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Featured News
Patti Smith Upcoming Tour for 50th Anniversary of Horses
By Harvey Kubernik “Horses was like the first cannon blast in a war – frightening and disorienting. I mean, she was so unlike the FM radio terrain in every way. She was literate, aggress
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Featured Articles
BOB DYLAN: A Birthday Salute
By Harvey Kubernik May 24 is Bob Dylan’s birthday. Bob Dylan’s ongoing influence is evident on the Bear Family Records’ 2024 compilation He Took us by Storm: 25 lost classics fr
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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.