If you subscribe to the notion that no one is supposed to read your diary, you might object to the fact that Angela Jaeger has just published hers under the title “I Feel Famous: Punk Diaries 1977-1981.”
She didn’t include all of them, mind you — maybe someday there will be an unedited special edition box set that contains every jot and pic — but for now, there’s a very colorful edit featuring 240 or so pages of the high points.
Jaeger’s time capsule — which is filled with verbatim entries, snapshots, samples of her art, and contemporary notes to provide context — starts when she was a 17-year-old young woman in the East Village. Jaeger actually grew up there on the corner of 11th Street and 2nd Avenue, watching a mix of hippies and hookers and all that you would imagine passing by her window.
The book ends with her at 21 and on her way to joining “Pigbag,” a successful British instrumental combo, as their vocalist. The bands that followed were “The Drowning Craze” and “Instinct.”
“I started keeping a diary when I was 10,” she says. “I still keep a journal — I write in it twice a week.”
Putting the book together wasn’t easy, as there was so much material to choose from: “I worked hard to include a broad selection of moods, people and places. I was a teenager, just absorbing things and reacting in the moment. As a teenager, I was very opinionated.”
Some of the things that she was reacting to included the burgeoning punk scene, and if you’re familiar with that milieu, you will appreciate the boldface names that she rubbed shoulders with — including The Ramones, Cramps, Talking Heads, Johnny Thunders, and more. Not to mention jumping onstage with the Clash and hanging backstage afterward with Warhol, Debbie Harry, Nico … the list goes on.
All the legendary clubs — CBGB’s, the Mudd Club, Max’s — as well as many that you’ve never heard of, were literally in her backyard, and she visited as much as possible. She visited so frequently that her name was often on the guest list.
And, of course, there was the short-lived but legendary Tier 3, which was booked by her older sister Hilary Jaeger and featured live performances by Angela Jaeger’s quartet, the “Stare Kits” (there is, thankfully, an explanation for that bewildering name in these pages).
Music was always around her growing up; as a youngster, she had a couple of clear ideas about her future.
“I wanted to be a singer or a waitress,” she proclaims. “I loved singing. I took voice lessons at the 3rd Street Music School and was in a band in high school.”
That combo, “200 Proof,” is lost to history, so we will just have to imagine the budding rocker belting out “Somebody to Love” and “Midnight at the Oasis” in the gym with her cousin Alex on drums.
But then, in her sophomore year, she got into punk.
“It was a combination of things,” she explains. “I was going to the Gem Spa to look at magazines, my mom’s boyfriend was bringing music mags home, my older brother Niles bought Television’s ‘Little Johnny Jewel’ and I distinctly remember the day that Tish and Snooky moved into their ‘Manic Panic’ shop on St. Marks Place.”
So the shift began, leading to entries such as, “I put some more makeup on last night and stood in front of the mirror imagining myself to be a PUNK,” and, “Last night I dreamed about Johnny Rotten,” that foreshadow an afterword noting that Johnny Rotten actually attended her wedding reception.
In between, there was a stint at Hampshire College, where she became fast friends with future music critic Byron Coley, prime punk partying in London, and a return to NYC, all duly noted with a cool reserve that belies her age.
“Not only was Angela Jaeger in the middle of it all,” notes musician Viv Albertine in a blurb for the book, “but she wrote everything down while it was happening.”
Hilary Jaeger, who shared a bedroom with her sister growing up, greatly appreciates the finished product.
“This book has been long in the making,” Hilary Jaeger states. “When Angela finally showed me her manuscript last summer with some scans of the pages and drawings, I was reminded not only of all the great stories I either was there for or heard about but of how visually creative she was. Look at her handwritten words scrawled, careening all over the page, the drawings and picaresque asides garnishing the margins. This is the book that needed to be published. It’s perfect.”
With the book finally in print, Angela Jaeger is looking forward to making music again.
“It’s a gift that I have,” she muses. “I have pretty diverse musical interests – classical rock elements, improvisation. I like songs. I don’t know how to read or write music, but neither did John Lennon or Barbra Streisand.”
One possibility is a collaboration with her partner, noted guitarist Alan Licht.
“Living with another musician has the possibility to be fruitful,” she says. “But it can also be a little intense.”
You can follow Angela Jaeger on Instagram at @ifeelfamousbook. She will be in conversation with author Lucy Sante at NYU on Saturday, Feb. 8. More information at as.nyu.edu/departments/sca/events/spring-2025/angela-jaeger–i-feel-famous—-with-lucy-sante.html.
