We were somewhere around Barstow on the edge of the desert when the drugs began to take hold. I remember saying something like, "I feel a bit lightheaded; maybe you should drive ..."' Everyone thought in the early days of punk, certainly once English punk got going, and even American punk, everyone thought it was a horrible right-wing Nazi thing—violent, racist, and against everything good in life.” Lou Reed is not, as you will see constant reference to, a scat-munching asshole. No, Lou Reed is a scat-munching douche. Readers must make note that this book covers primarily the development of 1970s-era New York punk, with a side detour to England to witness the birth of the Sex Pistols and British punk. Punk did indeed die at the end of the '70s, and it has of course been resurrected and reinvented by succeeding generations. But if you want to know where the whole thing began, you have to get this book.

Please Kill Me: The Uncensored Oral History 19+ quotes from Please Kill Me: The Uncensored Oral History

What pissed me off even more was that they didn’t mentioned any punk girls that weren’t just groupies or girlfriends aside from Patti Smith and Debbie Harris. They literally only name dropped the Runaways ONCE and didn’t even say anything about them or the members even tho they were 100 x more punk than the rest of the bunch. The only thing that made the music different was that we were taking lyrics to places they had never been before. The thing that makes art interesting is when an artist has incredible pain or incredible rage. The New York bands were much more into their pain, while the English bands were much more into their rage. The Sex Pistols' songs were written out of anger, wheras Johnny was writing songs because he was brokenhearted over Sable...” Immensely entertaining…I found these tales of unholy madness and drug-fueled abandon all too thought-provoking.” Even though Nancy was very disliked, everyone thought it was terrible that the police stopped investigating her murder after Sid died. Many people thought their drug dealer actually did it.Dishes the crud on everyone…As someone who was there at the time, I can vouch for how vividly it recaptures the swampy vitality of the New York scene…candid, inside, and detailed.” Penny Arcade said: At that time, the DRUG world and the ART world ran through each other. (1971 - 1974)” The Other Hollywood: The Uncensored Oral History of the Porn Film Industry, with Jennifer Osborne and Peter Pavia ( Regan Books, 2006). Adept as he was in the Hegelian dialectic — a system easy of abuse by those who seek to dominate thought by arbitrary flights of fancy and metaphysical verbosity — he was not slow in finding a way out of the dilemma in which socialists found themselves.” The focus is on American punk, which, unbeknownst to me, is where the movement began, about fifteen years before England. There is a similar book on England's movement, and it is on my to-read list if anyone is interested. In this book only the Sex Pistols are discussed. I am ashamed to say that I've had to create a list of bands with whom I'm not familiar so I can Spotify the music.

Please kill me : the uncensored oral history of punk Please kill me : the uncensored oral history of punk

How can U say one style is better than another. You ought to be able to be an Abstract Expressionist next week, or a Pop artist, or a realist, without feeling you"ve given up something. ... I think that would be so great, to be able to change styles. And I think that's what's going to happen, that's going to be the whole new scene. - Andy Warhol, 1963” How to Be Famous: Our Guide to Looking the Part, Playing the Press, and Becoming a Tabloid Fixture (Hardcover) Please Kill Me" covers New York punk from its birth in the mid-60s at Andy Warhol's Factory all the way to its eventual death in the late '70s, as corporate America once again begins to catch the wave and numerous members of the original first wave of punk begin to burn out from the excessive and dangerous lifestyles that they embraced. McNeil and co-author Gillian McCain present their material in the form of interviews with a vast number of the people who were there on the front lines, experiencing and inventing the punk scene as it developed. Johnny Thunders, Iggy Pop, Debbie Harry, The Ramones, Richard Hell, Danny Fields....they are all heard from here along with a host of groupies, drug dealers, hookers, agents and managers, club owners, and other scene hangers-on.

Please Kill Me: The Uncensored Oral History of Punk Mentions in Our Blog

And now, just because I liked it so much, here's my absolute favorite bit of the book, from Ari Delon (illegitimate son of model/groupie Nico and Alain Delon):