“Explaining her potential move to Texas, Cervenka says, ‘I have tons of close friends in Austin, I love the music, I always have a magical time there.” She continues, “The other reason I’m moving, if the creek don’t rise, is that when I moved to California in 1976, Jerry Brown was governor. It was barefoot hippie girls, Hell’s Angels on the Sunset Strip, East L.A. lowriders, the ocean and nature. It was this fabulous incredible place about freedom. Now when I think about California, I think of a liberal oppressive police state and regulations and taxes and fees. I’d rather go someplace and have my own little place out on the edge of town. I’m a country girl at heart. It makes me happy when I see people in Texas open-carrying. It makes me feel safe. I’m not even a gun owner, but I’d like to see a gun rack in every pickup truck, like my boyfriend had when I was fifteen years old in Florida. An armed society is a polite society.'” Exene Cervenka quoted in X’s Exene Cervenka Cleans Out Her Closet [via rollingstone.com] [h/t SA]

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80 COMMENTS

    • No joke. Whereas X were seminal LA Proto-punk, John Doe went the Alt-Country route and movies, and Exene… Exene is Cowpunkette par excellence.

      And, as the best ones invariably do, she left the Liberalism of her youth in the dust.

      Nicely done, Exene!!

  2. It is true; the hippy love generation rebelling against authority, rebelling against the man; are now the oppressive ruling class. They became their parents X 100.

    • they always wondered why “the man” acted the way he did, until they got a taste of the power themselves, loved the shit out of that feeling, and never turned back.

  3. Not all of us! We’re still into “free love.” Why, I love my Glock 23 AND my Romanian AK-47 knock-off equally! I love the sound of gunfire; the sound of FREEDOM. I still wear a peace sign, because I believe in peace. Peace through superior firepower. Plus, there’s nothing sexier than a girl with a flower in her hair… and an AR-15 in her hands. (Oleg Volk, you’re my hero!) Peace, y’all!

  4. It would be nice to see Texan’s walking around with their hog legs in vintage Safety Speeds. To me thats part of Texas.

    • Which brings up my question again – It is legal in Texas to Open Carry a vintage six-shooter. I forget the details, but I believe it has to be an actual antique, manufactured before a specific date, and use only black powder propellant. Is there any (unconstitutional) law, regulation or restriction in Texas prohibiting the open carrying of such a pistol in a holster while still carrying a modern pistol concealed?

      This would seem to be a very workable compromise for the Open Carry aficionados and maintain the Texas “Hogleg” heritage, even if your open carry was just a .36 Navy Colt.

      • Last I checked there was no statute of limitations on my right to keep and bear. I’ll hold out for the unrestricted constitutional carry.

  5. Free love and free guns sounds about right to me. Could do without all the drugs though, just the sex and guns is good enough for me.

  6. Not sure we need any more aging hippy chicks in Texas, we already have enough home grown ones, as it is. If you didn’t have enough sense to leave California at the end of “free love era”, you don’t need to move here. If you are not interested in self defense, Texas tax payers do not need to spend more money on adding more LOs to save your candy a**, which they can’t get there in time to do it anyway.
    LOs are for the purpose of taking notes and writing reports, oh and writing traffic tickets.

    • I think the implication of the article is supposed to say “pro-2A hippy chick with guns”

    • The nice thing about freedom of movement is that she doesn’t need to ask anyone’s opinion, either to leave Cali or to enter Texas.

  7. Well that quote surprised me. Was expecting it to go a completely different direction.

    I will give it this: Texas prides itself on independent people. You want to believe in God, well then raise your hands up. You want to believe in country music, play it loudly. You want to believe whatever, well then if they aren’t that way downtown, they damn sure on the edge of town. You believe that today is a perfect day to blow through some ammo, there’s a caliche or gravel pit just waiting for you. You want room to do or believe what you want, then you can always move a bit further out of town until you find the room you need. You want to believe that the old Southwest Conference was the gold standard of college football, well there’s drugs you can take to make reality less painful (grin).

    Texas has a lot going for it, I admit, but I think this native Texan will stay where he is in New Mexico, because Texas just doesn’t have enough altitude. And New Mexico allows those hoglegs in vintage holsters when you cruise into town in your beater pickup. And mountains. Those are nice here too.

    • There are mountains in far West Texas, where I like to hang out, but they’re not as numerous or as high as in lovely NM.

    • Old hag. Maybe now. She’s 59. My mother’s age But I assure you that if time travel is ever invented, she will be one of my next stops after I go back and have a three way with the Gabor twins in there 20’s.

