by Jas Keimig
Next weekend, from Friday, March 29, to Sunday, March 31, Black punks are taking over the Black & Tan Hall and Northwest Film Forum (NWFF) for Black Punk Weekend. In a three-day-long event dreamed up by the Sankofa Film Society; NWFF; and comic artist, filmmaker, and tattooer James Spooner, the rich tradition and diversity of Black punk communities will be on full display, with film screenings, shows, and a delicious brunch.
"There are a lot of specialized events for Black people all across the country, but not necessarily in Seattle," said Jill Busby, artistic director of NWFF. "So something that is not just a celebration of Black history, but also the Black present and future and is subcultural, I think, gets us out of a rut of talking about the same things and celebrating the same things because they feel safe in a community that likes it to be safe and Black."
Although Black & Tan Hall, Sankofa, and NWFF coordinated the effort, the majority of the weekend's programming has been curated by Spooner. A lauded graphic novelist of coming-of-age memoir The High Desert, Spooner grew up as a frustrated biracial kid in the small desert town of Apple Valley, California, and found refuge in bands like the Sex Pistols and Black Flag.
In 2003, he directed and released the seminal documentary Afro-Punk, a 66-minute film that provides a radical, firsthand glimpse into the lives of Black punks across the country in the early 2000s. Spooner's experiences in the punk scene compelled him to make the documentary, spurred by Black folks asking him why he's trying to be white and white punks evoking the white liberal sentiment of "race doesn't matter."
"I think, personally, I needed to validate my experience through talking to other people," said Spooner in a recent interview. "That's partially why I didn't just get interviews with six or seven prominent Black punk voices, but instead I cast a net wide and anyone and everyone who identified as Black and punk or hardcore to tell their story, which, in turn, validated my own."
Afro-Punk follows the lives of four Black punks and intersperses interviews with over 80 more throughout, discussing their personal histories, styles, prejudices they experience, and what compels them to participate in the underground scene. "Being Black and being a punk rocker are pretty similar," says one punk in the film. Taking the ethos of bands on the road, Spooner toured Afro-Punk to different cities, screening it over 300 times. The documentary also served as the inspiration for the Afropunk Festival, which Spooner co-founded with Matthew Morgan in 2005 (though he parted ways with the fest in 2008 over philosophical differences).
For Black Punk Weekend, Spooner wants to harken back to the original spirit of the Afropunk Festival, which was "a film festival with bands," Spooner explains. In addition to Afro-Punk, other documentary film screenings over the three-day event include: William E. Badgley's documentary on U.K. punk legend Don Letts, Rebel Dread; a film about the Minnesota anti-racist skinhead crew, The Baldies; a look at D.C. punk icons in Bad Brains: A Band in DC; White Riot, which follows the story of the U.K.'s Rock Against Racism movement in the late '70s; Henry Selick's delightfully punk stop-motion feature Wendell & Wild; and a feature about the U.K. punk rebel Poly Styrene: Poly Styrene: I Am a Clich.
Also part of the weekend's programming is a late-night Black punk show at Black & Tan Hall, featuring Seattle gunk pop originators Black Ends and Oakland-based filmmaker and musician Brontez Purnell. On Sunday, March 31, Black & Tan Hall will host a Black Punk Brunch featuring a spread by Seattle chef Tarik Abdullah. The brunch will also honor PNW punk legend Kimya Dawson, who is being awarded the Black Punk Vanguard Award for her contributions to music.
"I think that it's important for us to — like they say — give people flowers while they're still here to enjoy them," Spooner reflected. He will also be at the event, signing copies of Black Punk Now, a punk anthology he co-authored with Chris L. Terry. He also collaborated with Stoup Brewing for the weekend's festivities, drawing four designs for their specially made Black Punk Weekend IPA that will include a QR Code linking to information and tickets to the event.
In the 20 years since Afro-Punk first came out, Spooner says a lot has remained the same about the punk, hardcore, and DIY scenes ("Inflation has caused the [door ticket] price to go up a dollar or two"). But while it's still straight white dude heavy, he thinks the biggest change he's witnessed is the bigger pool of women, queers, and BIPOC punks and bands doing their thing, supporting one another, and speaking their minds.
"Black and Brown and queer and women punks are not quiet in the way that we were in my generation. I think in my generation, we were really worried about hurting our white friends' feelings or making them uncomfortable, so we were willing to take the brunt of discomfort in order to fit in," said Spooner. "And now I feel like there are a lot of bands that are very vocal about their Blackness, about their queerness, about their femmeness."
Black Punk Weekend runs through March 29—31 at Black & Tan Hall and Northwest Film Forum. Access tickets and screening and show times on Northwest Film Forum's website.
Jas Keimig is a writer and critic based in Seattle. They previously worked on staff at The Stranger, covering visual art, film, music, and stickers. Their work has also appeared in Crosscut, South Seattle Emerald, i-D, Netflix, and The Ticket. They also co-write Unstreamable for Scarecrow Video, a column and screening series highlighting films you can't find on streaming services. They won a game show once.
Featured Image: James Spooner's "Afro-Punk" is one of several documentaries screening at Black Punk Weekend. (Photo by Duwayno Robertson, courtesy of "Afro-Punk"/James Spooner.)
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