What could have Beethoven, Miles Davis and the Ramones in common? This fire inside that you can’t get rid off. Ivan is the epitome of that.
After his gig with James Chance, we had a lot of drinks and cigarettes, were sad passing by what’s left of the CBGB’s, and went home for some story telling.
Chance is a beautiful thing!
[French adaptation here.]
Who are you?
I’m Ivan Julian.
What’s inside that name?
Lots of joy. Lots of inspiration. Lots of pain. Lots of hurt. Lots of experience.
What does music mean for you?
Expression. At a certain point, like a political change, cultural change, cultural enlightement, political enlightement. Communication between cultures. Beauty. A safe place.
So, you are a hippie?
The hippies, I mean, in their truth form, like any other movement in his truth form, have a lot of things to teach us and changed society and culture. In their truth. Since, it has become I mean like whatever, it’s like the punk rock movement, it has become like a… I don’t know… It has become… this commercial enterprise. But in his truth form, there is nothing wrong, I mean, as Nick Lowe said: “what’s so funny about peace, love and understanding?” What’s so funny about the fact that I can be on the stage with people and none of us speaks the same language and none of us even, like, talk to each other, we can go on the stage, do this thing and make it beautiful? Is that horrible? Is that hippie? No. It’s what we should aspire to.
What do you think life would be like if music didn’t exist?
Intense violence.
Is it a therapy, in a way?
Of course, it’s a therapy! I mean, you take music away from adolescents, kids, myself included –which I’m still, adolescent– you take music away from the mass developing and they will become more and more violent and look to other means to express themselves as in taking a gun and shooting each other in the head. Which is what my nephew experienced, he got shot in the head. You ok? You wanna talk? If you want to challenge me on this, bring it up, I mean. Ok? Yeah!
Gosh! You’re so violent during interviews!
No, I’m just real. I’m just real. I mean, if you ask me questions, don’t expect like… These answers are story answers. I mean, I base my responses on my experience.
What does New York City mean for you?
Oh God! Diversity. Home. Hmmm. The home I’ve never had, you know. Diversity and the home I’ve never had.
Based on the diversity, based on the people that, I mean, so many different types of people altogether. And you can use this to write. You can use this. I mean, you walk down the streets, there’s so many stories within just one block or like, you know, whatever, like twenty meters, there’s twenty stories. And if you’re a writer and you care about letting this into your –forgive the word– creation somehow, this is all there for you. This is all there.
And that’s why I put up with all the hardships in New York. Because I love it. I love it for that much too much.
Is it home for you yet?
Not now. Maybe not always. I mean, there are other places I love as well, I mean, who knows? I’d never thought this would be my home.
So, you’ve never found home?
No. I haven’t found home. I’ll never find home. I mean, I’m a wanderer, I mean. I search but I’ll never find home. But this place, for now, it is home.
I used to watch this show and they would have Johnny Thunders on and Sable or whatever her fucking name was. Sable Page? I don’t remember her name. Anyway! Johnny’s girlfriend. And it was a very dark image of New York and I thought “God! It’s like fucking so hard there!” And then I got this job in order to move out of Washington. And I got this job to like come to New York all the time. I would come here and I would see Johnny Thunders in the freezing cold on Union Square, without a guitar case. I would see him there. And Sable Starr was her name. And then Sable hit up on me, I’m like: “God! This place is like horrible! I’m never moving here! Never ever!”
So, from there, I moved to London, and Europe before I moved here.
But yeah, I mean: home? It has become my home but, I don’t know, as much as any place can be, yes.
Could you explain how it all began for you?
Like what, my need to develop my life in music?
Well it began with me when I was eight years old. I loved to read and I loved music and I was reading books about Beethoven. And Chopin. And I realized that these people had a lot of pain in their lives. Lots of pain, which I felt at the time –justified or not being eight years old, whatever. I mean, a lot of pain but they found something that helped them transcend the pain. That helped them like justifying the pain. And I thought “I wanna find something like this in my life! I don’t know what it is. I wanna be like this, whatever else is happening in my life, I’ll be able to channel this and this will be mine and no one can take it from me.” It was special to me. “And I can give it to other people. I can like take this, bring it in and always have to and need to give it out to other people regardless of how I’m feeling”.
I mean, you saw me play last night. I was feeling like shit. I had a lot of problems, lot of issues but my thing was, when I got on stage, I was on stage. And that’s me.
