Rage: 20 Years of Punk Rock West Coast Style (2001) - full transcript

- I didn't know what punk was,

'cause there was no punk rock.

When I was a kid, I just
knew I was pissed off.

It was a fucking angry life,

until I found punk rock.

It just made me happy, you know.

To escape to fuckin'
loud punk rock,

there was nothing
fucking greater,

other than fucking a good chick.

♪ Says to shut my mouth

♪ Make me quit my thoughts



♪ Can't stop me from thinking

♪ About the hope I had

♪ Property is theft

♪ Property is theft

♪ This is just another day

♪ Don't care what they've to say

♪ Why should they
want to talk to you

♪ Maybe it's 'cause
we know the truth

♪ Property is theft

♪ Property is theft

♪ Money runs the world

♪ God's the only way

♪ Don't think you can win

♪ 'Cause we'll just make you pay



♪ Property is theft

♪ Property is theft

♪ This for just another day

♪ Don't care what they've to say

♪ Why should they
want to talk to you

♪ Maybe it's 'cause
we know the truth ♪

[Choral singing "Requiem
in D Minor" by Mozart,

mixed with "Property
is Theft" by TSOL]

- [Harold] When punk
happened in England--

- [Voiceover] Which
was like of '77?

- Well, actually I was
over in England in 1976,

and I would go over to England
every two or three years

to do, sort of,
buying for the stores,

like what are the new imports
coming in and I would--

- [Voiceover]
Independent record--

- Yeah, and I was
introduced by Andrew Lauder,

who was head of ANR
at United Artist,

to these two guys, Dave
Robinson and Jake Riviera,

who were starting a new
label called Stiff Records.

And I went down to
their one-room office

and they just started,

and they had a
handful of singles,

and I actually bought,
you know, I can't remember

if it was like,
10 or 20 of each,

and I put them in my suitcase
and I brought them back

and Rhino was the first store--

- [Voiceover] In LA.

- First store, I think it was
the first store in America

to stock Stiff Records.

- [Voiceover] Which is
considered the birth of punk.

- Right, it was
definitely, I mean,

they had non-punk as well,

but they had a lot of punk acts.

And it was part of, '76 was
really when it started--

- [Voiceover] The Damned.

- Right, The Damned,
the Sex Pistols--

- [Voiceover] The Clash.

- Right, The Clash, who
evolved out of the 101ers.

The 101ers were playing in '76.

And in the '70s, it was
really not a good time

because in the early
'70s you had soft rock,

you had James Taylor and
you had the Asylum Records

and The Eagles and
all that stuff,

and you know, that wasn't
rock and roll to me.

And then, in the mid-'70s,

then all of a sudden,
you had disco.

And, you know, disco,
that wasn't rock and roll.

So when I started to
see the energy from

the whole punk scene here--

♪ Vertigo

♪ Oh no

♪ Vertigo

♪ Let's go

♪ Vertigo

♪ Oh no

♪ Vertigo

♪ Things are getting
frantic on the panic train ♪

- Eerily enough, kind
of in the mid-'70s,

there was this, kind
of like this period

where I was sort of like
drifting around a little bit.

Not quite sure of what
I was going to do next.

I tried starting
a couple of bands.

And actually, I started a
band with Charlotte Caffey

and Joe Nanini, who went
on to become, you know,

like part of the Go-Go's
and Wall of Voodoo.

And we were looking for a

little bit louder
style of music,

but we didn't really
know how to address it,

because none of the clubs
would let anybody play loud--

- [Voiceover] No club dates.

- There was no clubs,

it was just singer
songwriters and these endless

acoustic audition nights
and we would go with

our little Champ Amps
but if you turned them

past one, you'd get
booted out, so [laughs]

obviously that wasn't working.

And finally The
Ramones came to LA

and played at The Whisky
to literally 10 people.

And we were among those 10,

and we were just
crying our eyes out,

'cause it was the
first amplified music

we'd heard in five or six years.

And right after that,
amazingly enough,

was when punk rock hit LA.

[punk rock music]

It started right about then.

One of them was the Germs,
the other was the Weirdos

and the third was the Screamers.

And those three bands
really were the three first,

I would say, punk
rock bands in LA.

There may be couple of others

that were sort of
forming at that time.

