This is a somewhat niche film, but if you have an interest in niche musical genres or at least punk, this might be of interest to you.
The punk movement had pretty much spawned from the thrashy proto-punk coming out of 1960 / early 70s Midwest and New York, via bands like the MC5, the Stooges and the Ramones, and the high camp rock of the New York Dolls. Then, the British took it on in 1976, added a liberal dose of anarchic 'I don't care' and a bit of social injustice.
This new version made its way quickly back across the pond, settling on the two US coastlines and finding chaotic little crevices to nestle in. Los Angeles was one such punk haven, but while those British punks were quickly morphing into post-punk, new wave and new romantics, their American counterparts clung on to the edgier end of punk.
So, over the period of December 1979 to May 1980, one film director decided to capture that LA punk scene, that became The Decline Of Western Civilisation (now known as Part I, because several more instalments were made later). The director, Penelope Spheeris, would later become legendary for being a writer on Roseanne and directing Wayne's World, but for now she was capturing the essence of west coast punk. It's fair to say that chaos permeates every scene of this movie - often it is the deliberate, antagonistic type of chaos, from bands and their audiences trying to wind each other up - but sometimes it is accidental chaos that comes from a music scene that was sadly riddled with more than a few broken characters, nursing their addictions and issues.
The film opens with Eugene, shot in a kind of sepia. Eugene is a young LA punk fan, who loves the music, because it is like rock n roll, but without the bullshit.
We get some slow, menacing, chords chugging along in the background, various club owners talking about the speed of this LA hardcore punk, the often political lyrical content and of course, the pogo dancing. One explains that the music can get up to an incredible 300 beats per minute.
The scene is set - enter the bands, the stars (or not) of the show. Love them, hate them, either way you get to meet a weird and wonderful collection of characters over the next 100 minutes or so.
Black Flag:
One of the more well known, and oldest, bands from the LA scene, Black Flag at this point have already been around for three or four years, their black flag logo was even said to represent anarchy. This was the era after singer Keith Morris had departed to establish Circle Jerks (more later), but before the legendary Henry Rollins had taken the role. This was the (brief) Ron Reyes era, before he quit due to escalating fan violence. Their sound is much rawer than much of the UK punk I am used to; the songs, short, sharp and aggressive. The band are interviewed in 'The Church', a much graffitied former place of worship, now a place of drinking and sleeping for the band, all for $16 a month. We see them play Revenge, a song about getting arrested by the LAPD. You start to see what LA punk, both bands and audiences, are all about.
Black Flag: Revenge https://youtu.be/IFmTImeZCRE
The Germs:
Another one of the founding members of LA punk, the Germs are the perhaps the epitome of the scene. They start in 1976, unable to play their instruments, and while the musicians gradually learn their craft, the singer descends into a personal hell of drugs and self-harm. At the start, that singer, Darby Crash (Jan Beahm) is smearing himself in peanut butter to distract the crowd from the band's ineptitude. By the time of the film, he is hellbent on self-destruction, talking about self-harm and how he gets attacked and hurt at every gig. He can barely sing into the mic, making his lyrics mumbled and barely audible. We need subtitles as he sings Manimal - "I came into this world like a puzzled panther, waiting to be caged."
Band manager, Nicole, talks about the riotous nature of the shows and seems bemused as to why she is still trying to manage this unmanageable situation. As the musicians become more proficient (bassist Lorna Doom, and a young Pat Smear on guitar), the singing makes them almost unlistenable. This is shown in Shutdown, a tune with a rough, swinging rhythm, that slowly disintegrates, but not before the camera has panned around to show many of the audience nodding their heads like they are in a jazz club. In the end Crash was dead, aged 22, from a deliberate heroin overdose (December 1980), before the film was released in 1981.
