DIRK:‘‘W

YA '1 MHR : How much do you think the age,

RR 0factor plays in that, as well?

W O

Dirk : A great deal . Obviously afourteen or fifteen year old isn'tgoing to be found at the Art Insti-tute . Which in the long run may ac -tually be more interesting or bene-ticlal . when you see someone likethe bassist In Free Beer, and howold is he, 13, 14't By 19, you'regoing to see one hell of a musicianthat no one can stop . I think that'sgreat . The problem is to deal withhim, or people of his age, rightnow . Looking at it from the stand-point of someone who has to dealwith the legalities of a liquor lic-ense, and you're dealing with a per-tormer on stage who's that young,and who therefore is going to re-late to an audience of the same age, ;this offers me a great challenge,since alcohol is involved.

MRR : Do you remember the first showyou put on?

Dirk : Oh, that would have been Laborday, about six or seven years ago.

MRR : For six or seven years, everynight, first at the Mabunay and nowat the On Broadway, you've been put-tin(' on Punk shows . You must be avery sick man, Dirk.

Dirk : Probably . (laughs)

MHR : You must have quite a perspec-tive on the scene, having seen it gothrough who knows how many changes?

Dirk : Well, there nave been a numberof generations of people who havecome and gone . There was an interes-ting scene this last Friday, somekid saying goodbye . He was going toIdaho to go back to school, sincethe vacation was coming to a close.Those kind of scenes have been goingon now for whatever number of yearswe've been at it . People saying"Well, I've got to go beck toschool," and when they come backthey have a slightly different out-look . It's two years later and theycome back and they are no longerpunks, they're in the main stream.It keeps evolving . the same problemsrepeat themselves with the youngerset, as it comes in . Until theylearn the ropes.

MRR : Uo they really?

"energy" cause I think "violence"immediately has a connotation which

isn't necessarily there . Violence,to me, meansliialicious Intent . Maybethat's picking bones or beinglegalistic, but, in most cases, Ithink the media misinterprets theenergy of youth, bouncing up anddown or whatever . You've got to livewitn these kids till they getthrough that stage . It's frustratingto deal with a new audience untilthey integrate . I would hate forthem to become boring and totally"mellowed out ." I don't think that'snecessarily

the

preferablealternative

to

their over ener-getic running around the pool.

MRR : So, you don't see any differ-ence between what's happening in thescene now compared to like, fouryears ago?

MHR : How have you dealt with that,so far?

Dirk : Uhhh (laughs), by never stop-ping ; running double time the wholeevening . And by throwing some of myfits . You've seen me.

MHR : Yes, indeed.

Uirk : But, you learn to live with it.

MRR : You seem to be singing a dif-ferent tune tonight.

Uirk : Oh, I'm still frustrated . I'mupset sometimes when somebody dam-.ges a piece of equipment which ot-her people have literally bustedtheir asses to get, by throwingbenefits or something . Some jerk inthe audience thinks it's tunny topull a mike cord which cause a $120mike to tall over, which probablyhasn't been paid for yet, so then wehave to sit there and pay for it andstill not have a mike . Or you'llnave somebody destroy an $BU seat,so that means the next 240 tickets,instead of being $2 will be $2 .5U.That's the way it goes . There is nomommy and daddy either in the sky orelsewhere that's going to give youmoney . WS the audience that paysfor it . The promoter is only ex-changing money.

MHR : You have been doing this forsix years, and some people mightthink "Ah, he's been ripping oft thescene for six years ." What kind ofshape are you really in after allthis time!

