The first time the guitarist Frank Agnew went to a punk present was about 13 years previous, and even when he was a minor, he was capable of enter the whiskey, go seeing the luggage, Black Randy and the Metrosquad and the unusual. It was 1978 and went together with his older brother Rikk.
“When the unusual, saints who modified my life without end got here as a result of it was so lovely,” mentioned Frank. “Since I noticed the unusual to whiskey, I’ve been sitting there pondering:” I wish to be so good, I wish to be so tight, “and subsequently that was my purpose.”
Frank and His Brothers Rikk and Alfonso “Alfie” Agnew Spent the Next Decade Forming and Playing For Some of the Most which means Bands within the Punk Canon, Including Adolescents, The Detours, Social Distortion, Christian Death, Tsol and Di, Among Others – and Now Their Journey As Punk Rock Musicians is Finally Being Told within the New Documentary “Agnew: The Story of a California Family,” Which is screening for the primary time on April 12 on the Fox Theater in Fullerton. Recently, the work of their life in music has been on show within the new exhibition “Punk OC – from the streets of the outskirts” on the Fullerton Museum Center which debuted final week. On a current afternoon, the Agnew brothers gathered on the museum to pose for the pictures and relive reminiscences by means of the artifacts of their younger punk rock.
“I always requested myself questions on my household and Rikk, of, youngsters, all that stuff, for me it’s unbelievable how many individuals not solely know however fear,” mentioned Alfie, who can be a mathematical physique that teaches CAL State Fullerton. “This considerations the scene of Orange’s county a lot and the individuals who supported it, not solely within the late 70s and 80s, but additionally to this point, so I believe it is a sort of celebration for all of us.”
The documentary of the director Gabriel Zavala Jr. was shot roughly between 2018 and 2024 and appears again to the traditional historical past of the brothers and their legendary musicality as additionally they seize the brothers as they play numerous reveals and navigate within the circumstances of their private life. Zavala instructed the Times that he was impressed by creating the documentary after seeing the Agnews taking part in an explosive present along with the Santa Ana Observatory.
The director Gabriel L. Zavala Jr., from the left, takes a photograph of the brothers Frank, Rikk and Alfie Agnew of the youngsters of the punk band subsequent to a show that presents the band on the exhibition “Punk OC – from the Streets of Suburbia” on the Fullerton Museum Center.
(Genaro Molina / Los Angeles Times)
“It was such a rush as a result of at the moment folks had been as soon as once more reinvigored by the punk rock and the model of Rikk and Frank’s youngsters and it was such an electrical night time,” mentioned Zavala. “I simply instructed them:” What if we did a documentary on your loved ones? “”
Rikk, Frank and Alfie all accepted to make the documentary with Zavala, who promptly began capturing and interviewing numerous musicians related to the Agnews together with GVLLOW, Gitane demon of Christian Death and Casey Royer of youngsters and of
Zavala, a filmmaker who directed and written the 2015 indie movie “Rude Boy: The Movie”, additionally interviewed the dad and mom of the brothers earlier than he died whereas capturing the documentary.
“I believe they might be happy with it, they had been at all times very proud and solidarity with their youngsters, I believe my dad and mom had been fairly distinctive in supporting such a enterprise – being punk rock and being musicians as an alternative of going to be medical doctors and attorneys, even when in the long run I grew to become a professor,” mentioned Alfie.
As youngsters of Irish and Mexican dad and mom with immigrant roots, the brothers declare to have grown surrounded by an eclectic number of music, listening to all the things, by Irish folks to the mariachi, and whereas their dad and mom weren’t musicians themselves, the brothers are most likely inherited from their musical gene by their maternal grandfather, Alfonso Fernandez. According to the brothers, Fernandez was an expert drummer who emigrated from Guadalajara and performed all through Mexico and within the south -west of the United States in a Latin jazz band known as Latinaires.
“When I discovered about my grandfather, who was notably private for me as a result of I had the identify from him – in truth my first device was the battery – I actually had that connection and I used to be at all times very happy with this,” mentioned Alfie, who additionally performs the guitar.
Frank and Alfie didn’t know his grandfather – Fernandez died in 1965 – however as Alfie, Frank additionally attributes the legacy of his grandfather as influential on his journey as a musician.
Fratelli Frank, on the left, and Alfie Agnew, of the youngsters of the punk band on the exhibition “Punk OC – from the Streets of Suburbia” on the Fullerton Museum Center.
(Genaro Molina / Los Angeles Times)
“My mom clearly mentioned:” Your grandfather Alfonso was a drummer, and he was the most effective drummer, “Frank mentioned.” And he had a status all through Mexico as among the best drummers and so he mentioned to her and confirmed her pictures in her drum equipment, was actually stimulating, it is like, ‘Oh S—, the grandfather was in a band, “we too.”
The brothers had been on the peak of taking part in reveals through the filming of the documentary, however in 2020 a number of difficulties had been held that reported the venture and in addition pushed the crew to lastly end it. First of all, the Covid-19 pandemic has scored all of the operations, particularly when the residence orders had been carried out in 2020.
“Covid hit in the course of this, God, so we had been like on this limbo the place we couldn’t movie for a month after which we needed to proceed with the individuals who had been prepared to assemble and work below restrictions,” mentioned Zavala.
This interval can be when Rikk’s dad and mom, Frank and Alfie died of previous age – first the daddy Richard Francis Agnew, after which solely six months later, his mom Lia Paula Fernandez. The father of Zavala, Gabriel B. Zavala, a famend interpreter and trainer of Mariachi, died firstly of 2021 by the issues of Covid-19.
The Alfie brothers, from the left, Rikk and Frank Agnew of the youngsters of the punk band with the director Gabriel L. Zavala Jr. on the exhibition “Punk OC – from the Streets of Suburbia” on the Fullerton Museum Center.
(Genaro Molina / Los Angeles Times)
“It was profound and it was unhappy, however I do know he would have favored to struggle and end the documentary, so that is what we did,” mentioned Zavala. “We fell hooked up and, in a sure sense, it was additionally a therapeutic course of to not actually have to consider it and I simply centered on the purpose of ending this no matter what would have wished to complete it emotionally, financially and with a troupe of skeletons.”
Through the difficulties, Zavala has been capable of efficiently full the documentary for greater than six years in progress, and the brothers declare to be grateful and nonetheless humbly stunned that anybody who thinks they’re fascinating sufficient to current in a full -figure movie.
“I typically hear from folks how a lot issues we now have influenced and the way it was a constructive factor of their life, and if that is the one takeaway, I believe it is lovely,” mentioned Frank. “Some issues we did have made folks glad, they made them transfer their toes or influenced them in a method it’s like” wow, I’m not the one one who appears like this “, and I simply suppose it is implausible and good, and I hope the documentary will present a bit of.”