Yeah, it started the whole thing, the need to be, like, you know, not to leave your job at five o’clock and not to care. I have never wanted a job like that, I don’t want to be the person that goes “Ok, five o’clock, done!”, you know? I want to be the person like “Ok, this is me always. I am this.”
Is there a difference between music and sex for you?
No.
Do you thing that there is a middle ground between leaving your job at five and being your job?
No. No.
Whatever you do, it doesn’t matter, cleaning the streets, an attorney, an accountant, you have to wake up in the morning feeling like “This is what I want to do! I’m waking up today and I’m happy. Even though today, I’m having a shit fucking day and I’ll have to fucking deal with this person and that person, it’s all fucking awesome!” But you have to wake up thinking “This is what I really love to do. I love this!” And I think that’s what everybody has to find. And through, you know, whatever, financial pressures, people get lost around the way and think “I’ve got to do this” and blame me! I’ve done it! I can’t count the fucking awful jobs I got along the way.
I’ll tell you one job I had with Wayne Kramer. You know who that is? You know the MC5? Wayne Kramer is the main guy from the MC5.
Wayne loves construction and at a time I needed money and he had the money and he told me “You want a job?” And so, he got me this job fixing the bricks outside a building. Outside the building! Something like one hundred meters high! We would like come down on this platform thing and we like, fixed these things and that was my job. And I was terrified everyday, I was terrified.
But that was not what I was meant to do, that’s not like my birthplace in life. That was not what I was meant to do. So, I mean, to answer the question, you have to wake up and love what you do.
Can you say that you were one of the founders of punk rock?
No.
Why?
Because punk rock is a media term that was invented in the 70s by basically Macy’s Department Store. I mean, the punk attitude has always been there. The blues people had punk attitude, the jazz people had punk attitude; this thing was like: ”Ok, I’m living my life, I’m doing my things, this is what I do.”
And in the 70s, everyone listened to Charlie Parker, every one was listening to… I mean, you would never know the influences that made punk rock. You know, everyone thinks like it’s the Ramones, like whatever, I mean, and the garage bands and everything, but a lot of things made this music and the attitude.
So, no, I can’t take claim or nor can Richard or… And Richard admits, we drew from what was before us because at that time, there was nothing in front of us. Because the music industry was out of stars: if you didn’t have a certain genre, play a certain genre, like really bad American, you know, pop, like heavy metal and have that little cute hairstyle and a little cute like silk vest…
You had kind of a cute hairstyle in your way!
But I haven’t got that one. And I didn’t have it then either. That’s why it was so magical that like Richard and I and Bob and Mark Bell –or Marky Ramone, whatever– hooked up because no one had seen anything like this in a rock band before. Because it is show business and so no one had seen like “Look at these four guys! What the fuck?” [laughter] The Ramones weren’t even… because they looked more like a generic rock band, everybody with the long hair. But the Voidoïds! Even with Blondie, no one had seen that before. There were things we challenged people with.
Can you tell us your start into punk rock?
As I told you before, I was living in Washington were my family settled. I wanted to play music. I couldn’t play original music, there was no place to play… There was no place to, like, write songs and I was dying to be a writer. I was dying. I had to write. I didn’t want to go and play other people’s songs on stage.
I loved the Beatles and I loved the Stones so I saved every dime I had and I’d slept in people’s houses. I’d slept in some really filthy places, you know? And I didn’t care. And meanwhile, I was working for a law firm everyday. I worked and I worked and I worked and I saved my money and one day I thought: “You can do this now!”: “A one way ticket to London. I’m not coming back.” And I thought about it, and I thought: “You may never see your family again”…
So, I went there, knew no one. And it was really weird, I had luck because when I get out of the plane, I was looking for a place to stay and I went to this woman and I was like: “do you know a place to stay?” and said like: “Ok. There is a Youth Hostel, you can stay there.” And a lot of people were doing this like, you know, that’s what you did. So, I mean, I stayed there and then my job, my actual job was to go out every night and go to clubs. This was my job! I’ve had money saved to go do this. Every night, I went to all these famous pubs I heard about, like the Marquee, I would go there and see what’s happening, see if anybody needed… see if I can find a band.
You were playing guitar already?
Oh yeah. Oh yeah. Yeah, I forgot to tell you like, in these years, when every one else was like having sex on Friday night and finding lots of women and all that, I didn’t care, I was inside playing guitar. Learning and learning and learning and learning. That’s what I was doing.
