Artist
Jesse Sublett, writer
Back on stage at the Continental Club with ex-Skunks bandmate Jon D. Graham, an ashen Jesse Sublett, all 120 pounds of him, looked like a junkie. His emaciated 6'3" frame was six months into treatment for a
cancer that had invaded his neck, requiring surgery and chemotherapy, and leaving his voice with a cool rasp. This Dec. 2 will mark two years since surgery, and the once cocky prince of Austin punk is doing fine.
"I was just conceited enough to think I could be a rock star, and I was just conceited enough to think I could get through this," Sublett said. "I guess I was saved by rock 'n' roll."
Sublett and future Go-Gos member Kathy Valentine played the first punk gig at Raul's with their band the Violators. It was during his later days as the frontman of the Skunks, arguably the hottest Austin band of its era, that Sublett began a love affair with hard-boiled mysteries a la Raymond Chandler and Dashiell Hammett. The Skunks song "Push Me Around" even includes vignettes straight from the James Cagney gangster flick "Public Enemy."
He's since written three mystery novels with such titles as " Boiled in Concrete" and "Tough Baby." All feature a--surprise--guitar-playing detective named Martin Fender. There's even serious talk of molding
Fender's adventures into a television series. Sublett also has penned the scripts for 30 television documentaries, including this year's "Killer Storm."
But the current project closest to his heart is the memoir he began writing to help him survive cancer treatment. The Johnson City native also will reflect on the exciting road he's traveled since leaving home.
"I haven't been bored since," Sublett said. "I haven't been fabulously successful at anything, but I've always been able to do creative stuff and have fun."
Kris Cummings, ceramic artist
It took 15 years, but Kris Cummings finally played keyboards again with nuevo wavo bandleader Joe "King" Carrasco. This time, Joe "King" was backing her as Cummings opened a show of ceramic art at San
Antonio's One Zero 6 Gallery.
"I felt like it was just yesterday that I was playing with him," Cummings said.
Joe "King" Carrasco and the Crowns originally confused punk audiences with their border-tinged, peppy music. The owners of Raul's, which began as a Tex-Mex bar before taking a turn to the punk, loved the band but the patrons weren't sold at first.
Cummings, who started begging her parents for piano at age 5 and finally won at age 12, grew up musically on classical and Professor Longhair. She happened into the Crowns after designed as album cover for Joe "King."
Cummings told Carrasco she'd stick with the band if he could get them a gig in New York City. Twomonths later they were performing at the Lone Star Cafe. CBGBs and the Mud Club followed.
"Word got back to Austin that we were playing at the Mudd Club and that was it," Cummings said. "We had been opening for the Standing Waves; now they were opening for us."
The rest was a whirlwind. Signed to Stiff Records, toured Europe, appeared on MTV. Quit the band. Had a baby. Cummings settled down in Wimberly with husband Joe Nick Patoski, and went back to school to
study art.
"Once my hands touched clay, that was it," Cummings said. "I like the shape, the form, what it represents. I try to ask questions about life and what we're doing here through my art."
That exploration has included giant locks, the corporate culture, big babies, chains and, in a show at St. Edward's University, masks.
"I feel like an alchemist and inventor at the same time," she said. "I'm jazzed. It's a great way to age. I don't want to be a rocker when I'm 60."