A rock & roll correspondence

At a recent show, we had time to pick through my own boxes of covers.  We put one box together hastily the night before without looking at the covers in any detail.  It turned out that there were some neat items in there...

These were covers from a single correspondence, with some creative ones with hand-drawn and collage elements.  One was a heavily illustrated piece of wood.  They all went to John Teagle (alternately Johnny or Johnnie) of Akron, Ohio, who saved them and may have been a stamp collector as well.  They were dated 1981 to 1989.

Clearly the senders were artists of some kind, so the recipient would also be a creator of some kind.  One mentions a 1989 concert: "went to see the Dragsters last night (Sunday 19 at CBGB)" and "Dave Janusko met Todd, chatted."  You mean this Dave Janusko?

Another sender was in Florida in 1981, said they heard "the fmodels single (it was really bad) and they went and saw the rockets.  One from Manchester, England (1984) said there was an Akron band playing last week "Jane Aire and the Bellvadaires", also "going to see Billy Bragg this weekend."

Jane Aire was indeed from Akron.   I figured the postcard writer spelled the Belvederes wrong.  Here they are. 

Billy Bragg can be found here.

Clearly these were musicians and music lovers.  Sounds like rock and punk and post-punk.

Some of these would qualify as mail art.  And there was s postcard for the First Annual Postcard Show at the Vox Gallery in Akron (July 4-30, 1987) which sounds like a mail art event to me.

But what about the focus of all this mail, John Teagle of Akron?  Here is a fine, lengthy recollection of his life in the Akron Beacon Journal 30 March 2023.

There's so much to say here.  He was the founder of The Walking Clampetts, with 43 years of live shows of rockabilly, surf and rock music, opening for the Stray Cats, Smithereens, and Los Lobos.  And many more, I'm sure.  He wrote books on guitars and amplifiers and articles for Guitar Player magazine.  Sounds like I guy I would have enjoyed seeing live.

If that link is blocked by the paywall, try this article in Vintage Guitar Magazine.

Of course Youtube has videos of the band playing.  Here's a show from 2022.

As for the covers themselves, there's nothing special about them from a philatelic perspective.  At the time, I put them in a sleeve and labeled it "Creative Correspondence - $6".  But I doubt I could even get that much.  To me, having spent an enjoyable time research this piece, these little scraps are priceless.  I do try to keep all correspondences together when I find them.  I wonder how many others got lost over the years.