INTRODUCTION BY
DEBBIE HARRY
IT WAS IN THE EARLY 1970S WHEN I FIRST
became aware of a rock photographer named Bob Gruen. I was a huge New York Dolls fan, and I’m sure it was at one of their shows at the Mercer Arts Center where I first saw Bob shooting away. When Blondie started playing in Max’s Kansas City and CBGB, we were introduced. One of my favorite photos is that really great shot of me wearing the zebra-print dress and the tiger teeth necklace—it was photographed by none other than Bobby G. The infamous Gruen was already infamous by the time I met him. His reputation as a cool rock photographer was well known, and in that little downtown scene of the early to mid-1970s, he shot as many bands as he could. Those days, he had a badass 1954 Buick Special—blue and white, I think. He also had a moped so he could get around town faster to make his deadlines. The thing about Bob is that he’s always really loved the music and really enjoys going places. He always seemed at ease and likable. We’d all appreciate it when Bob would show up at a gig ’cause we knew the pictures would be used somewhere, and our bands would get some press. But it was in the can-
did situations that he took most of his photos. Getting these types of shots isn’t easy with all the variables of light and movement, but Bobby would show up in the most unlikely places, smiling away, holding his camera, and ready to capture a piece of the action. After all of these years, Bob’s archive now has thousands and thousands of photographs. The problem was choosing which ones to put into this collection. This was really hard to do, but I think you’ll enjoy looking through these pages, which include images from his earliest work of Bob Dylan at the Newport Folk Festival in the mid-1960s to Green Day’s performance while on their latest tour in 2010. This book presents forty years of some of the greatest moments in rock-and-roll history and all I can add is, I look forward to the next forty.
H A L F T I T L E PA G E F RO N T I S P I E C E RIGHT
Debbie Harry, Max’s Kansas City, New York City, 1976
I N S E T, R I G H T
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BOB GRUEN
Kiss, West 23rd Street at Eighth Avenue, New York City, 1974
John Lennon, Statue of Liberty, New York City, 1974
Bob Gruen and Debbie Harry, Coney Island, New York, 1977
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A B OV E
Bob Dylan, Newport Folk Festival, Newport, Rhode Island, 1965
RIGHT
Bob Dylan, Rolling Thunder Revue, New Haven, Connecticut, 1975
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“For my first session with John and Yoko, I was very nervous until I remembered to breathe and relax.”
Yoko Ono and John Lennon, St. Moritz Hotel, New York City, 1972
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“For my first session with John and Yoko, I was very nervous until I remembered to breathe and relax.”
Yoko Ono and John Lennon, St. Moritz Hotel, New York City, 1972
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BOB GRUEN
“The Rolling Stones were always the image of rock and roll for me.”
Mick Jagger and Keith Richards, Madison Square Garden, New York City, 1972
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LEFT
The Who, Atlanta, Georgia, 1973
A B OV E
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BOB GRUEN
Pete Townshend, Spectrum, Philadelphia, Pennsylvania, 1973
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210
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“The Clash were the most powerful band.”
The Clash, Boston, Massachusetts, 1979
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“The Clash were the most powerful band.”
The Clash, Boston, Massachusetts, 1979
218
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278
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A B OV E
Adrienne and Billie Joe Armstrong, Bowery Electric, New York City, 2010
RIGHT
Charlotte Kemp Muhl and Sean Lennon, New York City, 2010
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