Video Vérité - The Films of Alan and Susan Raymond

LANCE AND THE MUMPS


After the broadcast of An American Family in 1973, Lance Loud moved to New York to follow his rock and roll dreams of creating a band. Lance and his childhood friend Kristian Hoffman started a punk rock band called The Mumps during the late seventies. They wrote their own music and created their vision of a new age rock band.
"Too pop for punk, too 'old school' for the New Wave. Mumps were a 70's era New York rock band, out of time. Everything about us was contradictory or cockeyed in a fashion era in which motorcycle jackets, Mohawk hairdos, torn clothing and lots and lots of chains were the order of the day, we were the band most often seen in jackets, dress shirts and ties. Our high vaunting musical ambitions were matched with low ranking musical expertise, we had a lead singer who could sweat better than he could stay in key, and besides the fact that three of us were gay in a hetero-heavy field which only acknowledged homosexuality as being a passing marketing ploy in David Bowie's career. The only thing shared between us all was our weird combination of superiority and insecurity... Our music spoke to the true misfit class of American teenager. Not the poetic James Dean type dream outcast, but the real, nerdy, nobody wants em, Forgotten Teens. You know the type. Too square to be down with the home boys, too idiotic to be up with the intellectuals, too insecure to be the center of attention and too impatient to just sit at home and wait until they get to be 21." - Lance Loud '94		Click above to hear Rock and This, Rock and Roll That

Lance was the up front, over-the-top lead singer. Kristian Hoffman played keyboards and wrote most of the lyrics while Toby Duprey played guitar, Paul Rutner was on drums and Kevin Kiely backed them up on bass. The Mumps played in the rock 'n roll dungeons of the downtown punk rock scene in New York in the late 1970's at CBGB's and Max's Kansas City. They were the first New York band to play in L.A. at such venues as The Whiskey A-Go-Go on the same bill as Van Halen. They were the headliners for such bands as Blondie, The Ramones and Television. The Mumps attracted a faithful crowd that might also include Pee Wee Herman and Patti Smith. The Mumps could pack the house and Mumps fan clubs were among the most devout.