I came along and joined
a band called The Bags,

me and Joe Nanini joined
a band called The Bags,

and The Bags was
one of, you know,

right after that they're
like maybe the fourth,

or fifth, I don't know what,

punk rock band in
LA at that time.

And that was also
around the time

that this punk club
called The Masque started.

And The Masque was
really the progenitor

of the LA punk scene,

because The Masque
was a rehearsal place

where we also had shows.

I was sort of like the
resident house sound man.

I slept on the floor, you know,

by day, and at night I set
up all this scrap equipment

to make a PA out of old
amplifiers and stuff.

And bands would just
play in the middle,

right on the floor of
this rehearsal place.

♪ As I crave, I consume
'em but I don't give

♪ I got you caught in my eye

♪ I got you caught in my eye

♪ I got you caught
in my eye again

♪ I got you caught in my eye

♪ I got you caught in my eye

♪ I got you caught
in my eye again

♪ I got you caught in my eye

♪ I never got along with
the girls at my school

♪ Filling me up with all
their morals and their rules

♪ They'd pile all their
problems on my head

♪ I'd rather go out
and fuck the dead

♪ 'Cause I can do what I want

- But the way that I
got into punk rock,

it's like I was a fuck
up in school, you know.

I'd been kicked out of every
school in the district.

So my first kick out
was in sixth grade.

You know, first time
I got high was nine.

You know, whiffing Pam and
all of that other shit you do.

And the way I got into it,

there was this girl and
she goes, "You're fucked."

She goes, "You're fucked."

And I'm going, "Why, why?"

She goes, "You're just an
asshole," and I go, "Yeah."

She goes, "I know these
guys that are just like you.

"You should meet them."

And I went over
and it turned out

that was the drummer for TSOL.

That's how I met him, you know,

'cause she said, "Look, you
guys are both criminals."

And it's funny, 'cause
I met her at her house,

I met him at her house,

and we said, "Hey, you
want to start a band?"

And I go, "Yeah,
let's start a band."

So we took her shit.

Like, she had stuff,
just, you know,

we took it and just said,
"Hey, fuck you, this is ours."

- [Voiceover]
Guitar or something?

- Yeah, guitar,
and a little amp.

We couldn't tune, so we
just had two strings,

we'd just use the
top two, you know,

and did one finger stuff.

And then we'd just
go around stealing.

That's how we got our stuff.

Like, you know, schools,
you steal from schools.

Like, our first drum
was a marching drum.

And we'd just lay there on
its side, you know, banged.

Fuck you!

And just yell and
fuck at the neighbors

and play and you know,
and then we'd steal stuff.

Like churches.

Like churches are
unbelievable for stealing,

because it's sanctuary,
you know what I'm sayin'?

So the door are always open.

It's like, fuck, clueless.

So you go in there and you
tip over the holy water

and piss on the alter
and grab the mics.

And take what you, I
mean, I feel bad now.

You can see that I'm
remorseful, you know.

- [Voiceover] [laughs]

- As far as I knew,

everybody that made a
band with their friends,

put out a record and thousands
of people liked them.

I didn't know anything else.

It's like I had no other,

I didn't know that people
work all their lives

to try to get popular,

I just thought, hey,
that's what you do.

Make a band, fuck stuff up.

Get paid, rape, pillage.

I mean, Biafra got
pissed at me one time.

I don't know if
he remembers this.

He was asking me,
he wanted some,

you know, he wanted some
political answer out of me.

He wanted me to back something.

And he asked me about
what I was in it for,

and I go, "Man, I'm
in it to fuck girls."

I'm in it to rob and
steal and fuck girls.

What do you want?

That's what I was in for.

I mean, it was the best job.

I mean, I was just
out of high school,

and it's like, hey,
somebody's gonna pay me

to fuck shit up?

You know what I mean?

It's like, I'm gonna
get money to sleep

with five girls a day,

steal and rob, you know,

get up and be the man,

and here's cash, you
know, it's like, fuck.

♪ Superficial love

♪ Only for a fuck

♪ But love is incest

♪ And it's only for a buck

♪ Eating to survive,
surviving for free

♪ Peace time, war
time, try to draft me

♪ All die for this land

♪ Some are overseas

Early on, to be a punk, you
had to be pretty committed.

You know what I mean?

It was a commitment.

It wasn't a fuckin'
Friday night trip,

you know what I'm saying?

It was a week-long thing.

You know, your
parents hated you,

the fuckin' school hated you.

