Old punks on the block
A new podcast warmly remembers a Wichita punk era nearly forgotten (even by its own members)
Punk’s not dead in Kansas.
Never was. Hopefully never will be.
For one punk era in Wichita, bands like Uncle Scam and Sexxxplosion! carried the banner for the scene. Or maybe it was Crooked Grin or Van or Astrovan, or whatever that band called themselves on any particular night while ripping through fast songs, jugs of vodka and the literal walls of a series of run-down apartments in south-central Wichita.
Two members of those bands have a new podcast exploring the punk scene in Wichita from about 1995-1999. Called A Prairie Punk House Companion, it features former Wichita residents Nick Scott (Neckbone) and Jeremy Bennett (JerBear) doing their best to remember a few years when they were often very drunk. It’s a loving, “I can’t believe I survived” sort of recollection, and both of the hosts are reflecting from a place of hard-earned stability: They are both in their mid-40s and have kids and jobs. Scott drinks “an occasional craft beer” and Bennett just picked up his 10-year sobriety chip.
“These are fun stories, but these weren’t always fun times. And part of dealing with our situation was self-medicating,” Bennett says in the podcast’s third episode.
Nick Scott and Jeremy Bennet are the hosts of Prairie Punk House Podcast. In each episode, they reminisce about their younger, drunker years as part of punk scenes in Wichita and elsewhere. Courtesy photos.
Theirs wasn’t the first punk scene in Wichita, nor the last. It takes an anchor band to keep a punk scene from drifting for a bit, explains Darren DeFrain, head of the writing program at Wichita State and co-author of the forthcoming book “No Choice But Action: A Critical History of Kansas Postpunk (1976-1995).”
For a time, that linchpin band was The Embarrassment, who were “way ahead of their time” during their 1979-1983 heyday, DeFrain said. The Embarrassment amassed critical acclaim and served as an inspiration for many post-punk acts that followed. They retained the status of “the best band you’ve never heard of” alongside the Lawrence-based punk act Get Smart!, which had a similar fate.
Fifteen years later, Scott and Bennett found a home in a different Wichita punk scene, one they helped create. Scott was “a standard Star Trek nerd” and attended a Catholic private school in Wichita until his junior year of high school. He rebelled against school and then everything else, and coupled with his discovery of the 1994 album “Punk in Drublic” by NOFX, the punk scene called.
With the help of massive amounts of Aquanet, Scott soon had a mohawk. When he delivered pizzas in Wichita, he tucked his mohawk under a cap and it looked like he had a bad mullet. The punk scene was always just below the radar for most Wichitans, but it was there — fueling its alcohol addiction by hauling pepperoni pizzas to the roughest parts of town.
Bennett, meanwhile, was into hair metal bands like Mötley Crüe. He somewhat begrudgingly admits it was the album “Dookie” by Green Day that first made him realize there was more out there. Next came “Punk-O-Rama Vol. 1,” a punk compilation from Epitaph Records that featured songs by Rancid, Bad Religion and NOFX. He first heard the compilation at a mall in Wichita and listened to the entire album in the store when that was something you could still do. Punk called him, too.
“I had tried to fit in and it just didn’t work,” he said. “And if I couldn’t fit in, I wanted to stand out.”
Bennett showed up to the first day of his junior year of high school in full liberty spikes, which get their name from the Statue of Liberty’s crown.
“I didn’t expect the reaction I got. It was fear,” Bennett said.
The podcast debuted in March, born in part because the 20th anniversary of the timeline in question brought back fond memories for the hosts. The stories seemed perfect for a few mediums, but with Scott no longer living in the Wichita area, a podcast became the most practical option.
A Prairie Punk House Companion contains 20 episodes and counting. It primarily chronicles what it was like living in Wichita when their microscale punk scene existed. The hosts interview each other about those halcyon days and also bring on guests, often those who didn’t technically live with them but crashed on their couch six nights a week anyway. The musical output and the particular bands who played the scene’s various shows are secondary to the lifestyle they created, the neo-Nazis they clashed with and the neighbors they certainly pissed off. If you lived on East Harry Street or North Kansas Street in Wichita during those years, your former neighbors are as sorry as they can be without apologizing for their actions.
At its core, the podcast “is about the sense of community, and about chosen family,” Bennett said.
DeFrain, who grew up in Salt Lake City and discovered its scene before carrying his love of punk rock to each stop on his journey through academia, said that punk scenes are destined to emerge when flyover-state conservatism meets youthful angst. Similar punk pockets are found throughout the Midwest, including in Lawrence and Kansas City. Bennett and Scott spent time in both locations, and several podcast episodes explore their time in those cities.
Scenes fade temporarily when the primary bands stop performing, DeFrain said, or because of saturation. If there are only a few hardcore punk bands operating in a market at a given time, it’s hard to sustain interest when the same three bands perform every weekend. There are still punk rock shows in Wichita, and DeFrain specifically lauds the band The Cavves, which blend surf and punk rock sounds.
Scott and Bennett left Wichita in 1999 to try their fortunes in Kansas City. Bennett moved back to Wichita to try and get sober, which didn’t take with his first few attempts. He joined a new band in Wichita that was finding success, but continuing would have likely involved a tour to help the band reach the next level. He was preparing to get married, so he left the band instead.
Because he moved back to the Wichita area, Bennett said he has more content for Wichita-focused episodes. They will likely continue until all the stories are told and until all their scene mates have been interviewed. In the meantime, the duo has launched the Prairie Punk Press and started a companion podcast called “Punk Movie Review” where they rate movies based on how punk rock they are.
The content, however niche, is finding an audience. The hosts recently received an email from a listener in Canada who said it reminds him of the days he spent living in a punk house on the Canadian prairie.
And if Neckbone and JerBear can capture a few Wichita moments for posterity’s sake, they’ll have done their job. They knew they were on to something the first time they sat down to record.
“My god, it all came flooding back,” Scott said.
“So many things happened, but so much of it is forgotten,” Bennett said.
Until the next episode, that is.
The Details
A Prairie Punk House Companion
A new podcast by two former scene members, A Prairie Punk House Companion discusses what it was like living as a punk rocker in Wichita in the late 1990s and also discusses the punk scenes in Lawrence, Kan., and Kansas City, Mo. As much as the podcast is about music, it’s also about enduring friendship and chosen communities.
Because the episodes discuss drug and alcohol use and feature adult language, the podcast is recommended for mature audiences.
Listen to A Prairie Punk House Companion on Apple Podcasts, Google Podcasts, Spotify, and other podcast apps. You can also listen using any web browser.
Kevin Kinder never learned to play an instrument but has written about music for more than two decades just the same. He’s a freelance writer and journalism educator. l
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