-
Featured News
Sylvain Sylvain, 1951-2021: The Teenage News Checks Out
AN APPRECIATION BY TIM STEGALL The current issue of Ugly Things contains a heartfelt tribute from Tim Stegall to New York Dolls guitarist Syl Sylvain, written in January after his passi
-
Featured Articles
Tina: New HBO documentary and a 1975 interview
By Harvey Kubernik SINGER/PERFORMER and author Tina Turner will be the subject of an HBO documentary from the filmmakers who were behind the acclaimed Searching for Sugar Man and Whitn
-
Bert Jansch – 1943-2011
by Alan Bisbort
“The Death of Bert Jansch” sounds like the name of a traditional folk song that Jansch himself might have resurrected on one of his early solo albums. Sadly, this imaginary song came true on October 5, 2011, when the legendary musician—whom Neil Young likened to “Jimi Hendrix on the acoustic guitar” and whose cross-generational influence is admitted by the likes of Keith Richards, Jimmy Page, Donovan, Johnny Marr, Joanna Newsom, Beth Orton and Devendra Banhart—died at age 67 after a battle with cancer. (more…)
The Phantom Brothers – Germany’s Wildest Beat Group
An Interview with Olgerd Wokock by Mike Stax, with Anja Dixson
(This article was originally published in UGLY THINGS #24)

The Phantom Brothers, 1965. L to R: Rudi Kruger, Horst Kruger, Olgerd Wokock, Wolfgang Wokock (Photo by Astrid Kirchherr)
In my personal Sixties rock’n’roll pantheon Germany’s Phantom Brothers occupy a special place near the very top of the heap. I actually became a fan of the group before I’d even heard a note of their music, my enthusiasm based entirely on a set of photos in the German pictorial book, The Beat Age. Surly and stone-faced, decked out in leather and stripes, and with a lead singer with hair down past his shoulders—in early 1965!—they exuded style and attitude. And the live shots, with that singer shaking maracas and tambourine together, and a guitar player windmilling his arm Townshend-style, suggested a sound that couldn’t be anything less than flat-out WILD, man.