This article is about celebrating Lisa Fancher and her baby, Frontier Records…after all, it IS their 30th Anniversary and the were one of the first punk labels to have reasonable amount of success and build strong credibility; a feat that deserves recognition in what is today’s music business. To be fair, Frontier and other labels like them didn’t care if their artists charted on Billboard’s Top 200, nor did the give a crap about radio airplay. The one exception might be Rodney Bingenheimer’s Sunday night show on KROQ. But mostly the west coast punk movement was all about the underground, the bars, the clubs, the live shows, the army of fans, and the attitude.
There will be a Frontier Records 30th Anniversary Live Show, in conjunction with Part-Time Punks, is confirmed for Sunday Nov. 7th, 2010. The Echoplex date features seminal Frontier Bands Including the Adolescents, Middle Class, Rikk Agnew, Flyboys and The Pontiac Brothers, with more to be added soon. Door giveaways and a Pop-Up Store selling rare Frontier Records items including imports, T-shirts and limited edition viny, add to celebratory event MC’ed by Circle Jerks’ Keith Morris. The lineup is sure to make independent music fans dizzy with anticipation. Tickets are on sale now! Doors open at 4pm and the event is all-ages. Tickets are on sale and available from Ticketweb.
Part Time Punkes is a club that takes over noted Los Angeles venue The Echo every Sunday night. Booked, promoted and DJ’d by Michael Stock, the club features a mix of vinyl and live bands spanning from the punk era to the present. Michael is also the DJ for the critically lauded Part Time Punks radio show every Thursday 3-6pm PST on KXLU (88.9FM).
Prior to the Los Angeles event, fans living in Seattle will be able to share in the Frontier Records 30th Anniversary celebration with a live show featuring the Dharma Bums and Young Fresh Fellows with special guests to be added. This will take place at the Crocodile Café on Sunday October 16, 2010. Tickets can be purchased directly from the venue.
The history of Frontier Records and West coast punk found its heyday from 1979-1984. West coast punk bands seemed to come from every city and from every garage or warehouse, from San Diego to San Francisco. The impetus was what was happening on the East coast with The Ramones, Talking Heads, Patti Smith, and New York Dolls, not to mention the earlier U.K. influence of the Sex Pistols, The Clash, Buzzcocks, The Stranglers, and The Damned. One difference was that the West coast bands were real DIY stuff. Most bands would record an album in one day and then hit the road in a broken-down van, playing from LA’s Madame Wong’s, The Whisky, and the Starwood Club, then head north to San Francisco’s Deaf Club, Slim’s & Mabuhay Gardens, with a buttload of clubs and cities in between.
This was the beginning of a movement that can only be topped by the music renaissance of the 60s. There was a barrage of punk bands all over the country, but the West coast had some of the best, even if they couldn’t even play their instruments! In the beginning of the 80’s punk scene, but it just didn’t matter. It was music for the lost generation and no one else mattered. Mosh pits weren’t violent; they were a ceremony enjoyed by the fans and the bands. It was a badge of honor to leave the show with a bloody face or a broken bone.
Group’s like NorCal’s Dead Kennedys, Flipper, The Avengers, Angry Samoans, Mutants, Romeo Void, and hundreds of others grew like fungi, but LA was where it was at with bands like The Germs, The Blasters, X, Fear, Dream Syndicate, Green On Red, the Go Gos, Savage Republic, The Dickeys, The Plugzs, Black Flag, TSOL, the Surf Punks, and the Circle Jerks. Three labels were mainly responsible for getting this music into the hands of hungry fans both locally and across the country. They were Bob Briggs’ Slash Records, Greg Ginn’s SST Records & Lisa Fancher’s Frontier Records. Each label did it THEIR way and had great success. There was a great camaraderie between labels and bands back then, as they all wanted to see each other succeed, or at the very least raise hell with the establishment, hippies, and most of all, parents.
And so we offer a hearty congratulations to Lisa Francher for 30 years of insight, willingness to take chances, and in helping to pave a new musical Frontier, without which we never would have seen or heard bands like Nirvana, Soundgarden, Pearl Jam, The Replacements, Offspring, Green Day, Blink 182, AFI, and so many others. Frontier was one of the first independent labels to document the nascent hard-core punk rock scene of Los Angeles before branching out into other scenes and sounds such as the so-called "Paisley Underground" and (always) guitar-based bands such as Thin White Rope, The Young Fresh Fellows and Heatmiser.
After learning the indie label ropes from her mentors Greg and Suzy Shaw at Bomp! Records, Fancher first hit the jackpot with the release of “Group Sex” by the Circle Jerks The success of "Group Sex" set the label up for iconic punk releases by the Flyboys, Adolescents, TSOL, China White and Suicidal Tendencies (whose defining anthem "Institutionalized" made its appearance here). Also of note from this era were the discovery of the ultimate Goth band, Christian Death, and the release of its masterpiece, “Only Theatre of Pain”. The importance of these albums cannot be overstated. An unmistakable affirmation of Fancher’s keen ear, all of these records have survived the test of time and are considered ‘must-haves’ for critics and serious music collectors alike. In fact, the label is quickly closing in on its 100th release.
