We Got the Neutron Bomb : The Untold Story of L.A. Punk
by Marc Spitz, Brendan Mullen

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Book Reviews of We Got the Neutron Bomb : The Untold Story of L.A. Punk

Book Review: A Solid Foundation
Summary: 3 Stars

Well, not a narrative really; it's modeled on Legs McNeil's "Please Kill Me", and consequently has no thesis or point of view--just a bunch of quotes from scenesters. And, as in PKM, many of the interviewees contradict each other, call the others liars, and basically pile on personal abuse, ancient diatribes, etc. So, as you may expect, the "authors" serve up tons of gossip, sex, drugs, violence, and almost nothing about music. Which (music) was the only reason anyone ever cared about these strung-out mutants, right? I mean, would you want to read a book about your neighbors in that slum right after college who used to shoot speed and have screaming fights and nod off in your begonia patch, if they didn't happen to be underground musicians? No, the music is what made you curious. So there's nothing about music, ok. You do get a lot of background on these artists, how they met, what their influences were, what seemed to drive them...well, too much background, really. Quick, without thinking: what was LA's most vital contribution to modern music? Ah no my friend, not art-damaged Farfisa cabaret bop, I'm talking h-a-r-d-c-o-r-e. Do you know how much of this book is devoted to hardcore? About a quarter. And most of that is material on bands like X, Fear and the Germs, which some would consider too corny and/or slow to qualify as HC, but...it wasn't their fault! No one from Black Flag would give them an interview! And hey, the whole hardcore thing has been played out in so many books already, right?

So we get tons of material on such obscure, underground artists as the Doors, the Stooges, David Bowie, and their glammy fan clubs, stuff that goes on a bit long, maybe, but other LA Punk books ignored this whole scene, so just see it as thoroughness. Iggy Pop, Kim Foley, Michael Des Barres, the Berlin Brats, Tomata du Plenty, Rodney Bingenheimer, Chuck E. Starr and, er, Brendan Mullen...if you want to know about their hang-outs and parties and the drugs and people they did, here's your source! And to be fair, the sass and transvestitism of these party kids helped set a kind of devil-may-care stage for what followed.

After page after page of this very non-punk stuff you hit paydirt: lots of great stuff on the Screamers, the Weirdos, Black Randy, the Bags, and other bands you don't hear much about these days. This stuff goes on for pretty long too, including more than I ever wanted to know about the myriad personal quirks of each member of the Runaways, etc., but there must be a lot of people out there who are interested in such things or they wouldn't be in the book, right? This section deals with a lot of music I hadn't heard, and after reading thousands of words on these bands I still have no clue what they sounded like, but that's what records are for, not books.

Next we hear the whole Germs story (riveting!), a lot of acrimonious sniping between members of the Darby Crash and X posses, some teasers about the Dickies and Middle Class, and finally a couple of slim chapters on LA's most potent export: the warp-speed thrash of Circle Jerks, Black Flag, Adolescents, TSOL, etc. There isn't much new material here, since Greg Ginn and company were typically uncooperative, but Keith Morris gets to run his mouth as much as he wants. And sandwiched between the hardcore chapters (oddly breaking the flow, some might say) are token offerings on the city's Chicano punk and rockabilly and roots revivals. The book trails off with mildly gossipy synopses of the Go-Gos' success and LA Rock's glam-metal twilight.

So, a convenient sourcebook that ensures no one will have to write about the highjinks of the LA glitter crowd again, and draws a nice outline for the definitive history of LA Punk, should anyone care to write it. The mere fact that Mullen and Spitz found all these people and managed to interview them points the way for a writer to take over.

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