Joan Jett saluted by Sunset Strip Music Fest for her lifetime achievements, then announces a new one
Kevin Bronson on
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While the Sunset Strip Music Festival and the city of West Hollywood were busy looking backwards last week, veteran rocker Joan Jett was looking into the future.
No sooner had she been honored with a “Joan Jett Day” proclamation than Jett announced she would be releasing “Unvarnished,” Joan Jett and the Blackhearts’ 14th album and their first in seven years. The news on Friday followed a big Thursday, Aug. 1, tribute to the 54-year-old singer-guitarist-producer at the House of Blues, as part of SSMF’s annual festivities.
- Photos by Carl Pocket
Jett was feted by the likes of Margaret Cho, Carmen Electra, Pat Smear and Rodney Bingenheimer, with the KROQ DJ and “Mayor of the Sunset Strip” presenting her with a custom guitar made by Gibson. A founding member of the Runaways, Jett was a regular back in the early ’70s at Rodney Bingenheimer’s English Disco on the Strip. Roxy Theatre owner Nic Adler and Rainbow Bar & Grill owner Mikael Maglieri presented with the Elmer Valentine Award, named for late nightlife entrepreneur who had a hand in founding three venues on the Strip.
Thursday night’s crowd at the House of Blues was treated to a performance by Jett and her band, who mixed classics with new tunes from “Unvarnished.”
Evelyn McDonnell just wrote a well researched book on the Runaways called “queens of Noise”. I was browsing it at a Barnes and Noble, and it seems meticulously detailed, and it interviews most of the surviving key players from the band, and all those associated with that band.