The news of Henry Rollins being a Calvin Klein model surfaced back in July. It seems as though a billboard of Rollins' ad just went up in New York City's lower east side, formerly a punk mecca and now a gentrified strip mall of high end clothing stores.
Naturally, this has led to some negative criticism of Rollins on social media, so much so that Cro-Mags frontman John Joseph felt the need to stand up for his fellow punk, telling everybody to calm the fuck down. Speaking on his Facebook page, Joseph said:
I've known this dude for 36+ years. Since the early D.C./ S.O.A. days. He's done mad sh*t for punk/hardcore and still does. Any of you dudes hating and popping shit would do this in a second (in a f*cking thong) if you got offered the dough from Calvin Klein. And he's giving props here to Black Flag and the Misfits.
Honestly, I do not see what Rollins did as selling out, and clearly Rollins doesn't see that as well. In fact, he went on a whole rant about how the term "selling out" is misunderstood on his old IFC show, saying:
“I wonder if it ever occurred to people that the reason the music of these interesting and alternative bands is being recruited [for advertisements] is because their fans are now the ones calling the shots. In other words, we have arrived. Of course the ad is trying to sell you something, and to gain your confidence by exploiting the band’s integrity for a commercial end. So what? You’re not a fucking moron, are you? You see through that, don’t you? What would you rather hear? Iggy and the Teddy Bears doing ‘I’m a Punk Rocker’ in a car ad, or enduring some generic background music? Do you have any idea what some of these bands went through to make that music? The fact that there might be some money for them all these years later is great. You think that paycheck is in anyway a slight to their integrity? Are you fucking kidding me? Pay them. Pay them double. Pay them now. It’s about fucking time.”
So everybody needs to just calm down.
