I feel your body’s close to mine
I hear your breath and mine in time
I know I’m nothing but it’s you that I need
I touch your skin and it starts to feedYou’re not the first you’re not the last
Another day another crashMy eyes meet yours in secret glance
Our bodies locked in ancient stance
You whisper something and I know it’s good
You’re acting crazy just like I knew you wouldYou’re not the first you’re not the last
Another day another crashEmbracing my life between your thighs
We will perform in the deadly skies
Reducing my mind to endless nights
You send my dreams to their demise
Realized by your last breath …I take your hair in to my hands
I pull it tight to fit your demands
Feel my body into yours
I Know it’s right cause that’s my soul you stirYou’re not the first you’re not the last
Another day another crash
You’re not the first you’re not the last
Another day another crash
You’re not the first you’re not the last
Another day another crash
You’re not the first you’re not the last
Another day another CATCH
In case you are wondering, this is about a homosexual love affair Darby had with another boy at the Hollywood Arts Free School he went to. But no matter. Naked Lunch is a great book, and Death in Venice will never be matched. Art does not abide our petty preferences. This higher calling is meant to transcend your petty prejudices. Art’s not about right and wrong. It’s about beauty, even when it’s ugly as sin.
God, I love this music. Very, very hardcore punk rock from the bowels of Los Angeles late 70’s to 1980. It’s so vicious it’s almost evil, but that’s why it’s great. Anyway I’m a bit of a Germ myself, infecting the bowels of this decaying nation.
I’m certainly contagious, good and bad. Just ask some of my exes.
No wait.
I saw these Germs maniacs in concert once at the Hong Kong Cafe. We got there and there were these angry punkers throwing bottles against the outside of the building. They glared at us, and we looked at them like, Hey not us, guys. We got inside, and we knew some of the local maniacs in there.
Diane Chin of the Alleycats was there. She really liked me one night, but she gave me 10 seconds to make a move. I didn’t do it, so she treated me like dog crap under her shoe for the rest of the night. I looked up at her wailing away on the stage. She seemed to be glaring at me. Apparently I just failed Shit Test 1, and there wasn’t going to be another.
Some of these psychobitches give you one damn chance. You need to move on them very aggressively in 10 seconds or so. You need to walk right up to her, put your arm around her, and drag her off with that look in your eyes that says you know you’re going to do this baby, no one can turn me down. Of course that violates #metoo 101. You just committed sexual assault, sexual harassment, and sexual misconduct, and if you play your cards very carefully, you commit rape later on that night if she’s willing.
These psychobitches actually want to be more or less raped by a brutish man. They want you to walk up to them, grab them, and start kissing them like they can’t say no. They want to be dragged off by their hair like the cavemen did. They want to be told what to do and ordered around. They want the confidence of Superman and the brooding danger of Marlon Brando. If you can’t measure up, you’re a pussy, and she wants to kill you.
She wore all leather, but that doesn’t mean much. Most punker chicks were submissives deep down inside, like all normal women.
Anyway there she was.
My friend points to her and says, “See that chick there? Diane Chai of the Alleycats?”
“Yeah?”
“She’s nuts!”
I look over at her.
“Yes, I can see that.”
“When she does her slamdancing thing…”
“Yeah?”
“That chick! She…actually…breaks…tables!” His eyes are falling out of his head.
Well I knew she was a psychobitch, and now that was confirmed. I made a mental note not to impersonate any tables that night.
My friend’s sister was there along with her best friend, a perpetually scowling punker chick with leather and frizzy hair. You would think she was a dyke looking at her, but no way. She softened up and went submissive if I tried to talk to her. That means, “I like cock.” Dykes don’t to that. Dykes send in reinforcements when you try to talk to them, unless you’re gay, in which case they might like you and treat you like their little boy pet.
I went to the bathroom. There was the great Darby Crash, lead singer of the Germs! Famous! Sort of. A complete maniac! No really, read a biography. He’s all dressed in leather like a street tough. He’s got this sneering snarl that’s rather appealing if you’re a mountain lion. I’m washing up. He sees me and smiles/sneers whatever. It’s not exactly unfriendly. He’s just saying Fuck the World, and he hopes you agree. He looks like he’s going to bust out laughing. His life was a bad joke, so he probably should have.