    • Whether you care for the type of music, or not; her band was a pioneering force in shaping the direction of underground rock&roll to come. Youth sub-cultures are often an undercurrent in pushing back against establishment authoritarianism. The underground alternative music scene has always had a strong DIY and “think for yourself” ethos to the culture. She is someone who probably still carries a lot of gravitas in alternative music circles. Admittedly, those circles have often gravitated to socially liberal ideologies. But, when someone who is respected within her own tribe surprises her peers by stepping over to our side of the line in the sand, it can trigger a shift as other influential musicians muster the courage to do the same. Young people are full of piss and vinegar, and they often look to their cultural icons when developing the compass of their worldview. I can tell you first hand, that the Ron Paul-ian and Libertarian crowd has made major inroads in changing the direction of much of the dis-illusioned younger generation coming through their college years. We are fighting a culture war for the heart of this Republic. You ask who this freak is and why anyone should care? Hearts and minds, sir. Hearts and minds.

        • For the record, I also didn’t get the Lyle Lovett reference, though I really enjoyed the video below. I thought the line, “That’s Right, You’re Not From Texas” was a reference to her statement that “It makes me happy when I see people in Texas open-carrying.” Y’know, since that can’t legally actually happen in the state of Texas (unless it’s a black powder pistol). I thought it was a reference to the fact that she holds reverence for an idea, not something that exists in reality.

        • Same here! Even though she and I are of the same generation, I never heard of her. But then, I’m famously clueless in these matters….

          • Yeah, my understanding is that there are quite a few California bands who were at the heart and core of the early punk rock scene, and though I had my punk phase (for a decade or so), I’ve still never heard of them. I’ve heard of the people who were influenced or inspired by them, but not the originators, a member of which I guess X is.

            Another one would be Social Distortion, who I’ve heard of, enjoyed in the past, and like now. But they weren’t the absolutely massive generational touchstone for me that apparently they were for people of my age who lived in (or at least closer to) California.

      • I love it. What can I say, I prefer X from before she learned how to sing (compare and contrast this video with the one at the top of the page, if nothing else, she’s learned to sing).

        I do find it amusing that at about the same time this came up, the ninth circuit essentially overturned California’s public carry handgun restrictions (well, part of the logic of the overturning of the concealed carry restrictions was that you couldn’t open carry).

          • …Really?

            I feel like since you were one of the ones that had “concerns” about censorship in the recent Housekeeping post, this is just you trolling to get zapped.

            It’s funny how over there you were all “sometimes you have to call an ass an ass” and “self-defense is a full-contact sport, so let’s not get to sensitive about how we talk about it,” which was only partly the areas we were trying to address, but at the first opportunity, you go all locker-room humor, which was most assuredly an area we were trying to address.

        • http://m.youtube.com/watch?v=kHoKYulJPhk

          It’s a movie reference, zap it if you wish…

          I don’t have concerns about TTAG, I was just expressing my opinion as a reader and commenter, it’s y’all’s site to do with it as you wish.

          I like hanging out on here, it’s something I do for me time, but I’m not stressing over it, I assure you.

          If you can’t tell by my sense of humor I don’t take too much seriously, can’t take life too seriously, none of us make it out alive anyways.

          • Haha, see, I’m the guy that said, “I don’t know what that means.” “It’s a saying.” “I don’t think so.”

            My apologies for overreacting (even if it was minor). I’m leaving it here as a testament to my fallibility.

      • PHLBT! I’ve owned a Collings. Martin STILL makes better guitars in that price range. They also make some moderately priced instruments, which Collings doesn’t do. If you compare $4000.00 guitars from both makers, Martin still makes a warmer, sweeter voiced guitar.

    • I saw Lyle under the big tent in Newport several years ago. I managed to stay awake, but it was a major struggle.

  10. I’m an old hippie. I hate violence. That’s why I carry a gun. It prevents violence (or, at least keeps it twenty or so feet away).

    And no – not all of the kids in the sixties grew up to be leftist oppressors.

  11. Who? I’m 60 & I must be ought of the loop.
    Don’t all you Texas guys complain about Austin being some sort of leftwing liberal commie enclave? This woman doesn’t even own a gun…just a fashion accessory to her.

  12. Some of the hippies’ ideas – like more personal freedom and less government – were good. Too bad that most of them forgot about those principles along the way.

  15. A GREAT example of a REAL Liberal with an open mind!

    That’s what liberalism is supposed to be about, having an open mind and promoting freedom, not opperssion and regulation.

  17. Hmmm… Listening to celebrities again, I see.

    Seriously, though: “I don’t own a gun, but feel better with a lot of them around…”

    Right on!

