L.A. punk band X to get 40th-anniversary exhibit at the Grammy Museum

The Grammy Museum will salute 40 years of L.A. punk rock with a new exhibit focusing on the long-running band X, which is marking four decades in music this year.

“X: 40 Years of Punk in Los Angeles” is slated to open June 30 and will run through Feb. 25, 2018. The exhibit will delve into both the band’s music and its impact on the music scene in L.A., where the quartet first started playing shows at the Masque in Hollywood and beyond.

It will include original handwritten lyrics to many of the group’s songs, instruments and other gear, clothing, photos, artwork and other personal items from singer Exene Cervenka, bassist John Doe, guitarist Billy Zoom and drummer D.J. Bonebrake, who continue to tour periodically.

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“An X exhibit in a museum? Unbelievable!” the four musicians said in a joint statement. “We are honored, dumbstruck and so grateful that all four original members are here to celebrate and share our history and 40th anniversary.

“It’s a very long way from a basement on Hollywood Blvd. [the Masque] to the Grammy Museum, but we feel that we bring with us all the punks from then and now,” they continued. “We are just the representatives for what has gone before and what is still to come in the City of Angels.”

X’s first two albums, “Los Angeles” and “Wild Gift,” were included in Rolling Stone magazine’s 2012 ranking of the “500 Greatest Albums of All Time.”

“While most will think of New York when they think of the punk movement [in the U.S.], the genre was also developing an impact on the West Coast, of which X played an integral role in developing, and we are so excited to tell that story,” the museum’s new executive director, Scott Goldman, said in the same statement.

X is continuing to tour this year and will play a 40th-anniversary hometown show in August.

randy.lewis@latimes.com

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