“Got any Tuuuuuuuuuinalssss?” He asks me with the not unfriendly James Dean sneer, a smiling laugh waiting to bust out and blow up the room.
His voice is is faggier than the Castro. He’s making limp wrist gestures. This dangerous maniac is actually a flaming faggot! What the Hell, man? The leather, the homicidal look, the deranged masculinity of a caged animal, and wrap it up with a mincing queen. It’s not even a product. It’s an April Fools Joke. Nothing about it even makes sense.
He’s asking me for Tuinols. Those are downers, barbiturates. Also called Blues. Popular back then.
Take one, and it’s like drinking a six pack.
Drink on them and you might die. Get behind a wheel, and all bets are off.
Give one to a chick, and she’ll turn into a half-conscious slavering nympho who won’t remember a thing in the morning. These pills do have their uses, you know? Girls liked to take them so they could have slutty irresponsible sex with the excuse that they were too wasted to be responsible, with the added benefit of being amnestic the next morning. Who knows what the truth is?
The thing is probably just a confession booth in a capsule. “I now absolve you of all responsiblity!” A blue excuse.
Well, I dealt drugs of course. I did for many years. And never got caught. Neener neener cops. I never sold pills though. Those are dirty and ugly. Sell them to some idiot, and he crashes into a bicyclist at night. You’re on the hook for felony murder and a guilty conscience til death no bottle can wash away.
“Nope, sorry,” I said. “Tuinal cigarettes. All I have are Tuinol cigarettes.” Well there’s no such thing. That’s an assholey thing to say, but then, Darby was an asshole, so it was probably appropriate.
“Tuinol cigarettes!?” he scoffs, realizing it’s a stupid joke. Part of him wants to hit me, and the other part wants to bust out laughing.
He starts sneering, and bursting out laughing in outrage, snarling out the door holding back the laughter.
I decided that I sort of like the guy, and now I just met a famous and very dangerous punk rock musician.
We go back to the club and buy Heinekens. My friend’s sister goes submissive, crumbles when I say hi. All the evil in her wrings out like a sponge. Now she’s a ragdoll, waiting to be taken. I get it. She wants to be raped too. All these scary punker bitches do. They’re all little girls at the end of the day.
Rape!? Well. Consensual rape. Let’s put it that way. You know, the way most mammals do it?
All you have to go is grab her like a maniac. And no, you don’t ask permission, you #metoo boneheads. Asking permission is pussy. It’s fail. A man doesn’t ask permission for anything. He takes what he wants, caveman-style.
I’m too chicken, so it’s a fail. Been listening to too many feminists. The only way to seduce her would be very roughly anyway, and that violates sexual misconduct, sexual harassment, and assault right there, with (consensual) rape later on if you get lucky. I’ve turned pussy. It’s all the fault of feminists and paying too much attention to my mother. About certain things, a man should never really listen to his mother. Listen to his father? Maybe.
The first show is Joanna Went. Apparently she’s actively psychotic or something. Her act is some sort of a schizophrenic breakdown on stage. I’m wondering if she’s really crazy or just a maniac like all the rest of these animals.
“Catatooooonic!…………Schizophreeeeenic!……..” She wails at no one and nothing. Her eyes look crazed. She’s got football player shoulder pads on like a circus freak. On a chick with pink hair. Well. That’s weird. Partway in, she starts ripping at the pads. The pads come open. They’re filled with shredded cheddar cheese! That makes perfect sense!
She’s grabbing handfuls of the cheese and throwing it out into the audience, wailing like a crazy woman the whole time. The maniacs in the audience are picking up handfuls of cheese and throwing it everywhere. Pretty soon the whole audience is caught in an actual blizzard of cheese. Like zero visibility. We are all covered with cheese. We’re pissed off, so we reach down and grab handfuls of cheese and start throwing them at Joanna. Hard. As hard as possible. That bitch. She threw cheese at us! For some reason, she likes this and smiles. She wants you to hate her. She’s trying to piss you off. It’s Duchamp and Man Ray, half a century too late. Dada, get it?
