We Are the Ones: Early San Francisco Punk and New Wave
From the mid-1970s to the early 1980s, the Bay Area was one of the first regions to embrace punk and new wave when the music had yet to catch on throughout the country. Acts like the Avengers, Crime, the Mutants, and the Dead Kennedys made some of the earliest and most exciting independent and records in the style, with local venues like the Mabuhay Gardens and radio stations like KUSF championing the underground movement.
This course covers the birth and maturation of the region's punk and new wave through film and audio clips, as well as guest speakers who were crucial to its growth in the Bay Area.
Guest speakers include:
- Jan. 23: Henry Rosenthal, drummer in Crime, San Francisco's first punk group; also a filmmaker
- Jan. 30: Penelope Houston, singer and songwriter in one of San Francisco's first punk groups, the still-active Avengers
- Feb. 6: Jackie Sharp, who helped run Target Video, who filmed many early San Francisco punk and new wave acts for video release
- Feb. 13: Jeff Bale, co-founder of the Bay Area-based and long-lived punk rock magazine, Maximum Rock'n'Roll
- Feb. 20: Denise Sullivan, who worked at 415 Records, the leading San Francisco new wave label of the early 1980s
- Feb 27: Alejandro "Alec" Palao, is a British musician, music historian, writer, and reissue producer. In addition to his musical output with groups like the Sting-rays, the Sneetches, and Mushroom, his works include hundreds of production credits and liner notes on important compilations of vintage rock and soul from Ace Records, Rhino Records, and others, plus a wide array of music-related print and film credits.
Faculty Bio
Richie Unterberger is the author of numerous rock music history books. His latest book is San Francisco: Portrait of a City. He’s taught rock history courses at OLLI Berkeley since 2019.
This is a Livestreamed + Recorded Course
- Classes will stream live on the scheduled day and time
- Classes will also be video recorded
- Classes will not meet in person as originally scheduled
- You must be a current OLLI @Berkeley member to register. Learn about membership, including our fee assistance program.
Schedule Highlights
- Course starts on Thursday, Jan. 23, and ends on Thursday, Feb. 27
- Classes meet for 6 weeks, 2 hours per session (10–noon)
- All course materials, including videos, will remain available to view and enjoy through Mar. 31
Member Praise for Richie Unterberger
Everything worked! His class is academic in nature and he has a very deep understanding of the subject matter, and imparts his knowledge so professionally!
Yay, Richie! Mr. Unterberger has an impressive encyclopedic knowledge of rock music and blues. Add to that a skill at assembling historical notes and ferreting out film clips (sometimes obscure) to create a comprehensive, entertaining, and empathetic narrative of his subject.