Dirk : About $30,000 in the hole,with ex-employees suing us, printerschasing otter us . I still wear apair of tennis shoes that I wore twoyears ago, and most ot my clothesare in the same condition . The thingis I feel that nobody forced me tochoose my lifestyle, and I obviouslyenjoy what I do, or else I wouldn'tdo it . It can be paint'ul at timesbut I have no complaints . That's thechallenge I undertook . It annoys mewhen I see people who aren't puttingtwo ana two together . In otherwords, like when we were kiddingarouna earlier about the photographthat I gave you, of me looking likea drooling idiot . I mean, I thinkit's a fun thing . The next personwho sits there and sees it is goingto say "THAT'S WHAT THE ASSHOLELOOKS LIKE . YEAH, THAT'S HIM AL-RIGHT :" and totally not realizing

Dirk : Well,

there are definitelycertain differences . I think the SanFrancisco Art Institute had astronger int'luence on the earliergroups, especially in the area ofgraphics . I think it's sort of seathat there doesn't seem to be asmuch creativity now as there wasthen . Take a look at the posters,that's one ot the interesting thingsabout the knockout art that you cancreate with xerox . After a while it

Uirk : (laughs) I remember one of the becomes less demanding to turn outfirst people was Michael Kowalsky something . (hat's the only thing

(of UXA) who got k .o .ed by Jeff that I feel is really negative inUlener of the NUNS, when he jumped terms of the creative standpoint . I

yip on to the stage, and flattened a think that's because people are moretable when he fell backwards . That into the music rather than the totalwas sort of the beginning in terms communication aspect that some ofor encounters or whatever you want the earlier bands were into . This

to call it . I hate the word vio- was because they had their roots in

lence . I prefer to use the word the Art Institute .

who actually sat there and retouchedit and made myself crosseyed . It's 'basically me oeing able to laugh atmyself.

MHK : Bringing up the concept of asense of humor, do you think thatthere is less a sense of humor or asense of satire in punk than thereused to be?

Dirk : Well, the thing is that whenyou're dealing with a younger audi-ence, I don't mean to knock them,the people out there who are 14 or15, they're the really adventurousones, and from that standpoint I'mtotally on their side, but by virtueof the fact that they haven't had asmany experiences, in some ways theywear blinders . Ihey're very intensein what they reel, so if you presentsomething different, they automati-cally have to sit there and becomelittle racists . I'm saddened to seethis . The fact that they can't beopened minded and say "OK, live andlet live" because if it wasn't forthat very attitude, Punk wouldn'thave come about . The thing that Ihave been striving with, whether itwas at the Mabuhay or at the OnBroadway, is to give people the op-portunity to express themselves . Ourgoal is to provide an open accessplatform to people for them to dotheir own thing on . Now if thatmeans to destroy that platform thenit becomes an interesting challengefor the people who have to keep theplatform open. I think that anybodywho wants to destroy that platformis basically a fascist . This is be-cause he or she is using their mightrather than their creativity tobring about change . That's where Ipart ways with some of the youngerpunks when you see these footballheavies or whatever using their bodyto oppress somebody else on thedance floor . Theresa, Biafra's wife,says she doesn't enjoy going toshows anymore because she's alwaysenjoyed standing in front and sheJust can't take the risk of havingsome 250 lb . bozo land on top of her.

MK : I've been thinking, either youare extremely committed to doingthis or you should end up committed,or you're just some kind of a maso-chist.

Dirk : Well, (laughs) I really don'tgo home and have to clean up, uh,from having, uh, climaxed, it's morelike I have to clean off the snotfrom my sleeves cause people havebeen spitting at me . I'm sure thatother people that have some sort ofgoal or vision go through something.I just would like to create a thea-ter or a stage in which someone withthe most rudimentary of requirementscan get up and do his or her thing,and have the technical crews to plugthem in . That's another challenge,getting a technical crew that isn'tjudgmental . That therefore, it theydon't like something, they won't sa-botage the music . It's always diffi-cult to find sound engineers andlighting people and such that wantto work with some of the (laughs)5085 that I call artists.

MRR : Currently, there have been someproblems that have come up with ' theintroduction of these Wednesdaynight shows that we have been doing.I thought you might want to talk alittle about this .

