans to stop creating a violent reputation for them, and in a few cases this has worked, shifting allegiances and creating new "in-groups." Also, I don't believe you really need a "solution" to the "problem" of punk violence. No one should go anywhere where they feel threatened, whether it's a cowboy bar, football game or punk show.

My feeling is that an equilibrium will be reached: hardcore shows will go "underground" where the audiences can punch themselves silly without anyone caring, and those groups who dedicate themselves to attracting non-punks will either moderate their stance or come down hard on the violence in the crowd. Those bands who want to play to the same 100 people time after time deserve that. Almost without exception, the bands with reputations for violent gigs live up to the billing, whether or not the police can be ultimately blamed for precipitating the real confrontation.

I'm sorry I have to stay away from my favorite groups because I'm afraid of getting beat up by punks who think my beard makes me a hippie, but I won't pretend that the hardcore fans don't have rights too. It's sad that they turn to self-destruction and violence instead of venturing their justifiable anger on the real enemies in our society.

Jeff Frane
Berkeley

The questions you raise about rock bands and violence pose interesting dilemma for all of us, for they are related to some important concerns about "blame" and responsibility that are not limited to rock and roll. One of the closest parallels to what happened at the Black Flag concert is "incitement to riot," the charge that was leveled against radicals only a few years ago. In the first place, I think BAM has performed an exemplary function by publicizing the violence. As Mitchell Schneider pointed out, unsuspecting people run the risk of being trashed at concerts like that, and the "rock press" has a responsibility to keep its audience aware of the danger. Reading the article and looking at those photos, I was reminded of nothing so much as the coverage of Altamont a dozen years ago, when the Rolling Stones - and hundreds of thousands of people - stood by and watched a series of stompings and a murder. There were more than a few who blamed the Stones for that incident. (Earlier in the day Marty Balin, alone, tried to stop the Hell's Angels in their mindless violence and got punched out for his trouble).

Are bands to blame for the violence that occurs at their concerts? However, much we should like to blame someone, and without making any effort to refute the evident Charisma that entertainers - particularly on stage- possess, to blame them is to fail to place the blame where it belongs: on these people who are acting in a violent manner. The skinheads are, presumably, rational human beings and as such are totally responsible for their own actions. We might hope that Black Flag would demonstrate some ethical behavior by discouraging the skinheads from their wanton violence, but since this is clearly too much to expect from them, some response must be made to stop further occurrences.

If the band cannot be held responsible for the violence of its audience, certainly the venues can, at least any venue that books such an act more than once and fails to provide adequate protection for its customers. People running clubs have a contract, of sorts, with the people who pay an admission to enter - and to be entertained. They are not paying to be beaten up. Any club that continues to book acts such as Black Flag deserves to be boycotted- and sued for damages. Their security people need to be reinforced, and the people they pull off of innocent victims need to be arrested - not simply pushed away or thrown out of the club, but arrested for assault. If the audience is somehow appalled by an increase in the number of security people, or the sight of a paddy wagon hauling away the skinheads, perhaps they should take some positive action, the sort of action that might have saved a life at Altamont if people had raised their voices and told the angels to stop. Or perhaps they should make their wishes known to club owners by refusing to patronize venues that fail to protect customers. If groups like Black Flag suddenly find themselves without gigs, perhaps they will find a personal reason for concerning themselves with their audience's well-being.

Violence is endemic in our society, and the Black flag concerts are a reflection of that segment infected with the disease. Those of us that are healthy need merely to cut them off whenever possible and live our lives without them.

(Bravo! This makes the most sense out of all the letters. If this person is correct, it is mind boggling to me that Black Flag never took a position on the violence happening at their shows. Why would they do that?! what did it cost them to come out and say, "Please, we do not condone the violence" and/or to stop playing until the violence stopped. In addition, these were assaults so why in the heck would the security guards just throw the perpetrators out the door? This guy is right - the people who were wontonly assaulting other audience members should have been held and the police called. Today, it is hard to believe that a club owner would even book ANY of these punk bands, knowing that almost certainly this type of violence would occur - When you think about the club's legal liability and lawsuits, but I guess things were different then. People just got the crap beat out of them, lost their teeth, had to have reconstructive surgery to their faces, or whatever, and "oh well" that's the way it goes. The perpetrators got away with it, the clubs were never sued and the bands were oblivious to the pain and suffering going on in the pit and refused to take a position. It is truly unbelievable when I think of it now in those terms. - Michele)>

Kristie Ross
Torrance

Black Flag shouldn't have to discourage their crowd from violence. They are musicians not policemen. The majority of what you call Huntington Beach surf-punks are actually clones from assorted cities and suburbs - people who don't know or respect what the scene is really about. I in no way condone the uncalled-for violence that happens at these shows, but I think you should explore the reasons why such things happen, instead of passing judgments.

