Keith Morris Podcast Interview with Jim Ruland and Todd Taylor
Forty Years of Group Sex: An interview with Keith Morris of Black Flag, the Circle Jerks, and OFF!
Images of the Masque, Black Flag, Chinatown, the
Circle Jerks, the Olympic Auditorium, and The
Decline of the Western Civilization spring to mind when I think of the
crucial moments in the early L.A punk and hardcore scene. The one person who
links these diverse and disparate scenes is vocalist Keith Morris. You can’t
tell the complete story of L.A.
punk without him.
It’s been forty years since the Circle Jerks released its ground-breaking
debut, Group Sex. To celebrate Keith,
now sixty-four years old, will hit the road this spring for a lengthy global
tour with Greg Hetson, Zander Schloss, and a yet-to-be-named drummer.
Keith visited Razorcake headquarters
in Highland Park
to talk about the upcoming Circle Jerks reunion, dealing with diabetes, delays
on the latest OFF! record, and how a bad romance has fueled his creativity.
Interview by Jim Ruland and Todd Taylor
Introduction and photo by Jim Ruland
Songs: “Wasted” and “World up My Ass,” from Group
Sex