Teenage Head: "Teen Beer Drinking Party", Toronto, 1980

This will be the first video to share on my new ‘Monday Memories’ series…I have over 1300 videos I’ve filmed since 1980…covering the ‘live music’ scene in Toronto and surrounding cities plus some videos I’ve filmed over the years in New Orleans, Negril Jamaica, Montreal and Vancouver Island. Toronto is and has always been an amazing city for ‘Live Music’ since the 1960’s….please check these videos out every Monday when I post them…then make plans to visit Toronto and its world-class music scene!

This was the very first music video I ever filmed…I had just graduated from university and was working at a local tv station in Toronto operating a big ‘studio camera’ shooting ‘news’ and various ethnic ‘talk shows’…when out of the blue (on an off weekend for me) my close friend Jeff Gruen a fellow university classmate got the 2 of us a ‘free-lance’ gig filming this legendary local punk rock band called ‘Teenage Head’…I begged the Producer to let me do the ‘handheld’ camera position that was on the floor in front of the stage…that was the beginning of my love affair with filming ‘live music’ and sharing it with the world.

Teenage Head was formed in 1975.
They spent a couple of years practicing in their garage before hitting the club scene in Toronto. Influenced by the requisite CBGB crowd, the group also loved early rock & rollers like Elvis Presley, Eddie Cochran, Gene Vincent, and Chuck Berry.

Often billed as Canada's answer to the Ramones, Teenage Head were in truth just as much a new wave band as they were a punk rock outfit. They had a similar affection for pre-Beatles rock & roll, especially rockabilly, as well as a sense of trashy fun that made them a terrific party band when they were on. Their songs were unpretentious celebrations of all the classic rock & roll staples: cars, booze, girls, partying, and teenage rebellion.

By May 1978, they released their first single "Picture My Face" on Epic Records, and their self-titled debut, Teenage Head, followed a year later, which went gold. The band's performance at The Last Pogo concert on December 1, 1978, at The Horseshoe Tavern in Toronto, ended in a riot and was shut down by the police. The concert was made into a short film by Colin Brunton, The Last Pogo.

In June 1980 their performance at Toronto's Ontario Place sparked a riot. The incident made headlines across the country, and led Ontario Place to ban rock concerts for several years. Their 1983 record Tornado was marked by controversy, with the band's new American label MCA Records demanding that they change their name to 'Teenage Heads' to placate the more conservative American audience and to avoid the double-entendre.