I’m in London and I keep going out. And that wasn’t a success, actually. I was getting very depressed, thinking: “I can’t go back, what do I do?” This was awful. It was like a month and a half, and nothing happened. And then one night I went to this place called the Town and Country. It is like a pub, was a pub that Robert Plant from Led Zeppelin used to sing at, before Led Zeppelin.
And I’m at the bar and these were these two girls saying: “what are you doing here? » « You know, I’m looking for a band.” And they say: “I know a place where you can find a band. We’ll take you home.” And they took me home, say “In the morning, we’ll come pick you up.” That was really like the most beautiful… I wish I knew these women’s name because they fucking changed my life! You know?
They took me to this place called Many’s rehearsal studios on the Old King’s Road. That’s were a lot of bands came through and everything and everybody played. They introduced me to this guy Mick who ran Many’s and Mick said “ok, you sit here for a while, someone will come and find you.”
So, I sat there for like a week, I’d buy them scones, I’d buy, you know, coffee because I fell bad for just being there, you know?
I wish I’d find these two women names ‘cause… oh my God! They’ve changed history! They don’t know it! I mean, I said “thank you” when they left me but… They were so fucking great, you know? No sex, no nothing, it was like: “ok, what is gonna help you?” It was really great! So anyway… I mean, I would have had sex with them, well, I think, but that’s not what they wanted, you know?
So, anyway, I’m there for a while and somehow this band come through and it’s the Foundations. You know the Foundations? Build me up buttercup? [he sings:] « Why do you build me up? » And Baby, you know, they have these amazing top ten hits. And they came in there looking for a guitar player. And I went into the room and it went like “You play?” And I was like: “You know, kinda.” And they said: “Ok! You’re hired. You have tonight to learn all the songs!”
And meanwhile, from the Youth Hostel were I was staying… I hated that place because I thought that there were lots of thieves there, so I moved in South London. I rented something, the floor was dirt and it felt like land. And I caught diseases there and I’m there with my little like hot pad and I’m sitting there and I learned the songs all night long and I went back and I played them and I got hired and that got me out of, you know, that.
So, I’m playing with the Foundations, I’m playing, I’m playing, I’m playing, I’m playing there, I’m playing in Europe and then at some point, I go: “I gotta quit ‘cause you guys are not writing, you’re not writing anything. » They really taught me everything I know. I mean in the Blank generation album, these chord patterns come from the Foundations. Isn’t that weird? They taught me a lot and I admire and respect them too.
How old were you at that time?
19.
It’s sweet!
It’s not sweet. It was painful. I needed to make music or I was gonna die. Don’t you understand? It wasn’t like I had an alternative. I had no alternative. And I still come across that in my life today if I need to do something and that doesn’t happen. Especially creatively. Other things I’ve learned in my age I can control like “don’t be stupid!” Certain things, they’re up to you, it is your decision and you gotta make it happen. It’s up to you so you somehow gotta make it happen.
And we were in Croatia to do a set and in Croatia, I decided like “No, I’m not doing this, you’re not writing.” And I kept hearing these voices in my head saying “New York! New York!” And this is when the whole punk rock was trying to happen in New York. Everyone was playing there. That’s when I went to New York. There is this story. Well I’m on a plane coming to New York. At the same time, Richard Hell is there with a band called the Heartbreakers.
So, then it all began in New York, not in London with McLaren?
Malcom McLaren comes from London to New York because he had heard that there was this thing happening and he wants to find out. He had heard about Richard Hell. He went there and saw Richard play with the Heartbreakers and he said “ok, I’m gonna like take this all style, like ripped t-shirts and safety pins, everything, back to London and I’m gonna make a band and make them this!” Because Malcolm was basically a fashion stylist. So he took it back there and he found all these people to like make this band, some of them musicians, some of them not –Johnny Rotten was not a musician. But they were great, I mean, the album they made was great, don’t get me wrong. And in every of his fucking books, Malcolm admits it, of course he does: “This is what I did, as, you know, a designer…”
Were CBGB’s and punk rock big at that time in New York? Did you know that something was happening?