- [Voiceover] 24 seven.
- 24 seven,

your ass is getting kicked,

you know what I mean?

It was a lot of people, that
I think got into punk rock

just 'cause they were fuck ups.

A lot of the bands
like, Early Ax, I dug,

you know what I mean?

And The Plugs, like going
to see The Plugs, man,

it was great.

And The Weirdos and, you know,

so many cool bands.

And seeing the Germs, and UXA,

and all these bands
you go see, and,

I don't know, most
of those people,

it was like the old
black blues guys.

You know what I mean?

It's like these people
were ripped off.

And the thing is,
then a lot of us

didn't have that business sense.

We weren't in it for business.

Nowadays these kids are in
it for money and business,

that's what it's about.

- [Voiceover] Economic nature

- Yeah, it's not
fuckin' punk rock,

it's fucking money and business.

And back then, it was like,

yeah, what, you're gonna give
me a six-pack, I'll sign.

You know what it's like.

I never had a lawyer
look at anything.

I mean, that may be stupid,

you know, and I'm paying
for it now, whatever,

I'm still broke,
but the fact is,

that wasn't the primary, the
music was the primary focus,

not the business.

♪ I was so wasted,
I was so wasted

♪ I was a hippie

♪ I was a burnout

♪ I was a dropout

♪ You know I was out of my head

♪ I was a surfer

♪ I had a skateboard

♪ I was so heavy, man

- [Voiceover] Is that the
music that excited you?

When you say--

- I've always like
loud, in your face,

fuck you, kind of music.

You know?

Anything that was gonna, like,

irritate any of the
other people around me,

I was pretty much into.

- [Voiceover] When did you
start playing with Greg--

- I started playing with
Greg, it would have been

towards the end of '77.

He was always into the same
things that I was into.

We were all into, like,
[mumbles], Ted Nugent,

Thin Lizzy, the
MC5, the Stooges,

the Ramones, Patti Smith.

He was a big Grateful Dead fan,

which was kind of
strange for the equation.

So that seems like the
one piece to the puzzle

that doesn't really
fit, but, hey--

- [Voiceover] Interesting.

- Everybody has some weird,
off the wall, something that--

- [Voiceover] Barbra Streisand.

- Barbra Streisand, Frank
Sinatra, you know, Wayne Newton.

- [Voiceover] Wayne Newton.

- Slim Whitman,
somebody like that.

- [Voiceover] When you
started to see that

the Orange County
influx of people

that were starting to
really start to like

the kind of music
you were playing,

and that there was
a growing audience,

I mean, do you remember
during what year that was?

'78, '79?

- It was probably
about '78, early '79.

'Cause it took us a while--

- [Voiceover] It took
a year or so to--

- Yeah, it took a while, I mean,

we played and paid our dues.

I mean, we played parties.

I remember we played a party
in Inglewood in a basement,

and I remember vividly
the checkerboard floor

being soaked in
beer, ice, and water

about that think, maybe an inch.

- [Voiceover] And you're
playing electric instruments.

- Playing electric, I
mean, the water hadn't gone

all the way back to all
the big powerful stuff.

Only up front
where the front man

stands with the microphone, yes.

My teeth lit up and
saw a big white flash

and everything looked dark blue

and then everything
looked, you know,

I went through all the
different colors of the rainbow.

- [Voiceover] And did
you grab another--

- All the fillings in
my teeth all shook.

♪ You'd yell out in defiance

♪ You're backed up
against the wall

♪ They're up there
clutchin' their guns, man

♪ And it makes you
feel real small

♪ So cuss

♪ Spit

♪ Throw bottles

♪ Broken glass

See, early on, you had
people like Captain Beefheart

and Frank Zappa who
could go in and record

whatever they wanted to
record and people like it.

I mean, maybe not
on the mainstream,

ultra mega level, but
all the record companies

always had these types of
characters on their labels

because it gave them
artistic credibility.

It gave them street credibility
and it basically said,

"We're not just in
this for the money.

"There are people out
there that we feel have

"something to contribute
on a creative level."

Like they could say
Captain Beefheart

would be the equivalent
to Pablo Picasso.

- [Voiceover] Crowds
were flocking.

I mean, I remember
in those days,

more kids going
to see your shows

then they would go
see cornball bands

at the [mumbles] anymore.

