Rest in Punk, Rest in Power, Saskia aka Sacha aka Syama de Jong! We shall never forget you. Herman de Tollenaere recounts her extraordinary legacy
The only Dutch person around Malcolm McLaren and Vivienne Westwood‘s London shop in 1975-1976, drummer of the first all-girl French rock band the Lou’s, and of the Miami Beach Girls and LoveCramps in the Netherlands, and cook for Public Image Limited, has left the building. Syama, born Saskia, lived from 6 July 1944, so, the same age as Charlie Harper, until 17 March 2025.
Of course, like Charlie, she also had a pre-punk history. She became a junior track and field Dutch record holder in running 60 meters. She then wanted to go to art school. But the art school said: “No, you are too young, and from a working-class family”. In 1962, she became the Dutch champion in twist dancing in Amsterdam. After that, at seventeen years of age, she decided to move to Paris, as she wanted to become a painter, like Charlie, who also went to Paris. Both in France and then later, back in Leiden, Syama painted.
The photo above, by Caroline Coon, taken in London in December 1977, shows the all-women band the Lou’s, from Paris, France. Left to right: guitarist Raphaëlle Devins, drummer Syama de Jong from Leiden, the Netherlands, singer and guitarist Pamela Popo. On the right, their bassist Tollim Toto; sadly, she is now the only one of the four still alive.
Her other reason to leave the Netherlands was because, being of a mixed Dutch-Chinese background, she was sometimes met with anti-Asian prejudice. She was also a lesbian in a country where the laws and much of society discriminated against homosexuality. Homophobia also existed in France: repeatedly, the French government deported Syama for her ‘crime’ of lesbianism. However, in the city of Paris, Syama found a big LGBTQ community.
French people thought that Saskia was a difficult name to pronounce, so she became Sacha. Before punk started, she sang on stages, from Paris to Tangier in Morocco. “What music, Syama?” “English language rock ‘n’ roll”.
In Paris, Chrissie Hynde, from the USA, became her housemate. With Chrissie, she travelled to London. There, she became the first Dutch punk – the only Dutch person present at the very beginning of the London punk scene around Malcolm Mclaren’s and Vivienne Westwood’s shop. So, in a mixture of punk irony and realism, I call Syama de Jong the ‘first lady’ of Dutch punk. Not in the usual sense, nothing to do with marrying politicians, but because she was first in what became a big innovative international movement. Syama and Chrissie Hynde rehearsed together, to start a band. Chrissie on vocals and guitar, Syama on drums.
Dutch national media have neglected Syama. Not so 2020s young punks: in a packed hall in 2024 in Amsterdam, where mainly people who in theory might have been Syama’s grandchildren or great-grandchildren, discussed the recent upsurge in punk, she got enormous applause when I named her as a punk pioneer. Laughingly, she reacted when I told her about it: ‘Yes, me, with these slanty eyes which are not blue!’
On 1 December 1976, the TV and conservative magazine Punch journalist, Bill Grundy, interviewed the Sex Pistols. He intended to prove that the fledgling punk tendency was contemptible and unworthy of attention. Siouxsie Sioux of the just-founded Siouxsie and the Banshees was in the TV studio. She disliked that interviewer Grundy was completely uninterested in the band. She decided to put the cat among the pigeons, saying to Grundy: ‘I always wanted to meet you’. 53-year-old Grundy took the teenage girl’s sarcastic remark seriously. A furious Steve Jones reacted with unparliamentary expressions. Sensationalist media and politicians started a witch hunt against punk. Before the Grundy live TV interview, punk had been hundreds of people in London and scores in Manchester. Afterwards, millions inside and outside of the UK got to know that punk existed.
Syama: “That TV interview was the big explosion”.
Syama returned to Paris. In Marc Zermati‘s record shop, the Open Market, imported protopunk and then punk vinyl. In its basement, there was a drum kit. Syama was permitted to play it.
“Wasn’t it difficult for you to start drumming, and stop singing, Syama?” Syama: “I did not stop singing when the Lou’s were founded. I sang along. And I co-wrote our songs, like ‘Back On The Street“.
‘As a drummer, one can determine the rhythm in a band. I learned drumming without a role model, I taught myself. Just hit it!’ Like Palmolive of the Slits did. In early 1977, musician Elodie Lauten connected Syama with three other women: bassist Tollim Toto and singer/guitarist Pamela Popo, who had known each other since secondary school; and Raphaëlle Devins, who was turning from being a film actress to a Clash fan and guitarist.