You know, when I joined the Voidoids, before we ever played CBGB’s and even before we’ve ever played our first gig, I looked at the place and said “this is like the jazz era. This is like something really special happening. This is like a special moment.” I realized that. I mean, this is a special moment happening in music history. “And I don’t know why you’ve been called from all the way.” I mean, you know, I was in Croatia. “Why have I been called from all the way across to come here and do this with these people?” But, I mean, this is something really special going on. I just knew it. I just knew it. And I would say even before… And after that, of course, the lines happened there. I mean, the place only held 350 people, 400 and there were lines all the way down the block with police barriers, barricades, stuff like that. I don’t always think that I am right. But that time I was. We had more to do but at that time, I thought “yeah!”
Yeah, this period was very strange, I mean, at least for me, ‘cause honestly, I had just arrived in the city, I had nothing… But I was wise ‘cause, I mean, as Richard points out in his book, I was the only one who had toured, you know, with a band, when I joined this band. The rest of them had like never toured any place, maybe once or twice — Richard had once or twice and made a mess of it. But I was the only one who was a professional musician. I said “ok, we go, we play, we preach.” We were like the ministers, we preached the thing.
So Television, the Heartbreakers and then the Voidoids really began the CBGB’s?
Yeah but that’s what people really get all so wrong and that’s why Europeans have to really understand something and really enlighten people. It wasn’t just… You think about Television and the Voidoids and Blondie, and who else?
The New York Dolls, the Ramones, the Talking Heads…
Yeah. These are complete different genres of bands, you see? This is like everybody’s playing something amazingly fucking different. Amazingly different. Everybody is.
But the attitude was the same?
Well, the attitude was like “we have no other place to go” and like I said “something special is being done here. We deserve a place where we can do it. No one else wants us. We have no place else to go.” You know, like I said, usually for bands, you had a thing, you had to look a certain way, you had to be pretty and all this, the whole band has to be pretty and the record company dictates what kind of songs you write and play and it had to be about this and that. And that company was always wrong, of course, and we took a chance into going “I’m not gonna try and do that”, you know, “I’m not gonna try to suck your dick” you know “I’m gonna find my own dick!” you know “and I’ll like it!” [laughter]
Was it really sex and drugs and rock n’roll?
Pose pose pose pose pose. Yes. Yes. Yes.
You know, everyone thinks it was rock n’roll, drugs and sex. In this order, rock n’roll first. But in this era it was sex drugs and rock n’roll. It was a heavily drugs-influenced period. Everybody was doing it.
What turns you on in music?
Sex.
What turns you off in music?
Mundane mediocrity. And people who don’t take chances. People, you know, who stay the same.
Do you have a guilty pleasure?
I have two guilty pleasures. Neil Diamond, and also Mac Arthur Park, which is a song written by… what was is fucking name? Hmmm Johnny Rivers? No! Fuck it! This song captivates me because there’s… It’s one of the worse song ever in the history of men. It’s like shocking bad shit but I admire that. How can you write something so bad and have it be so great? Red red wine is that kind of song. The Bee Gees.
The Bee Gees went to this period when they were writing ballads. And before the disco. And in the sixties. All of these songs are magnificently great. I can’t see nobody. Oh! My God! It’s fucking great! It’s fucking great! I mean, I wanna someday make a song like this!
Tell me an anecdote.
Actually, my favourite anecdote is this. It’s in a book, so it’s not original. So, can I do that?
Yeah, sure.
Or maybe it’s not appropriate but I’m gonna say it anyway. You have to understand how much we as punk rockers drew from the jazz era here. Because there were people like fighting, you know, for the whole thing as well, fighting for their own musical identity, their own venues to play and all that. So, Miles Davis and Charlie Parker are heading downtown to the Village from home. They’re both at the back seat of this cab — at this time there were these big cabs with lots of room, kinda English cabs in a way with like lots of room in the back. So, they run in the back and Charlie Parker’s eating chicken, you know. That’s what he was doing. But Charlie Parker was also getting a blowjob. — Who doesn’t want a blowjob? What the fuck, I mean who doesn’t want oral sex? — Anyway. He’s doing that. Riding downtown. And Miles Davis is at the back of the cab with them ‘cause Miles Davis is playing in his band. And Charlie Parker is there eating chicken and the girl goin’ “blup blup blup blup blup”, you know, like this. And Charles looks over at Miles and goes “You hate this, I mean, does it offend you?” And Miles is like “Yes, I don’t wanna see this shit, we’re heading downtown” and Charles goes “Then, don’t look, motherfucker!” [laughter]
Illustrations: Thierry Bouüaert based on pics by Clotilde Delcommune.