RIP Alan Vega

I'm not sure where to start in writing about Alan Vega. As a musician, he's an enigma. He toiled in obscurity since the 70s, but he was easily one of the most influential musicians in punk, post-punk and experimental music of all the time. His music was confrontational, bleak, wildly experimental and unforgiving. It's, frankly, difficult to listen to. But, without Alan Vega, there would be no John Zorn, no Sonic Youth, no Beck, no Pere Ubu and no countless other experimental and uncompromising forms of music seen today.

Having just recently finished ClaytonHeylin's "From the Velvets to the Voidoids", Vega's music and influence is still forefront in my mind right now. Even in the wilds of early New York's punk and experimental scene, which featured bands like Television, The Voidoids, Sonic Youth and DNA, Vega was considered an outsider, an artist that few paid attention to. But those who did drew much influence from his work.

Vega, born Alan Bermowitz in 1948, was best known for his work with Suicide, a noise/synthpunk duo he formed with Martin Rev. After seeing the Stooges in 1969, Vega was inspired to make music, forming his first band with Rev and performing publicly as Suicide for the first time in 1970. Vega was one of the first adopters of the term “punk music”, which he borrowed from the influential underground writer Lester Bangs.

Suicide played a ramshackle style of electronic music, with Rev's keyboards cobbled together from old organs and primitive drum machines, and Vega adding an inhuman growl and shriek to their performances. I've often heard it said, and I often say it myself: no one could scream like Alan Vega. Vega would often emulate Iggy Pop, brandishing a motorcycle chain on stage, wildly swinging it around, antagonizing audiences and sometimes wading into the audience with the chain. Like The Stooges, Suicide were often booed as soon as they hit the stage, and more than one concert degenerated into a full blown riot.

Suicide's first album, a self-titled effort, came out in 1977, to virtually no critical acclaim, but the album has remained a touchstone for punk bands, industrial musicians, art rockers, noise bands and hardcore bands alike. Today, it's considered one of the most important punk albums of all time. Their ten minute opus, “Frankie Teardrop”, a disturbing song about a factory worker pushed to the edge, is a seminal punk and post-punk track.

Suicide's discography is wildly sparse. Since forming in 1970, they have just five albums to their credit, the last, American Supreme, coming out in 2002.

Vega's solo and collaborative work is much more substantial. His first solo album, a self-titled album in 1980, had a lo-fi rockabilly feel to it. 1983's Saturn Strip saw him working with The Cars' Ric Ocasek and Ministry's Al Jorgensen. In 1985, he put out a failed stab at a more commercial accessible album called Just a Million Dreams, which led to him being dropped by his label. He followed that up in 1990 with a minimalist electronic album called Deuce Avenue, which he recorded with his new wife Liz Lemere. His collaborations with Finnish minimalist noise/electronic band Pan sonic as VVV are remarkable in their sparseness and disorienting screams. Together they released two albums, Endless in 1988, and Resurrection River in 2004.

In 2008, Blast First Records released a series of 10” records in tribute of Vega's 70^th birthday, tributes recorded by artists like Lydia Lunch, Primal Scream, Julian Cope and Bruce Springsteen.

Vega died in his sleep on July 16^th at the age of 78. His death was announced by Henry Rollins, who considered Vega a huge influence on his own work, and his Rollins Band covered Suicide's “Ghost Rider” for the soundtrack to the movie The Crow in 1994.