Jim Ruland - Corporate Rock Sucks: The Rise and Fall of SST Records

The end of the 70s

Greg Ginn was frustrated.

The Hermosa Beach guitarist had spent the better part of two years pouring his heart and soul into his banda noisy quartet called Panic!and had nothing to show for it. Panic! was faster than the Stooges and heavier than Black Sabbath. The band had its own gear, rehearsed in its own practice space, and wrote its own material, which was part of the problem because venues wouldnt book new bands that played original music. From the clubs in Hollywood to the bars along Pacific Coast Highway, bookers were looking for musicians who could play Top 40 hits. I thought of music as kind of a scam, Ginn said.

Ginn didnt get into music until he checked out the action at the Lighthousea nightclub down the street from his parents house that happened to be the most important venue for jazz music on the West Coast. Ginn played guitar during breaks from his studies at UCLA, but after seeing the Ramones play at the Roxy Theatre in the summer of 76, all he wanted to do was make his own noise.

Ginn found his singer, Keith Morris, at the local record store. Morris knew a rock and roll drummer named Bryan Migdol, the younger brother of a close friend whod died in a car accident. They started jamming in Ginns garage. Things began to click when Gary McDaniel of Wrm took over on bass. McDaniel, who would change his name to Chuck Dukowski, let them use his bands practice space in an abandoned bathhouse on the Strand dubbed the Wrmhole.

The Hermosa Beach police decided this was too much excitement and kicked everyone out. Ginn rented a space in a strip mall on Aviation Boulevard, not far from one of the bait and tackle shops Morriss father owned and operated. The band went back to work, conducting marathon practice sessions that lasted late into the night and occasionally attracted crowds of friends. When the calendar flipped from 1977 to 1978, Panic! still hadnt played a single show, which was becoming a source of frustration.

Panic! participated in the burgeoning punk scene that had taken root in Hollywood and was spreading to every corner of Southern California. Morris even made the drive up to San Francisco to see Johnny Rotten detonate the Sex Pistols at Winterland. Despite the bands engagement in the scene, Panic! was spurned by Hollywood punks. They considered us to be nothing more than beach rats, Morris said. If they were competing in the Sid Vicious lookalike contest, we were competing in the Peter Frampton lookalike contest. That didnt sit well with a lot of those people.

The bands appearance defied fashion-conscious Hollywood insiders and helped define its own aesthetic. The members of Panic! didnt dress up to go to punk rock shows or to play gigs. They wore the same clothes on stage Ginn believed the best way to get people to take his band seriously was to put out a record. Panic! couldnt get a gig because it didnt have a record, but how do you get a record deal when youve never played a show?

Glen Spot Lockett, a recent transplant to Hermosa Beach who worked at the Garden of Eden vegetarian restaurant where Ginn frequently ate lunch, offered a solution. I was writing for the Easy Reader and doing music reviews, Spot said, and one day he was eating there and he kind of called me out on one of the reviews I wrote. So we got into a discussion, talking about this stuff.

Ginn and Spot learned they had a great deal in common. They were passionate guitar players, and both of their fathers were military aviators whod flown combat missions overseas during World War II. Ginns father, Regis, served as a navigator with the US Eighth Army Air Corps in England. Spots father was a member of the famed Tuskegee Airmen: the first Black aviators of the US Army Air Corps.

Spot suggested that Ginn record at Media Art, an art complex with a darkroom where Spot developed his photos and a recording studio where he recently started working as a sound engineer. Best of all, it was right down the street. Ginn said he would look into it. Spot didnt know how serious Ginn was, but he would soon find out.

Panic! assembled at the studio late one night (when the rates were cheapest) and recorded eight songsall originals. Because the songs were so short, it wasnt nearly enough material for an album, but more than enough for an EP. The record was engineered by Dave Tarling with assistance from Spot. It was the first of many projects Spot would have a hand in making with Ginn. Panic! sent a tape of the recording to Bomp! Records and received a favorable response: Greg Shaw was interested in signing the band and offered to put out the EP.

Things were finally moving forward, but the band was in a near-constant

Ginn promised to send photographs to help promote the record, which he did the following month. Ginns correspondence with Shaw was typed on stationery for SST Electronics, his mail-order company, and signed Gregory Ginn.