The Daily Show’s future host Jon Stewart (then known as William and Mary student Jon Leibowitz) snapped in the mosh pit at a Dead Kennedys/Front Line show in Richmond, Virginia sometime in the early 1980s.
Fantastic!
Via Filthy Pit/Henry Baum!
Well, he was also a bartender here in Trenton at the great club City Gardens…
Jon Stewart, a man for whom gurning and pulling idiotic faces represent the highest forms of comedy
Shame that’s all he learned from Jello…
Pfft. . . I always knew that guy was a PUNK!
RAWR! Insert snarky remark about Jon Stewart here!
Fuck you all. Jon Stewart is the shit.
there were no “mosh” pits in the 80s, let alone at a dk show
re: n_b says:
Wikipedia disagrees with you.
http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Moshing
I can’t believe they played Richmond. Where was I? Oh, yeah… I wasn’t born yet.
Also, Stewie Lebowitz is indeed the shit. Why he changed his name to impress the goyim, I’ll never know.
Makes me miss Asheville, NC. Soon enough, precious.
@en_b I also disagree with you, having lived through the 80s. This goes back as far as the 70s. They just didn’t call it a mosh pit then.
js is simply fantastic - a much more boring tv landscape without him. eric and Bag - yes he has made a niche for himself, but no that is not the opportunity to shoot him down because of it. oppositional is not always a true alterntive. from a hazy memory, en_b - dk’s were putting out records from the very late 70’s or very early 80’s. ‘moshing’ might have replaced ‘slamming’ , ‘thrashing’ and other earlier terms, but you got the drift…
I’m shocked! Jon Stewart is actually ... black?
(and “and Mary student Jon” is a badass middle name)
Looks like some brick firehouse that was converted into a thrash pit {empty beer bottles and piss stalls} stage diving, etc.
Damn straight there was no moshing back then! It was called slam dancing well into the late 80s. Why did the name change anyway? I spent a lot of time at City Gardens. I sure don’t remember him, but that’s probably because I was drinkin’ up what he was puttin’ down.
No moshing in the 80s? Anthrax recorded Caught in a Mosh in 86…
@Christina You’re right, moshing is a decendant term for slamdancing and falls flat with context in regards to authentic punk terminology q: so why the name change? a: moshing just means going mainstream as in buy punk shirts at the mall and purchase tickets to your favorite bands through ticket outlet distributors instead of at the door.
@Ebola Anthrax isn’t really representative of punk like DK. Their genre is more thrash metal with crossover style links.
@gp: That’s exactly what I thought. I tried to keep the original term alive, but I was—as we can all see—crushed under the weight of MTV trolling the Lower East Side.
We called it slam dancing *and* moshing. I recall my first punk show show, perhaps in 86 or 87, in Tampa and it definitely had a “mosh pit”. OK, I agree 86 is a bit late, but then again, I was only 16. But still, I disagree with those who say it wasn’t called a mosh pit or moshing in the 80’s. When I went of to uni in 88, the friends I made who were into punk etc used the term, so it was current, at least in Florida.
The character changed though from the 80’s, when it was a very jovial sort of running about in a circle, arm in arm, getting picked up when you fell….I’ll never forget the image of a mohawked guy, bleeding from a gash on his head, with a manic smile, having the time of his life! Or getting knoked down at a bad brains show and being hoisted up before I hit the floor by a pair of skinheads who patted me on the head and set me on my way. Fun stuff. Then it just got stupid after punk broke wide.
I remember the same spirit in the early 80s. If you fell, you were picked up immediately with lots of arms—almost like you never fell. But then again, I was 16 in 1982…
Speaking as someone who was there during the 80’s, we most certainly had pits. In Philly we called in thrashing, but it was the same thing.
You guys have a better eye than I do—been a JS fan for years and can’t tell which one he is in this pic. Great find tho’.
I think this was the Mosque basement show, not sure if they played here more than once, probably 82-or 83. The movie people filming a Kennedy movie in town about JFK were not happy with the marquee at the Mosque saying “Dead Kennedy” and complained. Does anyone know if they played somewhere else in town? Any Black Flag fans out there check out my YouTube site youtube.com/brookesaunders and you can find very rare footage of Black Flag live at Hard Times with Nig Heist, who played nude. Just check the playlists and search the site to view and enjoy
Yup, slam dancing and thrashing in the 80s. I was going from about 83 to 85. I only heard the term moshing a few years later when I finally had enough of drunk guys knocking me around. I’ll bet I could still stand around slam dancers with the proper “stance.” Crouch a little and keep your elbow ready so that while you are trying to enjoy the band you can still shove the guy back into the fray.
Fear on SNL, 1981.
@Greg: That show was a pivotal moment for me. Fond fond memories.
shoulda changed his name to Jon Lovitz.
#1. moshing is a metal term born in the mid 80s, punks called it slamming or thrashing (later on)
#2. Dead Kennedys also played in Richmond at the Casablanca in 83 or 84, as did Black Flag and every other great hardcore band of the time
#3 most importantly, that is not Jon Stewart, that is Alford Faulkner, the bass player of white cross at the time, who opened the show with Front line. How do I know? I was there and all those guys in the pic are friends of mine. One of them is Penn Rollins from Honor Roll, Loincloth and Bread Winner. This photo has gone viral with the wrong information.
Or not: http://jukeboxgraduate.tumblr.com/post/16642431095/andrewtsks-standingbyyoursisterfair
it’s on the internet it must be real, maybe it is jello biafra’s brother joe ; i like slamdance better than ‘mosh’ but then i’m old
Jon was a fan of those bands and shows but someone at something called “Online Notebook” disputes that it’s Jon in the pic.
