The Mutants at Napa State

Overview

On June 13, 1978, the soon-to-be legendary rock band the Cramps went to play Napa State, a psychiatric hospital in the small town of Napa in Northern California. Opening for them was the Mutants, an eclectic septet of art school punks from nearby San Francisco. Also in the van was seminal Bay Area art collective Target Video, there to capture the show using one of the first video cameras available to the public, democratizing a medium controlled by mainstream media outlets. Target Video's 22-minute ½” open reel recording of the Mutants' opening set, previously thought to be lost, was restored by Dino Everett at the Punk Media Research Collection, University of Southern California, HMH Foundation Moving Image Archive, and released on DVD in 2023 by Grasshopper Films.