"WHEN HE LEFT for New York with $60 in his ...

Bazooka!!! is a fairly great album, too, establishing the Star Spangles as the city's first worthy successor to the Ramones. Not the Sire Ramones, either, but the underrated 90s Ramones who combined bubblegum roots with big rock cliches. That success hasn't made the Star Spangles any less neurotic, though.

"I don't know any of these people," complains guitarist Tommy Volume. "I told everybody to be here at 9 p.m., and now we're going to be playing to a bunch of record industry straights. You're going to write that we've got nothing but straight fans!"

Tommy's got reason to worry. US Weekly's Shirley Halperin is in the audience?although she leaves early, presumably in search of a more photogenic band. Tommy's still upset that record industry types have showed up at his Capitol Records party, but he relaxes once his diehard fans finally walk through the door. These include the Smithereens' Pat DiNizio, who I last saw rocking the mic at a Young Republicans gathering.

Tommy announces it's time to play?"now that it doesn't look like a Barenaked Ladies concert"?while I mention to DiNizio that it's always good to see a fellow right-winger in the house.

"You're going to see four of them tonight," he replies. "Did you know their favorite movie is Joe?"

Honestly, this band gets more likeable every day.

But then it's off to a crowd that used to be the hippies who would've made up Peter Boyle's happy hunting ground. I'm possibly the youngest person at the Marshall Crenshaw concert at the Bottom Line. That's understandable, since What's In The Bag? continues Crenshaw's fine adult obsession with jazzy pop. Still, there was a time when Crenshaw was the premier New York rocker, and probably the only one since who shares the Spangles' appreciation for Chuck Berry. Crenshaw's happy to hear that they're out there, too.

"God bless 'em," Crenshaw says. "I always love to hear a good rock 'n' roll band. I hope they have some fun and don't get chewed up and have their sound ravaged or any of that stuff."

Not that Crenshaw has any kind of emotional attachment: "Well, I haven't really heard of them until now. I'm pretty out of touch with youth culture. I'm almost 50 years old. My little girl broke her wrist the night of the power failure, and I'm painting the house. I have to drag myself out of a stupor just to answer questions about my own music."

Things get less family-friendly at the afterparty for the Sex Pistols show at Jones Beach. Specifically, it's not friendly to the Spungen family, since the party's at Serena's beneath the Chelsea Hotel. It's always a fine bar, but the gathering feels more like a cruel prank by Malcolm McLaren. The location and the crowd in the club are bad enough. Then there are the adoring fans outside, best defined by two portly 50-year-olds in shorts, black socks, and tight Sex Pistols t-shirts.

It's nice to think that the guests of honor would be appalled by all these record industry types sporting Cuban heels. It would also be nice to think that the Pistols haven't spent the past 25 years hanging out with this kind of crowd. In a remarkable display of consistency, the punk spirit is once again left to Tommy Volume. He should be out touring, but Tommy's making the local scene and passing on important breaking news. "They've got David Peel upstairs," he announces, "and they won't let him in because of how he's dressed. How punk is that? Man, I'm going back downtown. I hope they catch somebody smoking in here."

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