The Germs: Manimal https://youtu.be/sI12_BW2Y6s
Slash:
No, not the top-hatted guitar maestro of G'n'R fame, but a punk fanzine and later, independent record label. We get a tour around the bustling magazine office and get to meet the charismatic Kickboy Face (aka Claude Bessy), a man whose colourful life story will need to be investigated for a future story. He had already experience a lot of life, but now was a writer for the fanzine and singer with the band Catholic Discipline. His conversation is deep and seemingly profound - he talks of postulating on the scene, and that there is no such thing as new wave. The band though, provide us with something different. They are musically sound for one thing, and there doesn't seem to be any fighting or spitting in the crowd. The music, we get to hear Underground Babylon and Barbee Doll Lust, has some hints of Television and Velvet Underground, Bessy's rough, almost shouted singing, has a little Ian Dury about it.
X:
"Everyone's grooving on different vibes," or so says Billy Zoom, guitarist for X. The non-music section on them seems to focus way too much on tattoos - everyone in the room seems to be getting a tattoo at some point in the interview. We meet the rest of the band - John Doe on bass and vocals, Exene on vocals and DJ Bonebrake on drums, as well as a few presumable hangers-on, including the wonderfully named Top Jimmy. Then we get to the music, they rattle through Beyond & Back, Johnny Hit & Run Pauline and We're Desperate, and it is a wonderful high-paced rockabilly romp, propelled by the more than competent Zoom, looking a bit more 50s greaser, than 70s Johnny Rotten.
X: Beyond & Back https://youtu.be/iVICRYqZOR0
Circle Jerks:
Now we are with what is effectively a second generation LA punk band. Keith Morris had quit Black Flag earlier in 1979 and teamed up with Greg Hetson of Red Kross, along with Roger Rogerson (a classically trained bass player) and Lucky Lehrer (a jazz drummer), to form the Bedwetters, who soon became Circle Jerks.
Live, they seem to be very much propelled by the manic drumming of Lehrer, as they race through Red Tape, Back Against The Wall, I Just Want Some Skank and Beverley Hills Wasted - lots of short, punchy songs, a bit like the Dead Kennedy's. But Morris seems a loose cannon and as we watch, he is more involved with goading and then chasing audience members, before, almost inevitably, the scene breaks down into fighting.
We get to see Eugene again, and some other young fans, discussing why they are into punk and the dress code it provides them - to 'be myself' and be 'comfortable.'
Alice Bag Band:
Formed from a friendship made while waiting to watch Elton John appear on the Cher tv show, the Alice Bag Band was perhaps an unlikely punk band formed by Alicia Armendariz and Patricia Morrison (later of the Gun Club - and who had left by the time they were filmed for this). The film doesn't include their one and only single, Survive, and we instead see them play Gluttony and Prowlers In The Night.
Fear:
The film draws to a close with one of the most interesting, and controversial, of the bands. They get five songs featured here, including I Don't Care About You and Beef Bologna, and perhaps that is in part because of the friendship they struck up with Pheeris, which ultimately led to them signing for the aforementioned Slash Records, which was run by Pheeris's husband, Bob Biggs. Founder and singer, Lee Ving, spends as much time hurling insults (often sadly sexist or homophobic) at the crowd to get them riled, as he does singing the songs, which are again, short bursts of aggressive noise, but which fade into the background as first the spitting, and then the fighting begins.
The side note on Fear is that the film bought them to the attention of John Belushi, who became a fan and wangled them an ill-fated appearance on Saturday Night Live. From what I've read on that, there is probably enough for a whole other story just on that.
Fear: Beef Bologna https://youtu.be/1lazNWRXSlA
Verdict:
If you are a fan of punk in general, this is worth checking out. If you are interested in some of the sociology around musical subcultures, then you may also find this interesting.
Much of the music is not great - it feels like most of the British bands that couldn't play to begin with, got at least reasonably proficient quite quickly - but with many of these bands, it is almost like they were wilfully not pushing their boundaries very much, perhaps to maintain that DIY, lo-fi ethos.
It is quite uncomfortable to watch at times, the drug issues are apparent, though not hugely discussed, and the self harm and violence of the scene permeates pretty much every shot.
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