This nonsense is called Performance Art. I am not sure what the artistic statement is. Apparently that she’s crazy, we’re all crazy, and the rest of the world is nuts too. I think she could have said that without creating cheese blizzard, but it’s ok. Now I have another cool story to brag about.
The Germs come out.
There’s an air of menace in the club. It’s scary, you might get hurt. But that’s exhilarating too. Like war. The rush of impending potential violence. You’re on edge, but you’ve never been so excited.
The drummer is Don Bolles. He looks like a maniac.
The guitarist is Pat Smear. He looks like he’s criminally insane.
The bass player is this hot blond reform school runaway chick. She looks dangerous too.
Hell, they’re all dangerous. So’s the audience. That’s the general idea here. After a while, the dangerousness infects you, and you start getting antisocial yourself. I’m starting to feel pissed off. I guess that was the plan.
The band careens off into their set. This is some of the most terrifying music I’ve heard. Pure savage wailing raw animal menace. Perfect for a predatory animals like us. Apex predators. We forget that too often. We can kill everything else.
I’ve got nothing to be mad about, but I hate the world anyway. I’m not sure what the problem is, or if it’s even a problem. I want to hate the world, so maybe it’s adaptive. But why? I’m probably just not getting laid enough. But even if I was getting laid, I’d still be pissed off. I was 23 years old.
And now I’m gonna be 22!
I said a…Hey hey!
And a boo hoo!– Iggy Pop and the Stooges, 1970
Or…
Speed jive
Don’t want to stay alive
When you’re 25– Mott the Hoople, All the Young Dudes, 1972
You get the picture. Young men don’t need a reason to be angry.
Look back in anger.
What are you rebelling against?…What do you got?
Who knows what causes this aimless and meaningless anger of young men? It’s probably all down to testosterone poisoning.
The set’s halfway over.
Darby Crash has that same wild sneer and the 5150 look. He looks like he needs to be Baker Acted, and soon. He’s crouched down on the stage like a wild animal. Like a tiger. Or lion. Same man-eating look.
Everybody is starting to hate him. That’s the idea. Why? He’s an asshole! Just look at him! He wants you to hate him, get it? It’s not even serious. It’s a band of provocateurs.
People are throwing stuff at the stage, mostly at Darby because he deserves it most. The more people throw stuff, the more he smiles, crouches lower and screams like a man-eating feline. I’m starting to hate him. He’s really pissing me off.
We have cokes full of ice. There’s only ice left. I am grabbing handfuls of crushed ice and throwing it this freak on stage. Hard! Try to him! Hit him!
But why?
Because he’s an asshole! Just look at him.
The more ice that gets thrown at him, the more he smiles. It’s all a bit sado-masochistic. But as long as I’m dom, it’s all good.
The show crashes on until it ends, a freeway pileup in the fog on a sound stage.
We stumble out of the building.
It’s New Years Eve, 1979. Tomorrow will be a whole new decade.
The 70’s are over. Bye bye Hotel California. Bye bye paradise. Call someplace paradise, kiss it goodbye.
Hello Germs. Hello Hell. Hello Other Newest One.
It’s the end, the end of the 70’s! It’s the end, the end of the century!
We lurch out of the building and into an alleyway. A crazed, drunken man stumbles into our path. He can’t even walk. He careens nearly into us and crashes to the ground. He picks himself up and looks back at us wildly. We stop. He has granny glasses. He fell on his face, and one lens is smashed. There’s blood all over his eye. It’s Clockwork Orange and Night of the Living Dead combined. Pure horrorshow, droogies.
Maybe he’s gone blind. Who knows?
It’s horrible. There’s blood pouring out of his eye socket. He puts one hand up to his bleeding eye and lurches off ahead of, fertilizing the dawn of the new decade crimson red in his path.
It’s a whole new decade. Things are getting scary. Reagan just won. Nothing makes sense. Everyone’s pissed off and, no one knows why. A new decade looms ahead, glowing ominously with pregnant danger.
We shake our heads at the horror and the spectacle.
A whole new decade has come crashing in filth and fury. We drive home in near silence on the freeway. After all we saw, there’s no words to add. The words are sucked out of us for a good hour. We still don’t quite believe it happened, and we are trying to take it all in.
And that was the night I saw the Germs.