Working musicians usually get to see more than enough of airports, but here's a guy who saw one every time he looked at his stage name. There will be no more such looking for Jak Airport, former guitarist with the X-Ray Spex and Classix Nouveaux, who died quietly of cancer in 2004 -- at least a lot more quietly than he played his instrument. Punk rock may not be exactly known for hot lead guitarists, yet Airport's landing strip was the over the top vocals of Poly Styrene, a sound that can be compared to Little Richard and Yoko Ono stranded in a field of nettles. He had no choice but to be adventurous in his choice of chords, distorted in his tone settings and eager in his attitude, to put it mildly.

The guitarist's real name was Jack Stafford; dropping a "c" and throwing in an airport was no weirder than anything his peers were up to (i.e., Lora Logic, Sal Solo, Johnnie Fingers, and so forth). Solo, by the way, went on to become a Christian rock singer. Airport's transition was not from busy hub to empty parking lot but from aggressive punk to the apparently less vital new romantic movement. Once again, Airport's playing style can be considered heavier than usual for the genre he was involved in. Classix Nouveaux was assembled in the late '70s literally out of the remaining pieces of X Ray Spex, which had basically imploded after one album. Styrene was the first singer in the new band but was later replaced by Solo. This band appears to have been Airport's final combo flight. ~ Eugene Chadbourne, Rovi