Nate Jackson Takes Orange County Punk History Personally
- Joel Beers
- Jun 4
- 9 min read
Updated: Jun 7
Native son Nate Jackson co-writes first book documenting the history of Orange County's punk rock scene.
Nate Jackson didn’t exactly get the red-carpet treatment from the Orange County punk scene. It was the late 1990s, and the Yorba Linda seventh grader had recently discovered punk and was attending one of his first shows at the all-ages venue Chain Reaction in Anaheim. Suddenly, he heard someone drop a loud N-bomb and turned to see two dudes with shaved heads making a beeline for him.
Jackson sidestepped the first and bopped him on the nose, and then a few others in the crowd came to his assistance, and the aggressors were summarily beat down.
The possibility of enduring racially motivated violence at a concert could have soured any person’s nascent interest in punk music; instead, some 25 years later, Jackson has co-written the first book exclusively devoted to the history of Orange County punk rock: “Tearing Down the Orange Curtain: How Orange County Brought Punk to the World.” The book was published May 20 by Da Capo Press.
Jackson and co-author Daniel Kohn, a fellow music journalist, conducted around 100 interviews with musicians ranging from foundational figures in O.C. punk’s raw, chaotic infancy in the late 1970s and early 1980s to members of the bands that broke big – like Social Distortion, The Offspring and No Doubt – in the 1990s.
Supplemented by interviews with club owners, promoters and others tied to the scene, the result is the first full-length book to collectively document how a musical genre born from youthful discontent and working-class alienation in England, and urban decay in America, took root in sun-kissed suburbia and how it evolved – fitfully, at times – from keggers in Huntington Beach backyards and garages in Fullerton into arguably Orange County’s biggest cultural export.
Kohn and Jackson are seasoned music journalists who first met in 2012, shortly after Jackson was named music editor of OC Weekly, a publication with a long track record of telling stories about bands that were new and breaking on the local scene, as well as stories that examined the legacy and significance of those who created that scene.
They bring their reportorial and storytelling skills to a book that is historical in terms of time (1978 to the late 1990s) but isn’t a straightforward chronological history, nor an academic or interpretative one. Instead of theories or labored attempts to connect O.C. punk history with larger social, cultural or political forces, the authors largely tell the story through the perspectives of those who created, shaped and nurtured the music. Each chapter is a story, or several short stories, based on those perspectives that ultimately tell a larger story with a narrative context woven by the authors.
Two Waves, One Surge
That context might surprise those who think of O.C. punk as having two distinct waves. The first, which began building energy around 1978 and crashed into the county by 1981, being raw and aggressive, with slam dancing and hardcore punk, if not solely birthed there, finding an accommodating home – and then torching the lawn, spray-painting the walls and smashing the windows. By 1986, that wave had dissipated, but a second broke in the early 1990s with a new generation melding the vibe and energy of punk with other genres, grafting catchy hooks and melodic choruses to it and giving it a more polished, professional sound.
There were certainly differences between the two periods. But Jackson and Kohn are more interested in what connects them, and what they establish is a clear musical lineage of innovation and experimentation, a community that came together and gave back as much as it tore down, and a shared DYI ethos that helped punk gouge its way into the county as well as helping give later bands the resolve to withstand years of frustration and numerous setbacks before hitting it big.
As Kevin Wasserman, aka Noodles, the guitarist from the Offspring, said in a panel at the book release and signing last month at the Fullerton Museum Center, which is currently showing an exhibition devoted to O.C. punk history:
“Without TSOL and the Adolescents, there would be no Offspring.”
PHOTO 1: Steve Soto (left center), a founding member of the Adolescents, and member of Agent Orange, Joyride, Manic Hispanic and many other bands, was part of the connective tissue that bound O.C. punk from its earliest day to his death in 2018. PHOTO 2: Jack Grisham, frontman of TSOL, a band from Long Beach but no stranger to O.C. clubs, embodied the chaotic frenzy and defiant anti-establishment aggression of O.C. punk's early years. He and TSOL still perform in front of sold-out crowds throughout Southern California. Photos courtesy of Da Capo Press/Ed Colver
Giving OC Punk its Due
The fact no definitive history of O.C. punk had been written some 45 years after punk blitzed its way into the county, and some 30 years after O.C. bands helped launch it into the mainstream, doesn’t surprise one of the foremost chroniclers of Orange County’s alternative history.
“It’s such an obvious subject that I think someone would have done something by now,” said Gustavo Arellano, who was Jackson’s editor at OC Weekly and is currently a columnist for the Los Angeles Times. “But then again, this is Orange County and Orange County demands that its history be rosy and beautiful, and mainstream historians couldn’t care less about punk. But Nate is younger (39) and didn’t grow up in the scene or cover it in real-time, and I do believe that to do history you sometimes need to be detached to have the perspective to tell it.”
It wasn’t just the lack of O.C.-centric punk histories that motivated Jackson and Kohn to write the book; they felt that even when mentioned it didn’t receive proper credit.