Punk shows where the most
crowded, most energetic,

and to me all--

- You have to take
a look at the kids

that were going to the
shows, for one thing.

- [Voiceover] Okay.

- A lot of the kids from
southern California,

when I say southern California,
I mean southern California,

I don't mean, like, The
Valley or places like that.

I mean kids that were close to,

they had access to the ocean,
so there was a lot of surfing.

A lot of skateboarders, skiiers.

You know, in southern
California we've always had

a kind of a gung-ho, go
for it, kind of attitude.

- [Voiceover] Aggressive.
- Aggressive.

You know, you can
get on the freeway

and, I mean, it trickles
down from the grey hairs

to the, you know,

the purple hairs
and the mohawks.

♪ Gonna make a pact

♪ War

♪ There's no goin' back

♪ War

♪ We're all self castaways

♪ War

♪ We're gonna get away

♪ Yeah, hit the streets

- [Voiceover] What came first,
skateboarding or punk music?

- Skateboarding.

- [Voiceover] How old
were you when you started?

- Six.

- [Voiceover] Six years old?
- Yeah.

- [Voiceover] In what part
of, southern California?

- Southern California.

- [Voiceover] You started
this pre-punk music?

- I didn't know what punk was,

'cause there was no punk rock,

so when I was a kid, I
just knew I was pissed off,

and when my parents broke up,

it was a fucking angry life
until I found punk rock.

I found skateboarding
[background noise]

settled my nerves and
then as soon as punk rock

came into play it fucking
made me skate better.

- [Voiceover] So that's
what I wanted to ask you--

- Wanna play in a band.

- [Voiceover] When you
were skating prior to that,

what were you listening to?

Were you into music
before punk music?

- No, not at all.

My sister took that
all away from me.

She was about 10 and a
half months older than me

and I used to have to
come home to my fucking

pile of shit little
sister who was older

and it's just me
and her and her dad,

my dad, I guess, whatever,

and cleaning up after rock
and roll pieces of shit

just wasn't me
fucking cup of tea

and I fucking
grabbed my skateboard

and I'd split.

That's where that came from.

As soon as I heard The
Ramones on a skateboard trip,

it was, you know,
it came to play.

Before that all I
had was Alice Cooper,

and you could only skate to
Alice Cooper so many years.

[laughter]

- [Voiceover] What year was
that when you heard The Ramones?

- '77, late '77
when I heard them.

I didn't cut my
hair till late '78.

I didn't make a commitment
till I heard Johnny Rotten.

I was late in the game, man.

Heard Johnny Rotten well
after the record was out,

and it just, filtered to me and
it was just fucking serious.

- [Voiceover] So do you
think your skateboarding

was totally changed by
listening to punk rock--

- No,

it made me want to
fuckin' skate more maybe,

but I don't think it changed.

It just made me happy.

To skate to fuckin'
loud punk rock,

there was nothing
fucking greater,

other than fucking a good chick.

[punk rock music]

- [Voiceover] You're not a star.

- More than a star,

more than a punk rock star

- [Voiceover] All right!

- More than a greasy star.

- [Voiceover] Where's the beer?

- More than a three
triple bag star.

- [Voiceover] Do you
think it's gonna go,

people will finally
accept this overground,

as opposed to always being
pushed underground by the media?

Do you think you're ever
going to break through?

- Nobody really breaks
through, no way,

there's no chance of that
shit, you know what I mean?

- [Voiceover] Yeah.

- We've been putting
out great records, man.

I was listening to one of
our records the other day,

and it was like, I don't
know why this thing didn't,

but we don't know if
we're being liked,

we have no statements,

but I guarantee you, we've
never been on the radio,

so I don't see
anything real being

really productive, fucking
candy-coated America.

Honestly, I mean, no
doubt it's very huge.

And that chick is the
most annoying pile of shit

I've ever fucking heard.

I mean, besides
fucking Save Ferris,

[background noise], I mean,
there's these great names,

you know, but the,
what the fuck is this?

Bandos are making it to punk.

I mean, on our scene,
these bandos marching geeks

that can't make it in school

are fucking, and straw bands,

[makes band noises]

Give 'em a vest.

- [Voiceover] I was
going to ask you--

- Let's all go together.

Fuck, what the fuck.

["Solitary War"
by Gitane Demone]

- I guess it was
around '80 or something

and I was doing
some heavy metal.