For me to go into an alien environment to review music whose style I find distasteful would be a farce. I have no need to criticize things with which I'm not familiar, or to invade environments where I do not belong: I would not reside in Watts and expect to walk away unharmed. If these shows are not Mitchell Schneider's "idea of an evening out," my advice to him is not to go to these shows. Six nights a week the Starwood has other kinds of bands, and I suggest he go to them.

You talk about responsibility and burden in art. Does this mean that creativity and spontaneity - sparse realism left in a plastic world - are to be molded and conformed like the rest of this slick society? If that is the case, the end has already come, for all hope of individuality and freedom are dead.

(The argument here is it's the victim's fault for going to the concert because he doesn't belong there. - Michele)

Celeste Holmes
Berkeley

I am not 12 or 15, which the majority of the Huntington Beachers are. I am 20, and my favorite bands are Black Flag, Circle Jerks, Dead Kennedys and UXA.

The only time Bambi (the name we give gutless rag mags who only write about Journey and the Grateful Dead) ever prints anything on punk is to slag it. Where are you at most all the other punk gigs when everyone is having fun? I have been to over 20 B.F. gigs in the past two years and there have only been a couple with what you call "ultraviolence." That same thing goes on at heavy metal gigs, country western bars, and, most of all, football games. I went to an Oakland Raider game and it was worse than any Black Flag gig. The fans trashed the place and there were many tailgate parties that ended up in brawls in the parking lot. But I never heard anything on that because it's "good ol' American football."

Most reported acts of violence are overdone by the press. The L.A. Times blew the story of a girl's stabbing at the Whisky - it turns out it didn't even happen in there! Lazy sods.

Many times I'll be thrashing and dancing and flipping off the stage, having the time of my life, when some stupid jock or new wave poseur who thinks everyone is fighting will start punching. That's how most of the fights get started. Granted, there are a couple of occasions when it gets out of hand, like at the Starwood. I was there that night, and I am pictured in the crowd shot in your issue.

Things like what happened are senseless if they were ganging up on people only because of their looks-no one knows for sure- and I hope that the small handful of H.B.'s that cause trouble like this wisen up. But it is not B.F.'s responsibility to calm down their audience. Is it Stevie Wonder's responsibiility if someone O.D.'s on heroin at his gig? Black Flag stands for anarchy, so any action on the band's part would be hypocritical.

Most of the people who read Bambi will probably agree with your article because they are closet cases who listen to Journey, etc. How sad. It's too bad that Bambi has to be such a rag that it caters to big bucks, large arena gigs, and big-name promoters.

Kristee McChargue, Nancy Berg, Terry Berg, Greg Berg, Tracee Bates, Jill Littlejohn, Danny Perkens
Santa Ana

In your editorial about punk violence you seemed to take the typical hippie view of an Aerosmith and Van Halen lover. You're got to look at the situation from a punk's point of view. We don't go to longhairs' concerts, so why do they come to ours?

What did that so-called "straight-looking kid with blond hair" do to get punched? How many times have I been punched and shoved around and told "punk sucks," "Devo sucks," "B-52s suck" at school by a bunch of jocks? How many times have I seen hordes of hippies invade the Cuckoo's Nest in Costa Mesa and proceed to beat up punks, male or female, just to show what men they are?

All this article has done is further the anti-punk propaganda that seems to be going around these days. Never in a newspaper do you see "Rocker Shoots Policeman in Argument." But if a punk is involved the headlines read loud and clear, "Punk Rocker Stabs Limo Driver." The violence at punk gigs could never surpass the violence at rock concerts. But why bother writing about the violence in rock when it's been going on for 20 or more years, right?

You state that art is a responsibility. A band's responsibility is to go on stage do their show, and leave. Protection of the audience is up to the audience and security. If the kids didn't like the atmosphere they wouldn't be there. Personally, I wouldn't go to a gig if I knew there would be this type of violence. Everybody knows about Black Flag and their groupies. Anybody who gets beat up at one of their gigs probably deserves it or asked for it. This type of situation occurs at cowboy, low-rider, black, and hippie bars all the time. If somebody's going to fight, they're going to fight. The length of their hair or type of music they listen to really doesn't matter. It's just the shape our world is in.