Punk Rock, The Music Las Vegas Would Never Play, Now Gets A Museum There

The Punk Rock Museum opened in Las Vegas on April 1. Appropriately, this shrine to the music of alienation and rebellion is not in a glitzy casino, but in a black commercial building between Industrial Avenue and the 15 Freeway, where punk music plays on speakers all day long.

Las Vegas is usually more associated with the likes of Frank Sinatra, Elvis Presley, Celine Dion, and Adele than with Johnny Rotten, the Dead Boys or Black Flag. Yet the Punk Rock Museum is one of Sin City’s most anticipated new attractions, celebrating the loud, rebellious music that defined the 1970s and is still important today.

The museum sheds light on the punk movement, not just break-out stars like the Ramones, the Clash, Sex Pistols, and Nirvana. It features women from Patti Smith to Siouxsie Sioux to Blondie’s Debbie Harry to pioneering Latina punk Alice Bags. So too are today’s punkers and those from the Las Vegas scene. Indeed, we met a young punk who had come to see his band immortalized in an exhibit.

The 12,0000 square foot museum lets guests celebrate the punk lifestyle as well as enjoy hundreds of sacred relics from five decades of punk. There’s even a soundproof room where would-be punks can pick up an instrument and slam away—a time-honored punk tradition!

The Jam Room lets guests play instruments donated by punk musicians. Chris Shiflett from Me First and The Gimme Gimmes donated his green guitar, and Pete Koller from Sick Of It All his white ESP Viper, among musicians hoping to inspire a new generation of punks.

Lifestyle events can also be celebrated at the Punk Rock Museum. The museum includes a 25-seat “wedding/wake chapel” for marriages and remembrances, the Triple Down bar for toasting punkers past and future, and, coming soon, a tattoo shop for making memories permanent. Tattoos, piercings, customized tour jackets and the occasional safety pin are common among both museum guests and workers. If you’ve come incognito, clothing and other merchandise is available at the museum shop as you walk in.

The Punk Rock Museum, two years in the planning, officially opened on April 1. On April 15, the museum also celebrated its first wedding. Two radio personalities from Philadelphia, Matt Lindenmuth and Marisa Magnatta, tied the knot in suitable attire. Their officiant, a long-time friend, included the lyrics to Rancid’s Honor Is All We Know in the ceremony.

You too can have a punk wedding at the museum, with packages including the fifteen-minute Partners In Crime and more elaborate Till Death Do Us Punk. The premium Til Death Do Us Punk package includes an hour’s rental of the chapel, the ceremony, and a mini reception. As an add-on, you can even pick from a list of punk rockers to be witnesses to your wedding.

Launching the museum was a labor of love for former NOFX front man Mike “Fat Mike” Burkett and a group of friends and investors who include skater and mogul Tony Hawk and Brett Gurewitz, lead guitarist of Bad Religion.

The museum includes photographs, posters, records (gold and otherwise), painted jackets, the mold for Devo’s ‘helmets,’ and instruments. There’s an image of Kurt Cobain of Nirvana sitting on a couch—with the couch below the photograph.

In addition to the permanent collection, the museum also features rotating exhibits. Currently there are two photography exhibits on display. One is “Los Punks: The Backyard Punk Scenes in East Los Angeles and South Central, 2013-2016,” with photographs by Angela Boatwright. The other is “In The Beginning Photographs From the Dawn of New Wave, Punk Rock & Hardcore, with photographs by Rikki Ercoli, curated by Jason Hamacher.

Las Vegas has an interesting collection of museums celebrating 20^th and 21^st century history and culture. There’s the Mob Museum, the Neon Museum, the Atomic Museum and now, the Punk Museum. All have docents, but few can top the Punk Rock Museum which has live tours by live punk rockers.

General admission tickets are $30, or you can set up a guided tour with a punk guide at $100. Former members of Social Distortion, L7, Suicidal Tendencies, the Germs, Bad Religion. the Circle Jerks, and C.J. Ramone of the Ramones are among those giving the 60-to-75-minute tours.

Pete Koller from Sick Of It All, is one of the tour guides. He says, “I am very excited to share my stories about some of the exhibits at the punk rock museum. Even if I don’t know the true story, I will make some s**t up for you.”

Or as the museum website puts it, “Never mind the Bollocks, Here’s THE PUNK ROCK MUSEUM!

THE PUNK ROCK MUSEUM is located at 1422 Western Ave, Las Vegas, NV 89102, between the Arts District and I-15.