Henry Rollins once said of Glen E. Friedman, “…he was there at the beginning of so much cool stuff in so many different areas it’s not funny.” Too true. Friedman documented the genesis of the 1970s southern California skateboarding scene as a teenager, took pictures of pretty much any early American punk legend you can name, as well as most of the earliest and brightest hip-hop names of the 80s. But if ever there was a case of a band and a photographer’s philosophies, outlooks, and interests dovetailing almost completely, it was in his relationship with Fugazi. As a result, Friedman’s visions of the group stretched across the band’s career. This fall, Keep Your Eyes Open, a collection of those photographs, will be published on Burning Flags Press.
He’s never quite had the notoriety of a Michael Lavine or an Anton Corbijn; his path has been guided more by his ideology than marketability, which is one trait he certainly shares with the band. It’s the sort of sentiment displayed in the “Fuck You” that leads off the titles of quite a few of his books and exhibitions. His photography has always been iconic, a defiant thread running through even lighter moments with his subjects. Portraiture is often done in extreme close-ups and wide angles, putting us almost uncomfortably close while warping all perspective. His action photography of shows is dynamic and powerful, yet still finds hidden quiet moments amid the noise, deftly using sharp contrasts and gloomy shadows to affect the mood. With Fugazi, he always seemed at his best. We’re anticipating the book to be as fitting a pictorial look at the band’s career as Jem Cohen’s Instrument was in moving picture form. What Cohen and Friedman shared is both access to the band throughout their time together and a friendship with the group that shows in the heightened intimacy of the images.
Of no small note is the release date of Friedman’s book: September 3, 2007 is 20 years to the day after the first Fugazi show. The band is not known for feeding heavily on nostalgia. They’re firmly committed to the idea that the music that’s going on right now is the most important, and right now everyone in the band has other things they’re working on. But the band did do a 10th Anniversary show back in ’97, at DC Space the Wilson Center, the site of that first show. DC Space The Wilson Center may be long gone now, but dare we hope that the release of this book might not be the only event planned to commemorate the occasion? We can always dream. And if not, on September 3 we can always sit back with the book, throw 13 Songs on and allow ourselves a little nostalgia trip, even if Fugazi themselves continue to keep moving in front of the gravity.