And I got really sick of it

because it was just
the same kind of thing,

it wasn't really my trip,

but I was aggressive,
very aggressive female.

And I didn't really know,

I'd go out to venues, to
Al's Bar, to the Whisky

to the Roxy, all different
kinds of places around,

and go check out punk bands.

But I was really
shy to meet people.

So, um, I was
aggressive but shy.

And then I threw an
ad in The Recycler

I met Valor

and we started a band
called Pompeii '99.

Yeah, we started playing and

we had a record
release party for this

and Rozz came to it.

I'd never, I'd
seen him play live

and I was totally
intrigued with him

and he cameo--

- [Voiceover] What band was he?

- He was in Christian Death.

Yeah he'd done Only
Theatre of Pain

and he was playing with
the original lineup.

By the time he came to
the record release party

he was getting off
the track with them.

For some reason he didn't want
to play with them anymore.

He came and he met us,

and I was actually too
shy to talk with him,

and I'd never seen anyone like
him in front of me before.

- [Voiceover]
Intensly charismatic.

- Yeah, incredible, I was
like, "Woah, who is that?"

Then, apparently, Rozz
wanted to meet me.

I was pregnant,
I was only a few,

I guess four months pregnant
with my son, at the time,

and I went to his birthday party

and I walked in all
kind of bloated and big.

I walked in and there are
all these immaculate women

dressed up as men.

About a hundred of them
at a birthday party,

and I felt like, oh,

very, very feminine

in this kind of really
masculine woman image.

And I felt completely out of it.

But I met him, and he was great,

and he was interested
in having me do

backing vocals and keyboards--

- [Voiceover] So he
had heard your voice--

- He'd heard my voice, yeah,

and he liked Pompeii '99 a lot.

We did some opening shows
for him and 45 Grave.

We were mixed into that,

but we weren't actually
deathrock at the time.

We were doing something
very dark, but different.

♪ I accept the gift of sin

♪ The gift of
pleasure is bleeding

♪ To smother the words

♪ The four walls drain me dry

♪ Of all imagination

♪ Crying out to be
told to stand still

♪ Crying out to be told to be

- Fascinated with the
dark mysteries of life.

- [Voiceover] Like we
would read Edgar Allan Poe

as opposed to Cinderella.

- [Gitane] Sure yeah, and I
was reading a lot of odd stuff.

Surrealism and stuff even
though I couldn't understand

a lot of it when I
was a young teenager.

- [Voiceover] So your
evolution as a woman

kind drew you into this
whole musical scene.

- Yeah, I didn't really,
it was very subconscious.

I didn't understand it.

I was always dressing
in very dark colors

and I'd ask my mom, "Why
am I always wearing this?

"I don't want to wear this."

I think that Rozz and
the deathrockers here

really created their own thing.

I really do.

And it came out of punk.

And it was a
combination theatrics,

a need to be more dramatic

and visually expressive.

Everybody was just sort
of, to use a cliche term,

tuned in with what was
happening at the time.

The need, the desperation.

- [Voiceover] For truth--

- For getting this
thing out of their soul.

To meld,

to be one, to feel not alone.

To feel not alone.

To share, yeah, to
share this feeling.

- [Voiceover] Disorientation
from their families.

- Definitely, disorientation
from everything.

Yeah, from being a unique sort,

outside of all the other
categories that were laid out.

From school, from tradition,

from everything
that was laid out.

Okay, we're alone,
we're weirdos.

Who can we talk to?

Who can we sing to,
who can we play to?

Who can we be with,
who understands?

And this was one
thing that happened,

everybody's got their own thing.

This was something
else that happened,

and it was a complete alliance
with audience and performing.

♪ The world's my aim so

♪ Gimme gimme your hands

♪ Gimme gimme your mind

♪ Gimme gimme your hands

♪ Gimme gimme your mind

♪ Gimme gimme this,
gimme gimme that, yeah

♪ I'll join the pushers

♪ Join them all we'll
wreck the club ♪

- So I heard, through a
girl that I knew in LA,

there was a band
that was really cool

and they needed a drummer.

And I said, "Oh yeah,
what band is that?"

And my friend said, "Oh,
they're called the Germs."

I said, "Oh, I've got their
record, I just got it."

And I listened to it again,
because I guess I hadn't

really listened to it before.

It was the most amazing thing
I'd ever heard at the time.

The B side was just this mess.

