Punching Nazis: A True Gilman Punk Rock Story

There’s a piece of Gilman lore that involves a huge fight between punks and nazis in the late 80s. And, the punks kick the nazis butts. So much, that they never show their face at Gilman again. This tale was documented in a scene in the excellent documentary Turn It Around: The Story of East Bay Punk. But now, it’s been fictionalized and used as the inspiration for a story in the new film, Freaky Tales. 

Today we look at this nazi punching Gilman lore. We talk to the Freaky Tale directors, Anna Boden and Ryan Fleck, to get a sense of how and why they adapted it for their film. We talk to Turn It Around director, Corbett Redford. And we talk to three Gilman punks that were there when it went down: Kamala Lyn Parks, George Hated and MDC singer Dave Dictor. 

We also learn how Operation Ivy factored into this whole thing. 

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If you like our theme song, go download the EP Lives by Slow Gherkin. They wrote the opening and closing songs for our podcast. You can get both tunes from their Lives EP. Also, check out Dan P and the Bricks two LPs. They provided the mid-roll ad transition music. 

Support the In Defense host Aaron Carnes by purchasing a copy of his book, In Defense of Ska. The 2nd, expanded edition of In Defense of Ska will release in Oct 2024. 

Co-host Adam Davis has a band called Omnigone. Their latest record, Against The Rest released on March 31, 2023. 

The In Defense of Ska editor Chris Reeves runs a record label called Ska Punk International. They have new releases coming out all the time.

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