Dirk : Well, when you and I and theacts have organized a show and thenput a $2 price on it, it's obvious,or should be to anyone, when youstart multiplying . Let's say thatyou get 200 people and 100 peoplepaying their way into a show, andthen you have these huge guest listsand the next guy comes along andsays "Oh well, I think I'll write myinitial on a wall" or, worse yet,kicks a chair through a window, itwould make it just impossible togive those kind of prices . You and Iand Jeff are all aware that a lot ofpeople don't have the kind of moneyto pay to see shows that are pre-sented at some of the other clubs intown . That's why we worked to getthis down to $2, but when other in-dividuals start screwing around,which has nothing to do with themusic or freedom of expression, Imean it doesn't take any intelli-gence to break a chair . I think it'sthe disunity from within that isgoing to destroy the Punk movement,nothing from without, the more crapyou receive from without the strong-er it actually becomes . It is thissniping at each other and tearingaway from within that's going toscrew things up .

John Hanamura

MRR : I think it's a small minorityof nut cases that are ruining it foreverybody else . Maybe you shoulddiscuss the possibility that you maynot be holding anymore hardcoreshows at this point.

Dirk : The thing is, I always findmyself, when I'm really angry, say-ing "That's got to be THE last one ."But then I immediately realize thatthis is the wrong way to go aboutthings, because 98 people are total-ly blameless for the actions of acouple . However, I think that weshould all watch ourselves and ourfriends for when somebody may be ina bad state because he or she mayhave had too much to drink or mixedtheir drugs badly and all of a sud-den somebody is doing somethingwhich you realize can hurt the situ-ation, whether it involves the li-quor license being busted cause a13-year-old is drinking or haspassed out in the bathroom, or some-body is stuffing a beer bottle downthe plumbing in one of the johns.Those things are usually done withinthe sight of people and I think weshould just walk up and say "That'snot cool, just cut it out ."

MRR : You mean trying to establish akind of communication or peer pres-sure.

Dirk : Peer group communication,really . See, the thing is, pressureor cohersion, if you say to someone,"THAT WILL BE THE LAST TIME YOU DOTHAT :" - smash : I think that's thewrong way of going about it . Wewould really like if some peoplewould come forward and say, look,we'll help to sort of be a 'sanitysquad' or whatever you want to callit . I know that members of variousbands, like Henry of Black andBiafra as well as others, havespoken out on this and have saidhow, on the one hand, we are talkingagainst fascism and, on the otherhand, we're being little fascists.I'm not suggesting that people runup and down the aisles like schoolmonitors . What we would really liketo see is people coming out andsaying "OK, we'll watch out for someof the equipment of stage," etc.etc . And I don't think this shouldbe limited to the On Broadway.Trashing of clubs happens every-where . You just can't changeeconomics . There are only 100 pen-nies to the dollar and when youspend 50 of those repairing some-thing that had nothing to do witnthe entertainment or creative p^r-tion of the show, then it just meansthat you have 50e less to spend.Like you guys have been doing thebooking for no money and when agroup comes, whether they're fromTexas or L .A ., and they get $30, andthey start looking around and go"How come? It looked like there were250 in the audience and how comethere was only $200 left for all thebands to divide instead of twicethat much?" Well, most of thosepeople, a lot of them climbed overthe balconey or sneaked in the back.In order for me to stop them fromdoing that I would have to hiresomeone for $20 to be a watchdog forthe whole six hours of the show . Imean, we can stop it but then it be-comes a situation similar to aGraham show, where everybody sits intheir little seats and behaves them-selves . It doesn't have to be thatextreme . The things that we are ask-ing for is just mutual cooperationfrom everybody . When you notice thatyour friend has taker too much boozeor too many drugs and is in badshape or if they are just hyped up,just tell them to cool it . I feel ifyou go and approach somebody thegreater majority of people will re-act positively . There will always bethat one or two that have givenproblems before that aren't reallygoing to be touched regardless whatwe say . But that's to be expected.All we can do is try .