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BOB BERT PHOTO EXHIBIT: The Underbelly of Counterculture Music & Art Scene 1977-2003 - 6/8-7/27


  • 503 Social Club 503 1st St Hoboken, NJ, 07030 USA (map)

OPENING RECEPTION June 8, 6:30-9:30

Bob Bert, world-renowned drummer with the likes of Sonic Youth, Pussy Galore, Lydia Lunch, Jon Spencer, and more, has always had one eye on the viewfinder, and this exhibit documents an exciting time in music.

"The Underbelly of Counterculture Music and Art Scene"
1977 - 2003
After High School in Clifton, NJ, Bob Bert fascinated by underground music and the art world especially Andy Warhol and the scene at his Factory in NYC with the Velvet Underground, took
classes at the School of Visual Art in photography, painting, printmaking etc. He moved to NYC in 1978 and became a professional fine art silkscreen printer and ended up printing Warhol’s print editions and paintings while in the bands Sonic Youth and Pussy Galore. Always a big music fan and a witness to the fascinating scene developing at CBGB and Max’s Kansas City while never even thinking of pursuing being a musician or being in a band. That all changed when Bob moved to Hoboken in 1981. After seeing the Beatles on the Ed Sullivan show at the age of 8 and the British Invasion that followed, he took drum lessons for a year at the age of 12. Driving his family nuts banging away in the basement and having friends come over attempting to play Dirty Water by the Standells and Cream songs. Bob put the drums aside when he moved out of the family house at 18 to pursue art, glam rock, experiment with psychedelics and pot and go to tons of
music shows big and small. In 1981 in Hoboken Bob accidentally found himself in a band. He never stopped. In 1982 he joined the band Sonic Youth recording and going on their very first
tours of the US and Europe. From there he recorded and toured the world with Pussy Galore, Bewitched, Action Swingers, Chrome Cranks, Knoxville Girls, and in more recent times with Lydia
Lunch Retrovirus, Jon Spencer & the HiTmakers and Wolfmanhattan Project (with Kid Congo Powers and Mick Collins).
In the 90’s Bob Bert and his partner artist Linda Wolfe started the much acclaimed BB Gun Magazine, a yearly zine dedicated to the counterculture of music and art. The 7th and last issue was released in 2004. In 2019 HoZac Books published the book “I’m Just The Drummer” My time behind Sonic Youth, Pussy Galore, Chrome Cranks & BB Gun Magazine - photography &
interviews by Bob Bert. Currently out of print, a 3rd printing hopefully will happen this year. Bob Bert is currently working on his first solo album. And as it says on Sonny Bono’s grave “The Beat Goes On.“

Bob continues to be the charm in the room wherever Rock N Roll is made” - Thurston Moore
(Sonic Youth)
“Photographer, journalist, documentarian, Bob Bert has crawled through the musical underbelly
of the last few decades unscathed. Still Rockin’, Still Vital, Still Cool, Yeah Still Cool” - Lydia
Lunch
“We know that Bob is way more than just the drummer, Add photography and painting to the
Molotov cocktail of talent and watch as my mind blows the fuck up” - Kid Congo Powers
(Cramps, Gun Club, Nick Cave & The Bad Seeds, Knoxville Girls, Wolfmanhattan Project)