“According to Tollim Toto, the band name Lou’s was your idea?” Syama: “Yes, that is right.” “Raphaëlle said it was an abbreviation of loubardes, motorcycle gang girls.” Syama: “Yes, a name that sounded a bit threatening”. The Lou’s were not only the first all-female punk band in France; they were the first all-female band in French rock music.
The Lou’s were invited to the Mont-de-Marsan festival in August 1977. Syama told the other Lou’s: “It is a punk festival, so you need haircuts”. The audience and the festival organisers liked the Lou’s playing on the first day in Mont-de-Marsan so much that they were the only band allowed to play on both days of the festival.
Unanimously, French punk fanzines and also more established French music papers praised the Lou’s’ performance at Mont-de-Marsan. Others did not understand. A Bordeaux regional daily, which had expected horrible disasters from a punk festival, particularly minded that the Lou’s did not conform to the conservative maxim for women: “Sois belle et tais-toi” (Be beautiful and shut up). Dutch music paper Oor on 24 August 1977 considered the Lou’s “achterbuurtmeiden” (slum girls) who did not belong on a music festival stage.
Syama, according to Oor, was not a real drummer, more like someone “cutting meat in an old butcher’s shop which does not mind bone fragments” (my anger when reading that then led me to starting a fanzine and a band. When I showed Syama that review, she replied: “That reporter did not even talk to us. If he had done so, then I would have replied to him in his own language, Dutch”). The reporter from Melody Maker from England, like Oor, disliked the festival and dismissed the Lou’s with the sexist word “boilers”.
The Lou’s met Captain Sensible of the Damned, and other bands, playing in Mont-de-Marsan. The Clash valued them very much. Syama gave Mick Jones a big friendly thump on his shoulder. The Clash subsequently asked the Lou’s to open for them during their long ‘Get Out Of Control‘ tour in late 1977 in the UK and Ireland.
The Lou’s shared a dressing room with Siouxsie and the Banshees in the London Music Machine. They played with many other bands, like the Ramones, Sham 69, and the Skids.
In early 1978, they went on tour with Subway Sect. Vic Godard wanted the Lou’s and Subway Sect to headline in turn: though Subway Sect was better known in the UK, he thought that the Lou’s were musically better than his band. Sounds wrote of their concert in Leeds, when they played after the Mekons and before Subway Sect, that the Lou’s set “whipped up more out and out rock favour than The Mekons and Subway Sect put together”.
Also in 1978, the Lou’s went on tour with Penetration in Italy. Syama told me that she had good memories of Penetration, which is mutually the case with Pauline Murray. Below is a live video of the Lou’s playing ‘No Escape‘ at the Olympia in Paris.
In late 1978, John Lydon asked the Lou’s to open for Public Image Limited‘s first UK show at the Rainbow Theatre, London. By 1979, the Lou’s reflected; should we stay in France, or in England where we have many gigs? Tollim Toto and Pamela Popo chose the first option, Syama and Raphaëlle chose the second one. After a farewell concert on 13 July in the Quai de la Gare in Paris, the two halves of the band went their seperate ways.
Syama and Raphaëlle stayed with John Lydon and his Public Image Limited bandmates in London. Syama cooked vegetarian meals which everyone loved. She felt at home, but Raphaëlle not so in the long run. Terry (my bass/female vocals band co-founder) asked Syama: “Did you make music together with PiL?” No, instead the women responded to a vacancy ad for the band Verdict. They were chosen out of many applicants. Raphaëlle became a saxophonist, though she still had her guitar.
Verdict played many gigs for Rock Against Racism. At a big open-air concert on 2 September 1979 in Brockwell Park, London, they played to twenty thousand people, together with Stiff Little Fingers and Aswad. Verdict played a song there by Raphaëlle, called ‘Basement Five’, inspired by the Black London punk band of that name. Verdict then moved to Paris, but their guitarist went back to England, so that was the end of the band.
In 1980 Syama went back to Leiden, where she was born. There, she met another drummer, Maria. Ria, as she herself and everyone then called her, played drums in our band Cheap ‘n’ Nasty if our founding drummer Maarten could not play because of school. Maria told me: “Come along, meet a new friend”. We walked to the inner city Pieterskerk-Choorsteeg alley, where Syama was born and had returned to live. Along the steep staircase hung Syama’s paintings. Letting us in, she said; “Hi, I am Saskia. I used to play drums in the Lou’s”. I felt an electric shock. The person who had pointed the way to punk for me in 1977, was standing right in front of me!