It was this live thing that made

The Velvet Underground
White Light White Heat album

sound like a techno record.

It was amazing, it
was just unbelievable.

It was just garbled noise.

It was the Forming single
and the song on the B side

was called Sexboy,
although on the record

it just says Germs: Live.

Well, I thought that
was pretty insane,

and I thought, "Wow, this
would be something I can do,

"and I can move to LA, I
could join this amazing band,

"and life would be wonderful."

So, I called them up, I
got their phone numbers

from this person, I guess
they knew them peripherally.

And I called Pat and Darby and
talked to them about music.

I asked Pat, "So are you
into all these punk bands?"

I named all these esoteric
punk bands that I liked,

like Subway Sect,

like, I don't know,
Metal Urbaine,

and these weird punk bands I
thought were pretty happening

at the time, late '77.

And he said, "Well, actually,
I'm really into Queen,

"and Yes and I like
David Bowie a lot."

And that was like he said

some kind of Sid
Ko-an, you know.

I was just like [reverberating].

What, that was brilliant.

I thought, "My God, they
do this music, and, wow."

So I called Darby, the singer,

and he said pretty
much the same things.

I said, "Wow, well,
I'm a drummer,

"I want to come
and join your band.

"You guys sound
pretty interesting."

I mean, I'm going to
move to California

and I'm going to join your band.

And he said, "Uh, okay."

Like, whatever, if you want
to, yeah, I don't know.

And then Darby proceeded
to regale me with two hours

of stories about all these
people that I didn't know

in the LA punk scene and
their weird sexual quirks

and scandalous
behavior of all sorts.

He was like Kenneth
Anger or something,

a Hollywood Babylon
kind of thing.

Except all these people
were young and alive.

In the bathroom there, like,
auditioning for these guys,

who I had given up an
entire life in Phoenix,

to be in their band,
which I was never actually

certain that I was
going to be in.

I'm bashing on my
[background noise]

in this bathroom stall, they're
looking pretty concerned.

"Could you play a song?"

And I remembered that Nicky Beat

had actually given me a
drum list, my one drum list.

And he had taught me how
to play a Weirdo song

called Life of Crime,
it was very simple.

[mumbles] and most people.

But I learned how to play
it, and I played that.

In that stall, for
about a minute,

and then that was that.

I was hoping they wouldn't
ask me to do anything else.

And they didn't,
they went outside

of the bathroom and deliberated.

And apparently the conversation
went something like,

"What do you think?"

"I don't know,
what do you think?"

"Well, he did come
from Phoenix."

"Anyone that would come that
far just to join this band,

"must be kind of
worth trying, anyway."

So, they came back
and Darby said,

"Well, you're a Germ."

- [Voiceover] Did you have
a alcohol in front of you?

- Well, you know, everything.

- [Voiceover] Sex
and drugs and punk.

- Yeah, but you
know, with the Germs,

they were a little
too much for all that,

so that wasn't enough.

Most people were way beyond
sex, drugs, and rock 'n' roll.

It was utter chaos,
and it was so much fun.

- [Voiceover] Do you think
that Darb was the kind

of personality that liked that.

- Liked it, yeah.

Liked it, he thrived
on it, and created it

if it wasn't there already.

So, oh yeah, he was great.

In high school, he was
this amazing LSD prankster.

He would do things like
sneak announcements

onto the PA system, for
the whole high school.

Like, that Led Zeppelin had
been killed in a plane crash.

And all the stoners in the
class would start weeping

and he'd laugh.

- [Voiceover] That's funny.

- Yeah, he was good.

He's really into Scientology
and stuff like that also.

Various mind control techniques.

Nietzsche and
philosophy and Gurdjieff

and L. Ron Hubbard,
and Hilter, you know,

just interested in all of the
various forms of mind control.

He was a one-man
cult and personality.

- [Voiceover] So
you really saw this?

- He was great, he
has more charisma

than Jesus.

["Too Drunk to Fuck"
by Dead Kennedys]

- Punk happened at the
perfect time for me

because it was a very,
very depressing time

to come of age in the
mid to late 1970s.

And howl amongst our friends,

"We missed the sixties!"

All that fire, all that fun,

it's all mellowed out and
made into hanging plants

and what's now called
yuppies and New Age

and even long hair, which
scared the living daylights

out of people was now on
the heads Lynyrd Skynyrd

when they were playing benefits

for George Wallace and stuff.