Frontier Records took a turn for the Technicolor in the mid-'80s with such bands as the Salvation Army and the Long Ryders. The Salvation Army's psychedelic pop may have been perplexing to punk purists, but their genius was more than welcome to the label's musical expansion. A name change to Three O'Clock and two more Frontier releases (“Baroque Hoedown” and “Sixteen Tambourines”) were followed by the boys moving on to what they thought were going to be bigger things. The Long Ryders can take credit for kick-starting the alternative-country scene a good ten years ahead of the pack (not intentionally, of course). By 1986, the Frontier staff had their hands full with Thin White Rope, Naked Prey, the Pontiac Brothers, EIEIO, Flying Color and American Music Club. All of them were ahead of their time and/or critical darlings. Only AMC survived long enough to see a measurable degree of financial success (if that's how success is measured by). The Pontiac Brothers took the Stones/Faces ball and moved it onto their own court, writing retro-without-becoming-clothes-horse parodies. If they'd lasted a couple years longer, the world would have been their oyster, or at least a crab cake.
Of the band Thin White Rope, not enough superlatives can be said. Truly one of the greatest guitar bands that ever made ears ring, they disbanded in 1992 after a show in Ghent, Belgium which was recorded and released as “The One That Got Away”.
The first Frontier band to come from the mighty Pacific Northwest was Seattle's Young Fresh Fellows. They've defied description for over two decades, covering just about every conceivable musical style, and succeeding admirably at it. From the sublime to the silly, their earnestness burrows its way into the most cynical of souls. Bare Naked Ladies: we think you should be paying tithes to the Young Fresh Fellows! Following YFF's auspicious lead, came Portland's Dharma Bums, a rockin' little band with a huge heart and a monster sound to match. Then came Portland's Heatmiser's distinctive brand of groove-oriented punk rock has won them a slavish following and tons of press praise for their two albums “Dead Air” and “Cop & Speeder,” with the interim EP, “Yellow No.5.” Elliott Smith's critically lauded solo career before his tragic and untimely death ensures continuing interest in these three emo-core classics. Among the last of Frontier’s new bands were Birmingham, AL's Shame Idols, perfectly complemented by Seattle's Flop. Both featured brilliant pop/punk songwriters in, respectively, Tim Boykin and Rusty Willoughby, but it was a case of the exact right bands at the wrong time.
Never at a loss for recognizing talent, the keen ears at Frontier have found some out-of-print classics demanding re-release. It began with the former Smoke 7 junk-rock icon, “Born Innocent” by Redd Kross, soon followed by “Dangerhouse Volumes 1 and 2”, which include most of the crucial 45 tracks (X, Avengers, Weirdos, Black Randy et al). A part of the world fell over and died when Frontier released the Weirdos' debut LP, “Condor”, followed by “Weird World: Volume 1”, a sort of greatest hits from L.A.'s mightiest original punk band. Ten years after Thin White Rope's demise, Guy Kyser made the world a better place by recording a new record with his wife and new band-mates in the form of Mummydogs. 2003 was definitely the year of the Weirdos as Frontier coaxed a second volume of ‘Weird World” from the band. Sorry folks, the Weirdos only release records every 12 years!
The Frontier label came full circle in March 2005, celebrating its 25-year anniversary with the release of an album of mostly previously unreleased Adolescents material: "The Complete Demos 1980-1986" on CD and colored vinyl, of course (with a special numbered limited edition of the LP with a slightly different cover)! Continuing to be the miners of vintage Orange County punk, a compilation LP from Eddie & the Subtitles featuring the mighty "American Society" was released in 2008. It took nearly 10 years but The Middle Class' crucial "Out of Vogue" compilation was released at the end of 2008. Lisa doesn’t care what any documentaries or books say— Middle Class were the first American hardcore band! One never knows when a limited edition 45 will sneak out like the Flyboy's "Crayon World”, Eddie and the Subtitles' "American Society" or a virtually identical to the original "Out of Vogue" EP by Middle Class.
Frontier has always been a vinyl-oriented label with the limited edition colored vinyl LP Frontier’s main calling card. Just try keeping up with the colors! Now we find ourselves in 2010— thirty years and and besides a digitally remastered "Only Theatre of Pain" and a return to Rozz Williams' original artwork with additional Edward C. Colver photos., Frontier also plans to reissue Dangerhouse's other LP—“Yes LA”—in the near future. Many other delightful surprises are in store, too. Lisa and Frontier's strategy was to cultivate a small, focused roster of bands, create releases that remain timeless classics because of their musical merits, not their trendiness. The bond of trust created by Frontier's lifeblood, the indie record buyer, record store, magazine, and left of the dial radio station, has kept this label afloat all these many years, and that's never going to change no matter how many years go by. Here's to 30 more years of Frontier Records, and cheers to all you that have supported the music and the attitude! Now go find a mosh pit to celebrate!
Contact Mark Cope at: moandbee@gmail.com
Comments
I love the profile. Great to know that record labels like this actually still survive. Thanks for blog.
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