Eric Davidson - We Never Learn: The Gunk Punk Undergut, 1988-2001

F OR THOSE WHO know Long Gone John or are fans of his Sympathy for the Record Industry enterprise, the news that he was moving from L.A. to a cabin in the woods outside Olympia, Washington, was like hearing that Castro would be heading off to Dallas to manage a Starbucks. But then Long Gone, not unlike the Cuban leader, could probably use a rest after all these years ... especially after having to move his countless collectibles like Iggy Pops tiger jacket from the back of Raw Power, Ed Woods original hand-notated script for Plan 9 from Outer Space, the Mummies tour hearse, Sid Viciouss gold record for Never Mind the Bollocks, a huge fireplace mantelpiece carved from one piece of wood, and more than a hundred thousand records...

LONG GONE JOHN: Im looking at a minimum of thirty thousand dollars to move. Its been estimated at seventy thousand pounds and two semis with an overflow. The [estimator] said he has never seen anything like this in ten years of work.

ERIC DAVIDSON: Rumor has it youre thinking of selling off a lot of your stuff.

LG: No. Well, I said facetiously that when I move Ill sell all my extra copies of everything. With records, I used to buy two of everything when they came out, with this ludicrous mentality that one day I would use them as tradeand of course I never did that. I just kept buying and buying. Things like all the original hand-silk-screened Residents singles, all the Misfits singles, I used to buy them every time Id see them. Everything is mint cause I was always so anal.

ED:Is there anything youd sell if you absolutely had to?

LG: Well, I have a lot of things I would never part with: a Manson family jacketI used to live with Squeaky, Brenda, and a few of the other girls; the Plan 9 script; the complete works of Edward Gorey; Sid Viciouss gold record; an original papier-mch sculpture by Dr. Seuss, and I just bought this raccoon coat in auction a few weeks ago in Cape Cod. Fortunately, Ive never been in that position to have to sell things. I feel very badly for people whove had to sell their stuff because of hard times. Its nice to know that if something came up, I suppose I can do that. I have paintings that I paid forty thousand dollars for that are worth five hundred thousand dollars that I could sell tomorrow. But then you dont have the painting anymore.

ED: How did you get into the toy business with Necessaries Toy Foundation?

LG: Its the same path as records. The toy figures are something Ive always been into, and I went from being a fanatical over-the-top collector to one day saying, Fuck, I wanna do this myself As far as the record label, right now I have no releases planned. Ive been hit so horribly with returns, people going out of business. I do have a compilation Ive got to get finished someday. I just went through my catalog pulling out all the totally weird shit: Savage Pencil, Satin Chickens, Smegma, all that. The records called The Lounger the Drool, the Stranger the Brew, My Dear. Maybe Ill only do it as a fuckin LP, cause no ones going to really want it anyway.

Union Carbide Productions looking for kicks, Radium Club, Gothenburg, Sweden, 1987. (Photo by Carl Abrahamsson)

Y EAH, YOU KNOW the score with these list things. Impossible, presumptuous, maddening in generalbut whatever. They make for ace icebreakers. I left off best-ofs, live albums, reissues, and compilations. Kept it alphabetical for obvious reasons (though Teenage Love Bomb is the best single)... So dig and dispute at will!