It was just,

something new had to
replace the rebellion

that reached its peak
when it was fighting

against the Vietnam War.

Plus, of course, music by
the mid to late seventies

was, for the most part,
totally laughable.

Alex Harvey, the
Scottish glam-rock star,

predicted in an interview,

that before long a whole
new generation of people

were going to come in
who wanted nothing to do

with Coliseum Rock and
all the elitist pomp

that went with it.

He predicted that,
and within two years,

thankfully it happened.

So instead of being a
bad time to be alive,

suddenly it was the
dawn of another era.

Which I could feel
unfolding by the time

I was out in San Francisco.

I left school out of two months,

left college after two months,

'cause I wanted to dive
headfirst into punk rock

and be a part of that.

I mean, I could tell
my grandchildren

I saw The Avengers and
The Dils back when.

And if I was really lucky,

maybe even get a little
single out of my own music

to show that I actually
pulled something off

at some point.

- [Voiceover] Had you
been playing music?

Were you artistic, drawing,
going to art class?

How did you--

- I'm a real good example
of how punk enabled somebody

with absolutely no
musical talent whatsoever

on paper, by serious
music standards,

could make their own
music and make an impact.

I've never [mumbles] my friends
with musical instruments,

I just made up the
music in my head,

and would sing it to Klaus,

he'd transpose it to Ray
and we'd turn it into songs.

[punk rock music]

And in New York, and
on the East Coast,

it was over-21 scene.

Even though CBGC's was
connected with punk,

and so was Max's in New York,

they were established
rock venues.

You had to have an ID to get in,

they were not all-ages shows,

and so once the initial
wave of New York people

got signed and got bigger,

what followed was either, like,

leftover glamo-bar bands

who really didn't have
much going for them,

or stuff that was really,
really arty and meant for--

- [Voiceover] Talking Heads.
- Adults.

Well no, post Talking
Heads, and more importantly,

post James Chance,
post Lydia Lunch.

And so, you know, I
couldn't have done it

anywhere but in San Francisco.

And a large part of the
credit, I would say,

would go to Dirk Dirksen,
who had the foresight

to make the Mabuhay
Garden shows all-ages.

I was 19 when Dead
Kennedys started.

And a lot of the people in
those early bands were under 21.

If they had to wait
till they were 21,

they might have gotten more
serious about their careers

or something and never stuck
their necks out at all.

You know, it's important
to do these things

when you don't
know enough not to.

Kind of like when I ran for
mayor, or something like that.

Punk was a much more
wide-open term then.

It wasn't just Skank Or
Die and stuff like that.

It was anybody who was
sick of the seventies

and wanted to be part of
something new and exciting

was there, be it Bruce
Conner, the old filmmaker,

taking the photos, to
Mark Pauline whose project

evolved into survival
research labs.

The Voice Farm people who
were electronic and what not.

It was all part of a greater
umbrella called punk.

♪ Went to a party

♪ I danced all night

♪ I drank 16 beers and
I started up a fight

♪ But now I'm jaded

♪ You're out of luck

♪ I'm rolling down the stairs

♪ Too drunk to fuck

♪ Too drunk to fuck,
too drunk to fuck

♪ Too drunk to
fuck, I'm too drunk,

♪ Too drunk, too drunk,
too drunk to fuck

♪ I like your stories

♪ I love your gun

♪ Shooting out truck tires

♪ Sounds like loads
and loads of fun

♪ But in my room

♪ Wish you were dead

♪ You bawl like the
baby in Eraserhead

♪ Too drunk to fuck,
too drunk to fuck

♪ Too drunk to fuck

♪ It's all I need right now

♪ Too drunk to fuck

- See, the thing is, none
of us knew how to play.

So we had to grow,
and to us, to me,

selling out would be doing
the same record every time.

That's a fucking sellout.

Because I know what
people are gonna buy,

you know, people talk about now,

sellout, sellout, all this crap,

back then, to me, what
people were wanting from TSOL

was a three-chord
political record

saying, "Fuck Reagan," or
whoever was in there now,

Carter or Reagan or I don't
even know who we got now,

but whatever--

- [Voiceover] Same thing.

- So we're not going to do that.

We're gonna do something else.

And then we're going to do
something else after that,

and we're going to
something else after that.

To me, it was always changes.

