Photography | Paul Zone's 'Playground'

Detail: Tommy Moonie, Mandy Zone, Peter Hoffman, Miki Zone (The Fast) / Abbey Theatre, June, 1973.

Paul Zone was just a kid from Brooklyn when he and his brothers first took the stage of legendary venues including Max’s Kansas City, Mercer Arts Center, Club 82, and CBGBs during the pivotal glam rock and punk eras of the 1970s and 80s. As a member of The Fast, the teenage Zone had backstage access to everyone on the scene, from the rock royalty and drag queens to the actors and drug fiends. Armed with inexpensive cameras, Zone photographed his friends as they blazed a path that would one day become among the most heroic periods of modern music.

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Dee Dee Ramone (The Ramones) & Connie Gripp / Max’s Kansas City’s kitchen, 1975.

“Photographing at big concerts rarely worked out, but when we would go to the clubs I was always comfortable snapping away at friends and bands I knew. And everyone was our friend (it was so easy to meet people at small clubs), and almost everyone was in a band, or thinking about starting one. The New York Dolls; Wayne County; Debbie Harry and Chris Stein; and Patti Smith and Suicide were already performing in 1973 and 1974, and my brothers’ band, The Fast, began cementing themselves into the scene as well. By 1975 the underground had expanded with the Ramones, Television, and Talking Heads. Taking photos during my nights out was natural, comfortable, and satisfying. Friends wouldn’t be on guard and never shied away from my lens. I was close to them, I was trusted, and no one felt I was being intrusive.”

Lou Reed / Academy of Music, December 21, 1973.

The result is a sumptuous scrapbook, a veritable who’s who of the scene, a compendium of snapshot photography that is as warm and welcoming as your own family album. Included in Playground are never-before-seen photographs of bands including Iggy and the Stooges, the Dead Boys, T. Rex, and KISS, as well as musicians, artists, and scenesters such as Richard Hell, Johnny Thunders, Lou Reed, Alice Cooper, Lance Loud, Stephen Sprouse, Christopher Makos, Anya Phillips, Cherry Vanilla, Arturo Vega, Anna Sui, Sable Starr, James Chance, and Lydia Lunch, among others.