Please Kill Me: The Uncensored Oral History Of Punk (2006) - Plot & Excerpts
If copies of this book rest on any high school library shelves, principals should strongly consider throwing them into the furnace. If in the interest of free speech this book must be allowed into schools and put before the eyes of our young people, this should be done under the supervision of a real adult – preferably a retired Sergeant-Major of the US Army with zero tolerance for this kind of nonsense. From the first page to the last it is a record of a life-negating aesthetic that corrupts and harms every soul that comes in contact with it. It is the story of intensely and ever more increasingly (as the book progresses) fucked up kids and the grown-ups who, instead of intervening with tough love as a responsible adult might do, become band managers, drug procurers, publicizers and popularizers of decadence and perversion that were later branded “sex, drugs, and rock and roll;” seducers of underage girls and especially boys attracted to the so-called scene. If this sounds good to you, read this book. There is much detail about the lives of favorite punks and pre-punks; musicians, artists and other people in the 70’s and early 80’s NY scene, assembled by the authors mainly from interviews done for their magazine Punk. This book answers all your questions about who caught the clap and from whom, what Lou Reed, Nico and the Plastic Exploding Inevitables were doing during the long breaks between sets (shooting up in the bathroom), why you wouldn’t want to eat the chili at CBGB’s. (Hint: Think of the name of the band that performed the song “Wonderful.”) There are lots of details in this book about shooting up, the cross dresser scene, the amphetamine scene, the heroin scene; the hooker/hustler scene, David Bowie’s and Iggy Pop’s Isherwood-like “honeymoon” in West Berlin (and whether Bowie was really gay, or whether he just acted gay because it was fashionable and therefore good for his career), the rumble between Handsome Dick Manitoba and Wayne (now Jayne) County; Lester Bangs and his unpublishable expose of the “gay mafia” that he believed controlled music. Andy Warhol, his Factory, and all the people shooting up on the stairs. Patti Smith finding Jesus. Sid and Nancy. Some of the main groupies speak. Sable Starr talks about being fifteen and chasing rockers: “They” (her parents) “let me stay out until six o’clock in the morning, just as long as I went to school.” Also touched on - though not thoroughly enough - is the question, “What was the deal with all those swastikas and iron crosses everyone was wearing?” Especially since there were so many Jews involved in the scene. (See “Heebee-Jeebee’s at CBGB’s” by Steven Lee Beeber for a discussion about Punk as a Jewish phenomenon.) There’s a bit about music, too. Mainly it’s a record of culture destruction and artistic degeneracy that might have produced a few works significant enough to make the infamous 1937 Munich exhibition that was art’s last gasp in Europe before museum goers’ attentions were turned to total war and genocide. Not that much would make the cut though, because amphetamines aren't helpful for improving the quality of artistic output, although they can do wonders for the volume of the same.
i loved this book. i picked it up on a whim, thinking "hm, i don't really know enough about punk," and i couldn't put it down. (which became amusing: what's LESS punk than opting out of a crazy fun party on a friday night to stay in and read a book about punk?)the book is compiled entirely of excerpts from interviews with all the people who were involved in the New York punk scene. Leggs McNeil, the author, was one of the founders of Punk! magazine, and was actually the person who came up with the term 'punk' to begin with. the structure of the book is the best part; there isn't a single word added in by the authors. they took interviews over the years and then from them pieced together a chronological account of the evolution of punk from its origins in the mid-60s in the andy warhol scene with the velvet underground, up through the heyday of new york punk at CBGBs, and finally through to its meltdown as the music went corporate and everyone started dropping left and right from herion addictions (on a side note, if you want a reason not to do smack, read this book and you'll be convinced). it's like one long chat over coffee the night after an amazing show: just stories from everyone involved. gossip, sex, drugs, music, love, prostitution (dee dee ramone hustled guys! a fun fact for your next dinner party), fights, record deals... the whole 9. the interviewees include iggy pop, angie bowie, william burroughs, all the ramones, danny fields, bebe buell, patti smith, richard hell, and everyone you never knew was involved. you'll end up knowing all kinds of crap about punk, but mostly having loved the book.
What do You think about Please Kill Me: The Uncensored Oral History Of Punk (2006)?
One of the most purely entertaining books I've ever read. I can't count how many times I've read this book, whether it's cover to cover or just skimming through for particularly hilarious/bizarre/noteworthy parts. I love all of the 70s New York bands and artists that get covered in this book, so this definitely fulfills the role of the historical retrospective and sated all of the curiosity I had about the era. The other awesome facet of this book is the pure lurid and gross realism of the stories held within. The oral history format basically makes it one long interview with all of the luminaries, bystanders, groupies, industry people, etc. that were around at the time. Some of the stories and scenes in this book are just stunning. Also, a funny thing I started to realize as I read this book is that I would have fucking hated most if not all of the people whose records I worship. Iggy, Bowie, Reed, the New York Dolls...these people were sleazy, self-obsessed, egomaniacal, pretentious drug addicted fucking assholes. I'm seriously struggling to remember a person interviewed in this book that comes out looking good...maybe Danny Fields? Even the people who weren't outright horrible human beings in this book still come off douchey (I love her records, but Patti Smith comes off as a pretty intolerably pretentious person). This isn't really relevant to the quality of the book, just more of a funny revelation of the kind of people that great artists can be and an example of the uncolored light this shines on the whole era. This book is everything you could want.
—Nate
Overall, this is a very enjoyable and engrossing book. Some of it is laugh-out-loud funny and some of it is, of course, incredibly sad and sometimes even repulsive. As a life-long punk fan, this a subject matter that I already knew a lot about going into this read, and I really didn't learn anything new history-wise, but some of the personal details and behind the scenes stuff was either new information for me or it really fleshed out a lot of details that I was sketchy on. I enjoyed that aspect of the book very much. Now for a couple of criticisms. I know this is an oral history and you can't really control how people speak when they are being interviewed and, let's face it, most of these characters were pretty rough around the edges. That being said, I find it hard to believe that almost everyone quoted in this book at some point or another ends an anecdote with "blah, blah, blah". Seriously? That phrase was WAY overused. Another problem I had was this book was way too heavy on groupie history. I've read a bunch of '70's groupie bios and I know as much about that as I ever wanted to know, but this book was just full of it. I get it, groupies were a big part of the scene back then but they weren't the music makers and they weren't the performers and reading about one drug-riddled sex escapade after another gets dull after a while. My final thought is in regards to the British wave of punk rock. I know Mr. McNeil is a New Yorker and he prefers the US punk scene (that's an understatement!), but I thought he was extraordinarily dismissive of the Brits and didn't really have a single positive thing to say about them in this book and neither did anyone he quoted. Look, in my humble opinion, The Clash and The Sex Pistols did some brilliant work and, in a history of punk rock, they deserve much more respect. Still, I highly recommend this book to fans of the genre and of rock and roll in general.
—Laura Shannon
He was, indeed, a dick, and he certainly came across that way in Punk magazine's first issue. The interview (titled "Lou Reed: Rock 'N' Roll Vegetable") actually became famous overnight and put them on the map, though, so I guess it wasn't all bad. In one of the latter issues of Punk Magazine they had an interview with him titled, "Lou Reed, a Nice Guy?" that was pretty entertaining (Lou recounting the story of the SNAKE accompanied by John Holmstrom's distinctive artwork).
—Mike DaRonco
