(antiMusic) If you haven't noticed, we absolutely love Gibson's site. While it's great for musicians, with tips, lessons and allows you to salivate over that sweet Les Paul you've been dreaming of buying, their decision to make the site a destination for music fans in general has succeeded. Once of our favorite features is their "lists," mostly because they come up with interesting topics not the same old "top guitar licks" etc, etc. They published such a list this week that caught our eye. They researched some of the most notorious rock cults. We're talking real cults, not insane fans of karaoke singers from TV contests. While the lead off cult in their article, the Manson Family, is widely known, we discovered a couple we hadn't heard of. Here is one of those:
Circle One was the cult-like group that sprung up around Darby Crash and L.A.'s most notorious punk band, the Germs. Both Crash and guitarist Pat Smear met while attending an alternative high school with loose affiliations to scientology and a curriculum vaguely centered on methods of mind control. Crash took these lessons to heart and over the course of the band's lifespan attracted a large contingent of punk rock outcasts, disaffected teens, and runaways who followed Crash's every word. The mark of "Circle One," as they were dubbed, was a cigarette burn or "Germs Burn" as it's better known. The burn originated from Darby and you could only get a burn from someone who already had one. - Read more about Circle One and other rock cults here