  18. So, this lass is denouncing liberal oppression and waxing poetic about our rights to do what we please and we’re crapping on her because she’s an aging musician we’ve never heard of? Did this place turn old, crabby and intolerant overnight? Might as well start wearing our pants way up high and complaining about the damn kids and their hair. Sheesh.

    • Damn kids and their long hair!

      … That reminds me, I need a haircut. Getting below the shoulders again.

      • I always wanted long hair. Unfortunately, mine grows up instead of down. I’d shoot for the Jim Morrison look and end up looking like Mark Twain, instead. Or a Chia Pet.

        • One of my favorite authors, yup. I love the guy. I just didn’t want to look like him when I was a free-wheeling gadabout. Although, if I could grow a sweet Twain mustache, by God, I’d do it.

        • I actually cut mine a few years back. Was getting too damn hot and time-consuming. Do need a haircut though.

          My driver’s license picture is from before I cut my hair and got glasses. Fewer T-shirts and more collared shirts, too. I get more than a few double takes when I show my ID. 😀

          Also, Mark Twain ‘stache = bad ass.

  19. Face it. She probably voted straight Dem for the last 35 years, if she bothered to vote for anybody. Now the state’s become too expensive for her, so she’s looking for some other music scene, preferably in a cheaper state with no income tax, and one which won’t take her house in a bankruptcy proceeding. All that stuff about “feeling safe with lots of guns around” is cheap talk, not what she lived or voted for. And she’s going to Austin, not San Antonio.

    • Maybe she voted that way, maybe she didn’t. But you can’t fault a person for finally coming to their senses. Isn’t that what we are trying to achieve? Don’t we want folks to understand that liberalism is the rust consuming the infrastructure of our Republic? By the way, there are plenty of Diehard conservatives in Austin. As a resident of San Antonio I can assure you that the local government is packed full of people who espouse radical liberal ideologies. Our mayor supports being an “Amnesty” city which doesn’t enforce immigration laws, and we are the only city in Texas where automatic knives are still illegal to carry.

  20. If she doesn’t own a gun but feels safe with guns around, she might want to consider moving to Mexico. I understand that Michoacan is lovely this time of year.

  22. She’s no Johnette Napolitano, a gun-hating liberal if there ever was one (see “God is a Bullet) but I love her, anyway.

  23. Hey cute andfuzzy my wife’s 54 & she’s the hottest woman on earth…& my ex-wife is 63 & a very close 2nd. Actresses & singers.
    And they aint white hags.

  24. “An armed society is a polite society” More BS rhetoric, old and worn out…Try telling that to the gangbangers, and b4 anyone gets their panties in a wad, like it or not, gangbangers are part of society…

    • The quote is from “Beyond This Horizon” by Robert A. Heinlein, copyright 1948.

      Gun people love this quote, “An armed society is a polite society,” but too many times this paraphrase is misunderstood since it was taken out of context. Here is the complete paragraph:

      “Well, in the first place, an armed society is a polite society. Manners are good when one may have to back up his acts with his life. For me, politeness is the sine qua non of civilization. That’s a personal evaluation only. But gunfighting has a strong biological use. We do not have enough things that kill off the weak and stupid these days. But to stay alive as an armed citizen a man has to be either quick with his wits or with his hands, preferably both. It’s a good thing.”

      Perhaps the concept would be more precise to say, “A society where EVERYONE is armed tends to be a polite society.” Even gang-bangers tend to be polite to each other unless some rule of their social order is violated, at which time they go off and start shooting, a perfect real-world example of the adage. Even gang-bangers do not go around shooting each other just for sport.

      And it can be shown that in American neighborhoods where the citizens can be and ARE armed, there is a significant paucity of gang-bangers and other impolite criminal types.

      Before criticizing a popular quotation it might be a worthwhile exercise to research the origin of the quote. If you have not read Heinlein the Interwebz is still a great place for such research.

  25. She can sing, that’s what counts (you listening, Kanye West?), and her taste in music has certainly improved.

    All she needs is the waft of a little gun smoke in the morning, that’ll fix her.

    Pity nobody else came to her garage sale…

  26. Texas is one of the only states in the union where I like rednecks. It’s why I moved here.

    Different sub classes of people vary from region to region. In West Virginia I pretty much despised the entire culture of the area. In Texas I can understand and respect everyone from the highest level executives, to the good ol’ boys on the ranch, to the inner city guys downtown listening to ‘Pac.

    I just really love this state. The fact it is enormous and I can go to any type of country all in one state is just icing on the cake.

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