On 7 March 1981, Cheap ‘n’ Nasty recorded our ‘Covergirl’ EP in Dordrecht. Syama was in the studio as the only non-band member. She assembled and positioned Maria’s drum kit which had travelled with us from Leiden. I gave Syama a copy of our EP once it had been pressed.
In April 1981, at Syama’s place, the founding meeting of her new band, with her on drums and Maria on vocals, was held. Also present were guitarist Francien, who had played with Maria earlier, bassist Andrea, and myself. What would be the band name? I suggested: “the Priscilla’s” (later, in 2003, the name of a British all-women punk band). Syama said: “You might propose all kinds of fanciful names, like the Miami Beach Girls …” I said: “Hey, stop! A good name.”
On 16 May, the pub the Jam in Leiden organised their first ever music night, with two bands. For Cheap ‘n’ Nasty it was our first gig in Leiden since the recording of our EP, for the Miami Beach Girls their first ever concert. From Maria’s place, we took the amps and drums in a handcart to the Jam. The gig, with an enthusiastic audience, went well. After the show, Bauke and Dorith, our roadie girls since our 1980 concert with Crass and Poison Girls, and I re-loaded the drum kit and amps onto the handcart. Through the deep Leiden night, we returned it to Maria’s place.
On 4 June the Miami Beach Girls opened in the Kijkhuis in Tilburg, for Cheap ‘n’ Nasty and Ruts D.C. from England. On 12 June, the Miami Beach Girls were the support band for the Mo-dettes in the biggest ‘rock’ venue of Leiden, the LVC. Jeanet van Sijll was so impressed by Syama’s drumming, she joined the band on keyboards and vocals.
As Syama lived a ten minute walk from my place, I visited her often. She introduced me to her Lou’s bandmate Raphaëlle who had also come to Leiden. Sometimes, the three of us went to the Pijpenla, the only pub in Leiden which admitted punks, and where Raphaëlle totally defeated a teenage boy pub-crawler who had the illusion that he could show his mates that he could speak English and French and knew how to sexually embarrass an older foreign woman, but that is another story.
On 13 August, the Miami Beach Girls opened in the big hall at Paradiso in Amsterdam for Cheap ‘n’ Nasty (with Raphaëlle on saxophone). On 3 September, Syama and her band opened in Eksit in Rotterdam, for the Mo-dettes again. The next day, they played PH31 in Amsterdam.
On 11 September, they played in the N.V. Huis squat in Utrecht. Four Miami Beach Girls songs were recorded for a live compilation LP ‘OnUtrechtse Toestanden’. They were: ‘Hey Stoned’, originally a Lou’s song; ‘Delight’, ‘Tell You What’ and ‘Chain Reaction’.
In the autumn of 1981, a VARA national TV women’s emancipation show, Kijk Haar, made a programme about Jeanet van Sijll. In the studio for that TV item, the Miami Beach Girls recorded their songs ‘Screwdriver’ and ‘Angels In Hell’. Maria left the band, and Jeanet became lead singer besides playing keyboards. In 1982, Heleen replaced Andrea on bass (they have both also played in Cheap ‘n’ Nasty). The Miami Beach Girls went to Paris together with Perplex, Raphaëlle’s new band after she had moved from Leiden to Amsterdam. There, they played on 29 and 30 October in the Gibus.
The Miami Beach Girls continued, opening for Golden Earring in 1984. Soon thereafter, they disbanded, as Syama joined the Hare Krishna organization, ISKCON. Syama later left ISKCON as it clashed with her ideas of personal freedom, for herself and everyone else. But she would continue to feel connected to India, its culture and religions and philosophies like Hinduism and Buddhism, and also its wildlife. Syama was usually in good spirits, but one of the few things that could make her sad was cruelty against animals. She especially loved cats.
Syama, Francien, singer Vera and bassist Meinie started a new band: LoveCramps in the late 80s. The UK Subs were heading to Paradiso to play on 6 January 1989. I phoned Paradiso: “Is the new band of the former drummer of the Lou’s and the Miami Beach Girls welcome to play their first concert, opening for the Subs?” “Yes”, said Paradiso.
