The Flaneur explores the vicinity of Kezar stadium, uppermost Haight street, and the gateway to Golden Gate park.
I've come to see my old favorite John Doe, singer, guitarist, song-writer and founder of the greatest West Coast Punk band- X. John is also an actor I've seen in a couple of
films noir sur la route. He performed a country flavored set with a steel pedal guitar and a gal who sang a little like his ex-wife Exene. Really a sweet guy he hugged everyone who came up afterward to say howdy.
I brought my collection of 45 RPM records by X to get them signed.
They were signed by singer Exene Cervenka and drummer D.J. Bonebrake
at Lookout records in Berkeley over twenty years ago
Right after Green Day broke big.
I'm a quite reformed autograph hound but these were unfinished biz.
I got "Adult Books" at the Harvard Coop in Cambridge in 1978--
I might have paid for it, but like the b-side said,
original punks like me,
"We're desperate, get used to it"
The first Hippies evolved here
A strange dream-like lagoon
welcomes you to the Park from the Haight
The water looks energy drink blue
Youth enjoying the open spaces and the grand trees
Golden Gate park belongs to all
These days I stay off the beaten path...
To climb a well-worn stairway of yore
Kezar stadium itself
Footraces were taking place, Rome won
The fog slid in floating Twin Peaks tower
Legendary stadium archway still standing tall
The pavilion here is tied to another great memory I have of the original Punk era --
a 1979 show by the Clash. Openers included the Dead Kennedys whose Jello Biafra jumped into the crowd and returned wearing only his belt and the loops to a shred of his pants. He continued on with his knob bob-bob-bobbing along. Then the Cramps did a truly decadent set, with that original guitarist with the white forelock spitting his lit cigarettes into the mob. Lux the excitable zombie climbed on the structure of the stage bouncing it so much it would soon have collapsed.
The Clash had to work hard to follow them but they were always up to the job.
Art grass.
Barley growing within a fence woven from branches
A feature of a groovy little green next to Kezar
A bench made from a redwood burl
that Dali might have dug
Farewell for now to my charming discovery
Time to climb the rest of the way to the Judah street
to ride the rail all the way home
1 June 2014
