In the early 1980s, at the top of the Punk Rock scene in Fullerton, the interest and the punk demand in the County of Orange reached a boiling point during a particular Tsol show at the Fullerton College.
The group played a part filled with full capacity when an overly zealous crowd of people stormed the rear door, causing the chaos as an incessant current of punks flooded the just building to see the most dreaded and venerated group in the Oc punk history. .
“You know when people are trying to get out of a building and they are trampled on? Well, they were people trampled on their way in a building,” said the singer of the group, Jack Grisham, in Times. “It was crazy, it was like the people who tried to go up to Costco a morning of Thanksgiving, Black Friday, except that they were not going for televisions and Xboxes, they were going to Punk Rock.”
The story of Fullerton's punk rock is highlighted as part of a greater celebration of Orange County Punk at the Fullerton Museum Center, where a new exhibition entitled “Punk Oc: From the Streets of Suburbia” starts on Saturday with an opening reception featuring live performances by Di and Tsol, Joe Escalante des Vandals deducing and actress Chris Estrada that master of ceremonies. The exhibition takes place until August 10 and was assembled by the Conservatives Georgette Collard and Jim Washburn.
A guitar from Fullerton Punk Band Orange Agent exhibited at the Fullerton Museum Center
(Courtesy Fullerton Museum Center)
“There were already a lot of punk enthusiasts here in Fullerton, starting with our mayor at the time, And from there, it was just in a way on the talks of `Hey, we should have a punk exhibition, all these large groups had just Fullerton '' … Many of our members of the board of directors were previously in the Punk Rock scene in their youth, so everyone was really excited to emphasize and present it,” said Collard.
The exhibition tells the Punk history of the OC starting with the first groups of Fullerton in the late 1970s such as Eddie and the subtitles, social distortion, the Orange agent, the DI and adolescents before going through the decades and highlighting the bands that have passed other cities in the county. Notable groups like Tsol, the crowd, the vandals and the offspring will be among those presented, and an assortment of rare objects, works of art, leaflets, photographs and personal memories will be exposed.
“I was impressed because we tend to consider punk as almost a disposable commodity, if people live too fast, you would think that they would not preserve these things as you go, and there is a huge amount of things that people have saved, it fills the walls here,” Washburn said.
Show Oc Punk Exposure inside the Fullerton Museum Center
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As a conservative region, OC may seem an improbable reproductive ground for punk rock, in particular compared to Los Angeles Voisin, but Grisham, which came to the Punk Oc scene with its group comrades in Tsol, attributes the region to innovate punk rock with a distinct sound that has catapulated music beyond local neighborhoods.
“It had nice groups, but the sound of the County of Orange – this surf skating sound that came out of Orange County – that's what exploded punk rock,” said Grisham. “Now, some people would like it to never be exploded, that it remains in their own basement, backyard, but that's what really put the punk rock on the map, skaters, surfers, videos, clothes, everything came out, it did not get out of these other areas.”
Even with the creation of this innovative sound, the County of Orange was not easy to navigate for punk rockers in the late 1970s and early 1980s, according to Grisham, and its conservative grip on residents often made life difficult for aberrant values and creatives.
“You can go to downtown Los Angeles or something else and you can dress crazy and no one will look at you, they don't care, there is so much madness in the street, nobody gives like …,” said Grisham. “You go down to a suburban district and go down to someone's street with a leather jacket and purple hair, there will be a problem, you will be stopped by the police, you will be harassed, you will be threatened, that's what we were going here.”
Grisham said that poverty and family dysfunction also spoiled the region, and it was not different there elsewhere.
“Of the four original tsol guys, I was the only one to have as a family unit together, they were all broken, divorced, torn families, all,” said Grisham.
Social distortion guitar and paint of the group's logo painting exhibited at the Fullerton Museum Center
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According to the Conservatives, the exhibition will help deconstruct preconceived concepts on the Punk of Orange County by exploring the various horizons and the socio-economic factors that have prompted many groups to rebel and channel their creativity in music.
“It was pleasant to learn a lot about this, I was, among other people, quite disdainful of the Punk of Orange County for a long time, you would think:” You live in a bucolic paradise compared to where a part of punk music comes from, what are you upset? “Washburn said.
Presenting this juxtaposition and the community which was born to create a dynamic musical scene is one of the most impactful aspects of the “Punk OC” exhibition. Basically, it is the resilience and the community of the Punk scene of Orange County which is enlightened and celebrated.
“One of my main objectives for this exhibition is to educate the public, perhaps people who do not understand punk rock,” said Collard. “I want to educate people to show that this is an inclusive environment for punk rockers and that anyone is welcome to be on the punk scene – there is a great sense of community in the punk rock scene and I think it will be obvious in the exhibition.”
