From the collection of Omid Yamini
Soft-core Japanese porn. Gig flyers. Fanzines. Ticket stubs. Cherie’s corset. An anvil case. Acetates. Bootlegs. These are just some of the items ultra fan Omid Yamini has in his Runaways collection. The collector and metal musician has let me ravage through his files and bookcases all weekend. It’s been an immensely educational two days, a grounding of all the oral research I’ve done so far for Queens of Noise in actual artifacts. A picture tells a thousand stories, and Yamini’s image library includes professional photos, publicity stills, and fan shots. A view of Cherie Currie oozing fake blood from a live performance of “Dead End Kids” is one of my favorite finds — and came out great in my photograph of a photograph.
It will take me weeks to weed through all the articles we’ve scanned and ephemera I’ve photographed — i.e., more posts to come. Now, I must sleep: One last day of digging to go — concert T-shirts here I come!
Populism 