They liked LoveCramps’ performance so much that they invited them to play again in the big Paradiso hall on 22 September 1989, opening for British pop punk band Transvision Vamp. One problem: Meinie left the band, her replacement Moniek had never played bass before. So, Meinie had to give Moniek a crash course, to enable the over forty year-old novice to play bass for the first time and to play punk for her first time ever. LoveCramps also recorded the two songs in 1989; ‘Candy Man’ and ‘Wind Up’, released on Sjock Records.
The line-up of that recording was: Vera van der Poel, vocals. Karin Klebe, keyboard. Syama de Jong, drums. Francien de Zanger, guitar (formerly Miami Beach Girls 1981-1984, Ten Girls Ago). Moniek Voulon, bass (formerly drums Interior, Blue Murder, 1979-1984. Bass in LoveBurns, 1990, bass in Maida Vale, 2011-2015).
LoveCramps were invited to a contest for women’s bands, in January 1990 in Kyiv, then still Soviet Ukraine. The other participants were cover bands. The jury appreciated that LoveCramps played their own songs. They won the title Miss Rock Europe. In the summer of 1991, they returned to Ukraine, and also went to Moldova. In that same year, they recorded this video of their song ‘I Wish‘.
Sjock Records released their song Skrewdriver, in 1991, which the Miami Beach Girls had previously played. In January 1992 they were once again invited to play in Ukraine, playing Kyiv for the third time. By then, the line-up was: Stijn Minneboo, the only male member, making them a mixed-gender band, with Jeanette Molenwijk, vocals; Renée Stevense, bass; Francien de Zanger, guitar; Syama de Jong, drums. They also played in the women’s prison in Charkiv on 17 January, to an extremely enthusiastic prisoners’ audience.
Syama in September 2024 told us she had good memories of the concerts in Ukraine. “Language was a bit of a problem, I spoke French there”. It saddened her that Putin’s invasion has caused so much war misery in Ukraine. After LoveCramps disbanded in 1998, Syama travelled a lot, including to her co-ancestral China. Her old friend Chrissie Hynde enabled her to go to India. She moved from the Pieterskerk-Choorsteeg to a flat in the eastern inner city of Leiden, with a beautiful view of trees and a canal.
Sadly, in 2009 her health deteriorated. She had to have a heart operation. In the long run, her heart condition would turn out to be fatal. When the COVID pandemic started, Syama did not want to be infected or to infect others. So, she lived in quarantine, with her decades-long friend Bauke being her only contact with the outside world. She still called me on the phone, we spoke for hours on end.
In 2023, Chrissie Hynde visited her, encouraging Syama to exhibit her paintings, which so far had not even been framed, for the first time ever. Her debut exhibition happened in August 2023 in the Zône gallery in Leiden. Unfortunately, Chrissie could not be present.
On the phone in 2023, Syama told me about her travels in China, and said that she would love to play drums again. Going to a rehearsal studio was a health problem for her. So, after Terry and me had a long talk with her in person in September 2024, Terry suggested that she should have a drum pad. Fortunately, her former Miami Beach Girls bandmate Heleen provided Syama with one.
Syama told us that she had been sad in 2022 when she heard about the death of her fellow Lou, Pamela Popo. But the rest of our long conservation was joyful. Terry, me, Bauke and Syama were all so happy to see and speak to each other again.
We all promised to see each other again; as Syama rose, insisting upon accompanying us to say farewell all the way to the door. We didn’t know then ‘again’ would be the commemoration meeting for Syama, at the Rhijnhof crematory in Leiden on 21 March 2025. Around forty people were present, including former members of Syama’s bands. More people could not have fitted into the small room. Beautiful commemoration speeches were made by Heleen and Bauke. Chrissie Hynde read a Chinese poem, translated into English by Kung Fu movie actor Bruce Lee.
Syama was the first Dutch punk, the first one of the hundreds of women who would play in punk bands in the Netherlands in the 1970s and early 1980, breaking pre-punk music business sexist barriers. Syama’s music, and her refusal to submit to racism, homophobia and misogyny should inspire all of us to keep the flame which she lit in the 1970s burning, at a time when some politicians in the East and in the West endanger these progressive achievements.
Finally, I quote about Syama her Lou’s bandmate Pamela Popo: “Hey, you won’t forget me, will you!”
(Read The Lou’s Biography HERE)
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In 1978 Herman co-founded Dutch Rock Against Racism and was a founder of Pin punkzine. He’s vocals/saxophone for Cheap ‘n’ Nasty and in 2021 co-founded the Punk Scholars Network, Netherlands.
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