Photo by Gary Leonard
Exene Cervenka, founding member and vocalist of X, can’t remember the last time the band was in Milwaukee, but she remembers the first time. X rolled into town in their tour vehicle, a bread delivery van, to play two nights at a Milwaukee nightclub of yore, Starship, in June 1981.
“We were amazed because when we got to sound check, there was so many people waiting for us, which never happened in bigger cities,” Cervenka recalls. “There were longhaired kids and hippie festival kids and punk rock kids, all these people, and some had a record they wanted us to sign, but most of them were hanging out because they wanted to be there when we arrived to see what we looked like. It was cool because back then there was no MTV, videos, very little media coverage in Milwaukee. It was like, ‘Hey, the circus is in town; let’s ride out to meet them.’ You don’t just go to see the circus—you went to go to see them arrive in town. We’ve always had a good audience and a lot of fun in Milwaukee.”
Back in the band’s hometown, Los Angeles, an ’80s punk rock renaissance was going on. X was in the vanguard of this scene, along with other bands like Germs, Agent Orange and The Weirdos, but developed a sound more poetic and melodic than their colleagues.
“It was the most magical time ever,” Cervenka says, adding that one of her own favorite bands from that era was Latino punk band The Plugz. X formed in 1977 with Cervenka on vocals, John Doe on bass and harmonizing on vocals, guitarist Billy Zoom and drummer D.J. Bonebrake.
X has gone through different periods of hiatus while band members pursue solo and side projects (three-quarters of X were also in the alt-country group The Knitters) and then regrouped to occasionally record new material—their last studio album was in 1993—and tour. The group’s current How I Learned My Lesson Tour kicked off with a four-night stand in Los Angeles, where they played one of their classic first four albums in its entirety each night.
As the tour was starting, they ran into an issue: Zoom, who had been successfully treated for prostate cancer five years ago, was diagnosed with bladder cancer and needed immediate treatment. An online crowdsourcing effort happened to help with Zoom’s bills.
“He has insurance, but it doesn’t cover much,” Cervenka explains.
X fans pitched in to make the fundraising goal and then nearly doubled it. X teamed up with Sweet Relief Musicians Fund, a charity that helps musicians struggling with medical bills. To temporarily replace Zoom, the band tapped rockabilly guitarist Jesse Dayton, who has recorded with Waylon Jennings, Willie Nelson and The Supersuckers, to fill in for X’s August dates while Zoom recovers.
“[Dayton] is really respectful of Billy and the whole band, a really wonderful human being,” Cervenka says. “We’re doing good shows, like we should. It was weird at first [not having Zoom along], like are we supposed to be good? Supposed to enjoy ourselves and have fun? What are we supposed to do? It was so weird, but it’s working out.”
As for future plans, Cervenka says the band philosophy at this point is to play things by ear. She doesn’t anticipate the band recording new material and isn’t certain if the band will continue to tour in the future, but Milwaukee will at least get the chance to see the circus roll into town one more time.
X plays Sprecher Brewery’s 30th Anniversary Bash at Juneau Park on Friday, Aug. 28 at 8:15 p.m. Other bands playing the fest Aug. 28 and 29 include The Ladders, The Grovelers, Christopher’s Project, Robert Allen Jr., The Living Statues and De La Buena.
