16
Apr
2009
Please Kill Me: The Uncensored Oral History of Punk by Legs McNeil and Gillian McCain
Possibly my favorite thing in this entire, voyeuristic, drug-infested, chaotic jaunt through musical history is this: Punk is American. Not British. And it started with the Doors, the Velvet Underground and the shit that went on with Andy Warhol at his studio back in the ’60’s.
The name Punk may not have come into being until some years after the genre had started to figure itself out. But that was still before the Sex Pistols. Not that the Sex Pistols didn’t play a part. But it was just that. A part.
Legs McNeil, co-author/interviewer of this book, and coiner of the term Punk, says himself of the strange phenomena that was the Sex Pistols:
After four years of doing Punk [Magazine], and basically getting laughed at, suddenly everything was “PUNK!” … I was like, “Hey, wait a minute! This isn’t punk–a spiked haircut and a safety pin? What is this shit?” …So it was like, “Hey, if you want to go start your own youthmovement, fine, but this one’s already taken.” But the answer that came back was, “Oh, you wouldn’t understand. Punk started in England. You know, everyone is on the dole there, they really have something to complain about. Punk is really about class warfare and economic blah, blah, blah.”…But you couldn’t compete with those images of safety pins.
A great story though, on that same page, is about the time Sid Vicious shat in some chick’s mouth.
So what is Punk then? Is it a movement? Is it music? Is it a scene? A vibe? A label? Is it shitting in some chick’s mouth?
I think that you have to read this whole book to get a fair understanding of all that Punk is. And it is necessary to read this book if you ever have done any of the following:
- dyed your hair a color that nobody is ever born with
- shot heroin
- called yourself Punk
- gone to the spot in NYC the guide book tells you CBGBs is, only to find an abandoned warehouse
- gotten into an argument with an Englishman over whether Punk started in the US or UK
- tried and failed to make a case in your US History class that Andy Warhol was a robber baron
- complained that there’s no good music anymore
- wondered how it all got started and why you weren’t born yet to be there
I’ve done all of these things except shoot heroin. Most of these I’ve done after or around the time I first read this book, which was the summer before I started high school.
I count myself as a better person for it.
Buy Please Kill Me: The Uncensored Oral History of Punk on Amazon
If you like this book/author, you might like:
(my reviews in blue)
Rant by Chuck Palahniuk
Edie: American Girl by Jean Stein
Lexicon Devil: The Fast Times and Short Life of Darby Crash and the Germs by Brendan Mullen
Capote by George Pimpleton
World War Z by Max Brooks
Girl by Blake Nelson
Exile by Blake Nelson
The Philosophy of Punk: More Than Noise by Craig O’Hara
Naked Lunch by William S Burroughs
The Electric Kool-Aid Acid Test by Tom Wolfe
Go Now by Richard Hell
Lobotomy: Surviving the Ramones by Dee Dee Ramone
U2 by U2 by U2 and Neil McCormick
The Time Traveler’s Wife by Audrey Niffenegger
The Good Fairies of New York by Martin Millar
The Savage Detectives by Roberto Bolaño
Sex, Drugs and Coco Puffs by Chuck Klosterman
The Good Fairies of New York by Martin Millar
