Dec 14

The Germs

THE GERMS
 
 
Germs  are a California punk rock band from Los Angeles, California, originally active from 1977 to 1980.  The band’s early lineup consisted of singer Darby Crash, guitarist Pat Smear, bassist Lorna Doom, and their most consistent drummer Don Bolles.  They released only one album, 1979’s (GI) (produced by Joan Jett) and were featured the following year in Penelope Spheeris’ documentary film The Decline of Western Civilization, which chronicled the Los Angeles punk movement.   (More from Wikipedia)
 
 
My earlier article on The Eyes mentioned that members of the Go-Go’s had deep roots in the Los Angeles punk rock scene, but I didn’t know the half of it.  I recently picked up an LP called Germicide (oh, yes, they are still making new LP’s – I get them all the time) of the first live concert in June 1977 by the Germs (I also mentioned that band in the article); their first single on What Records?, “Forming” b/w “Sex Boy” is regarded as the very first punk rock record that was released in LA.  The woman introducing the band at the beginning of the concert was “Belinda”; and sure enough, I was able to pin that down as being Belinda Carlisle, the lead singer of the Go-Go’s.
 
(July 2012)
 
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Here is the What? Stuff compilation album that introduced me to The Eyes: 
 
 
 
 (July 2013)
 
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Remarkably, in early 1979, Joan Jett produced the only album by the pioneering L.A. punk rock band the Germs, called (GI). 

 

(November 2013)

 

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These Are the Days by Certain General was produced by Genya Ravan, the former lead singer of perhaps the very first all-female rock band Goldie and the Gingerbreads.  She was also in the band Ten Wheel Drive and has released several solo albums; I have Urban Desire (1978) myself.  Among her other production credits are the Dead Boys’ first studio album, Young, Loud and Snotty (1977).  That’s two important punk rock albums that I know of which were produced by women, the other being the 1979 album by the Germs, (GI), which was produced by Joan Jett (a veteran of another all-female band the Runaways). 

 

(March 2015)

 

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As punk rock began to gain ascendancy in an underground sort of way, Bomp! Records was there to release 45’s by some of the seminal bands and artists like the Germs, the Weirdos, the Zeros, the Romantics, Devo, Josie Cotton, and Venus and the Razorblades. 
 
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Mark Breyer and David Winogrond had been in a Chicago-area band called Brevity; when they relocated to Los Angeles, they connected with guitarist/keyboardist Bruce Wagner who answered an ad that they ran in a music magazine.  David Winogrond also did some work outside SS-20 and Skooshny; he was the drummer for one of the earliest L.A. punk rock bands, the Germs, though not the original drummer. 
 
(December 2017)
 
Last edited: March 22, 2021