Women In L.A. Punk - Part XIV - Rover

Rover is one of those girls who added life and color to the early punk scene and made it so interesting. She received one of the first wounds (six stitches in the scalp) in the "us against them" skirmishes that seem to occur whenever people are afraid or intolerant of those who look different from them. It's hard to imagine a time and place when having short, crazy-coloured hair could provoke a violent reaction from a stranger, but that is what it was like in the 1970's.

I had no idea that it was Rover who came up with the idea of selling "best friend" status for a quarter. After awhile, the idea caught on at the Canterbury and people would offer to be your friend for the price of a burger or if you agreed to help them out with something.

Rover's interview captures the youthful innocence that was part of the early punk days but which is often overlooked for the more sensational aspects of the scene. She remembers the "in crowd" being an "impossible clique to penetrate" and says that it was "self-protective, justly so." I only recall that my friends in the scene, Rover being one, made up a sort of extended family of like-minded individuals who were similarly outcast from "normal" society.

Click on the thumbnail to read Rover's interview.