In-a-Gyda Da Vida - unedited version Gyda Gash's Younger, Louder and Snottier Days Pop Smear Issue 20-Manson Family SexDrugsRocknRoll Issue Photos by Sarka ***When I found out that Legs McNeil (author of Please Kill Me, a book documenting the Punk movement of the '70s) was going to do a Manson family reenactment for Pop Smear I thought that it might be a great time to interview one of my favorite local musicians who had been mentioned and quoted in his book. This being Gyda Gash.**** Gyda Gash is the ageless, exotic-looking kickass bass-player in Angel Rot. (X-White Zombie guitarist Tom Five's brainchild) During the day she battles the internet as the innovative web page designer of the makeup company Manic Panic, and by night she dazzles music lovers with charisma and talent. I had heard that Gyda might not have been completely happy with the outcome of her interview with Legs, so I called to ask what she thought of the Manson idea. She immediately blurted out, "OF COURSE LEGS WOULD DO A MANSON REENACTMENT. THAT'S JUST LIKE LEGS-HE WOULD LOVE TO IMAGINE HIMSELF AS MANSON AND HAVE A BUNCH OF BRAIN-DEAD YOUNG WOMEN AROUND TO SUCK HIS DICK!!" (Gyda and Legs are actually good friends) For this interview, she suggested we meet at the Integral Yoga Institute in downtown Manhattan, take a Hatha yoga class and talk afterwards. It seemed pretty ballsy of her to invite a Rubber Girl---world renowned for flexibility-to a yoga class. How could I refuse? Little did I know that the woman named after the bloody marks her razor blade necklace left on her neck and chest is a devotee of Guru Mai, and a vegan to boot. As I walked down First Avenue toward Integral, I was thinking, "Sure, she's a better bass player than me, but can she bend?" Surprisingly, Gyda held her own quite well. In fact, aside from her shiny, sea green toenails, thick black eyeliner, bleached silver hair with black tips, and the black knife tattooed on her forearm with the word "Stigmata" etched across the top, nothing differentiated her from the rest of the class. I, on the other hand, had nothing but trouble. I just can't bear chanting or modern dancers-it was all too distracting. Upstaged Again. After the last "oms" were said, we went to the vegan restaurant downstairs and Gyda told me about punk in the '70s, which was rather surreal with the Indian music droning in the background.. GYDA: .There was this whole thing going on which was a lot of sad, angry, damaged, misfit kids that were not pretty or cool-women like myself who were not beautiful or Playboy Bunnies or models, the shy kids, the angry kids, the ones that never fit in-that was the punk movement. It wasn't the popular people who were going from scene to scene. Those fuckin' popular motherfuckers were the ones who ruined punk rock and turned it into a business and a fashion and fucked over all the artists. That, I don't think, came out in Please Kill me. The drug thing and how sad it was that most people died of drugs, that sort of came out, but I don't think the reasons why we were doing drugs were really expressed. That remains my outcry. Punk rock was not a fashionable movement. It wasn't like this social scene; it was people who were social cripples. That's why there was so much drug use going on-it fit in perfectly with that kind of mindset. ULA: You were quoted in Please Kill Me as saying, ".I wandered into CBGBs and there was Roxy hanging out with Cheetah.there she was with Cheetah Chrome and Stiv Bators of the Dead Boys. I thought that was way cool, because the dead boys were getting popular.." GYDA: I kind of resent the implication that I was in any way some kind of groupie, or a girl just going after rock stars because those guys were NOT rock stars. I mean, NOBODY wanted them. They were UGLY!..They were my fuckin soulmates.When I met those guys, especially Cheetah, it was like Oh Yeah, THANK GOD! Someone who understands! That was the major attraction-the music was great too. ULA: Were you playing any music back then? GYDA: I was singing in some bands - I wasn't playing bass. When I met Cheetah I was singing in a band. He came to New York and I fell in love with him. He was going to go on tour in the UK and said, "Come with me!", so I went on tour with the Dammed and the Dead Boys for two months and I just put my whole life on a shelf because his life was so much more glamorous than mine. From that point on I just sort of lived vicariously through my boyfriend - I didn't play again until we broke up in 1983. ULA: Were you ever married to Cheetah? GYDA: No. Well, Stiv had gotten one of those mail-away certificates for some Unitarian church where you could like send in a thing to become a priest. One night in some hotel room we stood up on the bed and he said, "I pronounce you man and wife!" or some bullshit like that. But, no, we were together for six years, but we were never married - not legally anyway. ULA: So what happened to Punk? GYDA: Well, it was downhill from there because everybody was afraid of punk rock. And at first we were sort of encouraged to go hog-wild which we would do anyway..and then these wild things that we were, all of a sudden it was like-"Wait a second, we don't want you to be so wild!" Well it was too late. There was NO taming anybody at that point, and record companies didn't believe in the music and the money was pulled.People said punk rock would never last and whatever - it was really sad. And then you had the '80s: happy, productive, dancing people - where us miserable, screaming punkers were left in the dust with nothing but a drug habit. That's what the whole scene was like. It was really sad. Really disappointing. Jerry Nolan and Johnny Thunders and Stiv.so many of us died so young. I remember somebody said, "My father was in WWII, and he said that he has more friends (left) than I do." For me, punk rock is over and it served its purpose. I had to move on, and get into other types of music---heavier, scarier music. Angel Rot fulfills those desires.

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