- Erich - half a scavenger
Mike Froidl
Erich (right) 1985
Erich, 60, punk from Munich, states that where he grew up, a rivet belt often sufficed for an arrest: "There was a different wind from the state side than anywhere else." In other cities, it was much easier to be a punk. " The citizens had always behaved nicely on the street side.
Erich first came into contact with punk in the mid-seventies in Paris. "The Clash" or the "Sex Pistols" were too soft for him, he discovered hardcore bands like "Discharge" or "Black Flag". At the beginning of the eighties he founded the Anarchist Pogo Party of Germany (APPD) - rather "a kind of real satire", nevertheless: "She is still the only party that is relevant to me - stupid and happy."
Erich is and remains punk: listening to anyone or meeting any expectations? No way. "No one has anything to tell me, I notice myself if I'm doing something wrong, or realize in retrospect that something was wrong." After being a lighting contractor for the film and managing director of the beer company "Pogorausch", he has been working exclusively as a dog trainer for seven years. He trains young animals until the companion dog exam. Erich has seven dogs and also looks after problem dogs from animal welfare.
Tim Hackemack
Erich today
The job is in his blood, "meaningful employment without superiors and set rules". The 60-year-old also takes care of the socialization of behavior-prone dogs. "The worse they are, the more I go to work," he says. "I'm half a scavenger myself."
- Myriam - not a girl-girl
Private
Myriam (middle) at that time
She was not allowed to play football or American football. Cheerleader would have been fine. But she did not want to. "I was not such a girl-girl," says Myriam, 49. "Punk rock was something I could be what I wanted, loud music and against Nazis - that was mine."
At that time, there were almost 100 punks in Hildesheim, Myriam seldom had a drink. The police have unknowingly often dumped the seltzer. "I've always been more fond of doing something productive than shooting myself," she says. One day after leaving school, Myriam moved to Berlin in 1986, studied political science and traveled with brigades to Nicaragua, where she rebuilt destroyed kindergartens.
Today she is a concert booker and has been working hard in Berlin's SO36 club since the early 1990s. She was always particularly interested in a broad spectrum: "From Miriam Makeba to Marianne Rosenberg to Turkish bands, punk rock, ska, hip-hop and hardcore, everything is welcome." In 2001 she got twins, was a single mother, booker and student. After graduating in education and the enrollment of her children, she still trained as a life science teacher.
Tim Hackemack
Myriam (today)
Since then, she has been regularly speaking with elementary school students about topics such as self-determination, skeptical thinking, diversity, conflict resolution, friendship, gender roles, racism, solidarity or moral courage - "my version of punk rock as a subject so to speak".
- Akoe - a punk in the opera
Private
Akoe (then)
"I was just a stupid village punk," says Akoe, 48, about his youth in Augsburg. A concert by the hardcore band BGK in the early Eighties changed everything: "Holy Shit, they were so fast and hard, that was my thing." Akoe was fascinated and from now on with "do-it-yourself punk bands" on tour. "I was socialized in occupied houses, so to speak.
But the "super-left sectarianism" went "in the bag". In an occupied house barbed wire was stretched at head height, so that one could not pee while standing: "They wanted to get out of the company and managed to create an excessive set of rules, under which one could suffocate as well."
Today, Akoe is not all that important anymore: "When you reach a certain age, you no longer define yourself as belonging to a scene or a milieu." All this dogmatism was mostly found in the people who still live with Mummy lived and wanted to create their own identity by demarcation. "
Tim Hackemack
Akoe (today)
Meanwhile, Akoe works at the Stuttgart Opera as an orchestra leader. Not so long ago, he and his friends unrolled a huge self-produced rainbow banner with the word "diversity" over half the opera house facade, a demo against sexual diversity in the education plan. It never stops, says Akoe: "The Spirit goes on - even when you get old."
- Today a punk - the stories of a dozen other punks can be found in the photo gallery. The photographer Tim Hackemack met and portrayed her. Here he tells how it came about:
One day: Mr. Hackemack, for "Yesterday's Kids" you drove 15,000 kilometers through the country to meet punks of the first hour - who are all over 40 today, many much older. Did it still need a book about punk?
Hackemack: Need? No. Actually, the shops are actually flooded with books by people telling their old stories. That's why I do not want to attack anyone, but often that's just weak, and everything repeats itself. Campino travels to London for an Arte documentary ("London's Burning") and meets with all the other old musicians who say that everything was much better then. I do not need that. It always the same people to speak. They celebrate for something that they were only there for so long until the trend wave rolled on. When I read the book "Verschwende Deine Jugend" I could have puked on some pages. Many of the protagonists are in the purest self-congratulation. Everyone was the first in everything. I'm certainly too critical, but in my opinion punk always wanted to tear down walls - and here are currently built too many monuments.
photo gallery
23 pictures
Punk book: Today a punkone day: What did you do differently?
Hackemack: Not so much, after all . It was important to me that only people were portrayed who were punks back then and still are today. In the photos and interviews, I wanted to talk more about today than about yesterday. 77 well-known and unknown people from all corners of Germany so I have their personal stories told. This gives you a very good overview of the history of German punk. Whether I have succeeded, others have to decide.
one day: Why only the people who are still punks today?
Hackemack: That's another challenge. At 16, you live with mom and dad, who pay all your bills. It's easy to be punk, to fuck the world. But add two more kids, a job and a social life - responsibility. You have to invest something to hold onto this ideal thing.
one day: You deliberately renounced old footage of the protagonists. How so?
Hackemack: Today Punk is so past- fixed , with a lot of nostalgia. I want to show that it continues, that it is not a youth culture, but a counterculture that has evolved over the years. Anyone who dyes his hair is not part of a subculture. Today, every supermarket seller runs around with an Iro, every footballer is tattooed. The unique selling point, the dangerous, has disappeared. That bothers many. In the seventies and eighties, punks were being chased through the streets. Today people say, "Oh, look, that little punk - sweetie!"
one day: Is not Punk dead?
Hackemack: What people used to think of as punk may be dead. Then we are just experiencing the 22nd reincarnation. Punk has changed. Today there are huge festivals, everything has become more professional. There are many tolerated autonomous and alternative youth centers that receive money from the state. And then there are bands who protest against the state. In the Ruhr area, countless clubs make concerts, in Berlin you can definitely go to a concert every day. This year in Münster we organized one for two punk bands from South Korea. Punk is still alive everywhere and continues to evolve - in all countries.
DISPLAY
Tim Hackemack:
Yesterday's Kids
Hirnkost KG; 500 pages; 36,00 Euro.
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one day: Are you a punk today?
Hackemack: Punk is a matter of attitude. If you ask me: yes. I follow my ideas, go my own way without constantly adapting. For me it is important to create a counterculture and to work on it. Of course, as a father, husband, and professional, you can not ask yourself every decision: is that Punk? Punk does not force you in somewhere. Punk frees you.