“I can tell you that the person being identified as Jon Stewart here is almost certainly Alford Faulkner of Red Cross/The Prevaricators (thanks to a bunch of RVA punks who’ve been around longer than me for helping me figure this out). Of the three guys in front of him with their arms around each other’s shoulders, the one in the center is Cliff Farrar and the one on the right is Pen Rollings of Honor Role/Breadwinner/Butterglove.”
http://andrewtsks.tumblr.com/post/16640021219/standingbyyoursisterfair-clintisiceman
Also, we in the Southwest also called it Slam Dancing in the 80’s
that’s right, and that is Andre Cisneros in front, the big dude, who was the singer in the Norfolk HC band FRONT LINE.
THIS IS SOOOO COOL! I always knew he was a punk. And wondered if Stewart were his real last name. Ha ha, this is a keeper!!! Thanks for posting!!! I am sharing on FB now!
Not him. Some dude named Alford. Jon Stewart is a boring bourgeois hack, so who the fuck even cares?
I saw/participated in ‘slam dancing’ at NYC clubs in 198o/81/ Bad Brains @ A7’s was a memorable night. The term ‘moshing’ and ‘mosh-pit’ came later on in the mid-80’s. Sounds like an LA/West Coast term to me.
I’ve heard the term “moshing” having been credited to HR of Bad Brains. he described the dancing as “mashing” which sounded like “moshing” with his accent.
Punk gigs in Scotland seemed to be a huge fight with a semi-musical background.
Just as a bizarre FYI, Jon Stewart is apparently a hearthrob amongst American Muslim girls:
http://tinyurl.com/6nbt25c
I believe Joe Anaruma—-
that doesn’t look exactly like jon Stewart (although he would be the right age.)
Jon Stewart has a handsome, but somewhat common face.
Y’all are correct in saying the term “mosh” came later in 80’s.
The really older punks (like the Minutemen dudes) said “pogoing” for that kind of dancing!
btw, jon is totally telling those nazi punks off camera to fuck off
That’s Cliff there! (thanks Joe, I had not looked carefully) Alfred (wonder where he is?) and Pen, I recognize him. Must be an urban rumor, Jon Stewart at this show? Maybe he came with Stephen Colbert
Many of you are throwing around terms as if punk started in the 80’s ... “mosh pit” was used in the late 70’s in LA ...
You can see me in the Screamers at the Masque, Dec 16, 1977, on youtube. I’m whipping the lead singer, Tomata Du Plenty, from the side of the stage. When you see the audience, some were slamming and pogoing in the mosh pit. Most any footage from the Masque in 1977-78 you see that kind of audience participation.
Just cos American Hardcore (and similar sources) say something ... ha ha, that book/movie TOTALLY overlooks the west coast. LA created hardcore first ... in the NINETEEN SEVENTIES.
First pogoing, then mosh pit and slamming or slam dancing. I was there, taking pix. Where were you? Do you read OLD fanzines from the 70’s?
**NEWS FLASH: EVERYTHING that EVER happened in punk started in the 70’s.
FIRST in NY (most say about 74-76), then in concurrently (same time) England and LA starting in 76, AFTER the Ramones hit both places.
Bands were playing on England and LA, but it really came together after punk spread from NY in both directions ....
I just hate it when ppl saying “definitive” things and they are in the wrong decade ... the 80’s or worse, late 80’s, off by a whole decade…
Now pls go do your homework and read everything you can ... starting with my book, PUNK PIONEERS. I don’t use those terms, but you can see how punk spread in LA.
I didn’t like to shoot in mosh pits or when ppl slam danced, cos it wasn’t safe for my camera or toes ... But I remember it well. Certainly at the Masque, but X at the Starwood and Whisky, and many times w/the Germs. But if I had the time or inclination, I could list many 1970’s punk shows ...
Bad Brains, ha ha ha. Just cos someone used the term doesn’t mean he coined it ...
I was in England shooting Sham 69, June/July 1980 and lots of mosh pit slamming. I shot the Clash there, but their audiences were not into that. Everyone’s eyes were riveted on the Clash.
NO ONE has written anything near the definitive book. Most are centered on one area, and most in the 80’s. But it started in the mid-1970s. Pls remember that!!!
Bottom line: I am soooo tired of ppl talking about my pix and saying I shot in the 80’s.
PUNK STARTED IN THE MID 1970’s. Including mosh pit, slamming and pogoing.
GO BACK TO THE SOURCE ... start at the beginning and go forward. Not backward and stopping when it was wrong decade. Pls and thanks! Have a nice day!
if you wanna get for real, punk always existed it just had different names before. people calling it punk are as guilty of trying to box everything in and label shit as the magazines from the era defining how to “dress punk” and people ignoring that “new wave” bands were all apart of the same scene before labels and people without brains only looking for scenes came into the picture.
bob dylan was punk before punk. think about it. and if you wanna get into a dogfight about where the sound commonly referred to as punk these days came from, ask yourself whether iggy and the stooges or mc5 were bands of the ‘70s and whether they were east coast or west coast. it’s all american pop music at the end of the day.
and yes, it’s ‘70s - as in taking off the “19” and a plural number of years (not possessive).
Giselle Fauquet says:
“Y’all are correct in saying the term “mosh” came later in 80’s. The really older punks (like the Minutemen dudes) said “pogoing” for that kind of dancing!”
1. Punk started way before the Minutemen. Do a bit more homework, you’ll like what you find.
2. The fellers in this photo are not pogoing. If they were, at least one of them would be in the air. It’s the messiness of a mosh pit, even if that term wasn’t made up quite yet.
Looks like a portion of a circle pit to me…