“There have been tons of books written about New York, London and Los Angeles’ punk scenes,” Jackson said, “but when Orange County is mentioned, usually in books about Los Angeles, it’s generally not favorable. It’s more like what ruined the punk scene was those Orange County kids. But we thought there was a lot more nuance to it and things that had gotten skipped over, like the genius behind some of those early bands that allowed them to bring the music out in their own voice.”
“Orange County punk should be considered just as historically important as punk in New York and the U.K., and grunge in Seattle. Because it shouldn’t have happened here, but it did,” Kohn said. “I would say those earlier groups had a bigger hill to climb just because of the climate of the area during that time and the backlash to anything remotely close to punk. They were the first and in order to survive they had to believe in themselves and the music. They were true to themselves and authentic and that showed in the music. But so did those bands that came a little later. They had the talent and determination and the same grit and grinding, never give up attitude.”
PHOTO 1: Social Distortion, who formed in Fullerton in 1978, backstage at the famous (and infamous) Cuckoo's Next in Costa Mesa. PHOTO 2: Social Distortion performing at the Cuckoo's Nest, circa 1981. Photos courtesy of Da Capo Press/Ed Colver. PHOTO 3: Social Distortion frontman Mike Ness performing at the No Values concert in Pomona in 2024, an O.C. punk rock family reunion of sorts. Ness wrote the forward for "Tearing Down the Orange Curtain," and is featured in the epilogue. Photo courtesy of Dick Slaughter
The authors largely champion that determination, as well as the musicianship and the venues, promoters, record labels and others that helped it develop. But this is a history of punk rock and the jagged edges of that history aren’t softened. The first chapter begins in 1981 at the Cuckoo’s Nest, the Costa Mesa club that served as the county’s first incubator of punk and the venue that did most to help foster a sense of community – as well as provide a forum for mayhem and violence. Stories of suicides, drug overdoses and addictions, and bands crumbling due to infighting populate the book, but so do stories of perseverance and resilience, of hard work rewarded and demons, if not conquered, at least fought to a standstill.
Covering all those years and bands and how the scene developed over the years makes for a lot of history. But there’s another history at work, one never mentioned or even slightly alluded to, but without which this book may never have existed.
Taking Punk Personally
Jackson and Kohn are both admitted punk aficionados with a wealth of knowledge about the O.C. scene, but whereas Kohn, who grew up on Long Island, first became aware of O.C. punk through a Social Distortion video on MTV, Jackson’s entry point was more visceral.
“It just sounded like what we were doing, the wheels on the concrete, the trucks grinding on the rails, falling and busting your ass,” says Jackson of his first connection to punk rock, which came via the skateboard. “Skateboarding was a fun way to get aggression out. Plus, when you’re psyching yourself up for a big trick or whatever, or when you fall and scrape your knees, you’re not doing that to the Back Street Boys. Someone always had a stereo and the music was always stuff like the Offspring or the Adolescents. I didn’t even know these bands were from Orange County at first. It just sounded like how I felt inside.”
The music resonated with Jackson on a deeper level. He grew up in Yorba Linda, in a nice home in a nice neighborhood and his dad was a well-respected professor at Cal State Fullerton who had helped create the university’s African American Studies program. But he was also biracial in a very white community and often felt “that I wasn’t always welcome. I didn’t feel like an outcast, but I did feel different when I was dealing with the white kids in my neighborhood. And then we’d visit relatives and it felt like I wasn’t Black enough. So the way I dealt with it was diving into music, which to me was a very diverse place. I could listen to and watch musicians and bands that were from all different races, all over the world. Getting lost in that world is a lot like reading a book where you can experience things outside of your immediate surroundings. “
His connection to punk music in particular strengthened once he started attending punk shows and was swept up in the physical and sonic energy. The occasional young fascist aside, he no longer felt different from those around him.
“I think a main tenet of what punk does for people is give them a sense of belonging and community,” he said. “It wasn’t about your race or color or religion or whatever. It was just kids letting loose.”
After his father bought him his first bass guitar at age 13, Jackson began playing in punk bands, where he discovered another outlet, one that “allowed me to think creatively.” And then when he found he had an aptitude for writing, it was a no-brainer that he started writing music reviews for the campus newspaper, which eventually led him to graduate from Cal State Fullerton with a journalism degree (as well as one in African American studies), and launched his journalism career (he currently is a deputy editor for the Los Angeles Times entertainment and arts section).
“So yeah, punk rock has been a part of my existence for a long time, and even though this book was about the music and the scene, I think, in a non-pretentious way, I sort of made it about me in order to write it,” he said. “I was writing about punk history, but I was also defining myself.”
Jackson said he’s proud of the work he and Kohn have accomplished and hopes that it will give those who know what it’s like to live in an area so often considered an extension of Los Angeles, or overlooked or dismissed as a cultural wasteland, “a sense of pride in what this area has contributed to music history and if they’re not from here gives them more insight” into the reality of life behind the Orange Curtain.
Joel Beers served as theater critic for OC Weekly.