Like, you know, using
pianos, using keyboards,

doing whatever--

- [Voiceover] People put you
down, I remember back then,

when some of these new
punk bands started up

and thought that Jack
Grisham had sold out.

- Selling out, for me, is saying

the same thing
every fucking time,

'cause I know that's
what they're gonna buy.

You know what I mean?

And I won't do it, and
I still won't do it,

you know what I mean?

I get people pissed
at me all the time.

My mother used to get pissed

'cause I'd change my
name every record,

you know what I mean?

She's go, "What's
the matter with you?"

And the reason why I changed
my name every record,

it just to show people
it didn't matter.

Our whole troupe
was a no rock star,

no hero thing, that was our bag.

So this record, I'm
going to be Jack Grisham,

next record I'm gonna
be fuck all, you know,

or whatever, Alex
Morgan, Jack Greggors,

Jack Lloyd, whatever, I
changed my name all the time,

'cause it didn't matter
who was in the band.

And for me, it's
always been small.

They've always been
independent labels,

and the one thing,
you think back,

yeah, it's like, TSOL,
we could headline

a show at the Palladium,
and there'd be 5,000 people,

they'd be sold out, and not
one major record company

would talk to us.

And if you took a band today--

- [Voiceover] How do
explain that, that's insane.

- I don't care, fuck 'em,

I wouldn't have got
along with them anyway.

I would have ended
up punching one out,

so it's like, I remember
this one record company

hired my buddy to go with me

so I wouldn't attack
anybody in the band.

It's like, okay, we'll
pay you to sit with him.

You know, will you babysit
during the meeting?

You know what, fuck 'em,
who wanted them anyway?

I didn't.

And God, all I needed
man, is just to have

some fuck hole tell
us we're out of tune

or we're not hitting
something right

or we're doing, I
remember this guy,

one of those idiots pulled
a gun on me one time,

in a studio, some Hollywood
fucknut was doing whatever--

- [Voiceover] What a
coke dealer or whatever?

- No, I called him some racial
slur, you know what I mean?

Just to be fucked,
you know what I mean.

It's like, I don't care,
you know what I mean?

I looked at him, I said,
"Hey, you fuckin' yeah, yeah."

- [Voiceover] Yadda, yadda.

- And the guy goes, "Ah!"

And he starts choking up.

And he goes, "I didn't do
two fuckin' tours of 'Nam

"to have some little
punk-ass bitch like you,

"where's my pistol?"

Fuck you, you know, what
are you going to do,

shoot me, you fuck, whatever.

So I'm glad they
stayed away anyway.

I wouldn't have
got along with 'em.

- We were not under any scrutiny
by any major record labels.

- [Voiceover] Now, why
do you think that is?

- Because the music we were
playing was too offensive.

It was too fast, it was
too loud, it was abrasive.

- [Voiceover] But a big crowd.

- Basically, what
we were playing was

everything they
didn't want to hear.

- [Voiceover] Now, you're
talking radio, record people.

- Yes.
- [Voiceover] What about--

- No, there were people
amongst all those other people

that were interested
in what we were doing.

And got a kick out of
what we were doing.

And knew that we
were doing something

that was not part
of the mainstream.

But, they could not
do anything to help us

maybe make a few suggestions,

but they could not do
anything to help us

because it really wasn't
in their interest.

- By early 1978, the
major record companies

had decided they wanted
nothing to do with punk.

The ongoing feelers and
negotiations with people like

The Avengers, the Mods, Crimes,

and I'm guessing
the LA bands, too,

all of sudden just
snipped, like that.

And The Dickies were the
last ones to get signed.

And if I recall, Leonard
had a relative at A and M

or something and
then no more bands

connected with punk or
even any kind of powerful,

independent underground
was signed again

till who-sker-do
almost a decade.

It was, um,

they decided that
punk from then on

would be the stuff we
don't want to sign,

but we will push New Wave.

Necktie bands, who bop
around onstage and smile

and sing girly-poo songs

and will do whatever some idiot
in a satin baseball jacket

who still listens to Eric
Clapton at the record company

tells them to do.

And so, unlike England,
where there was always,

because of the Sex Pistols
were a top-10 chart band,

there was always more punk,

it was more powerful there.

Here, to stick around, you
kind of had to make a decision,

we're doing this because
we like the music

and we don't give a fuck

whether or not we get
signed and put on a leash

by somebody at Sire
Records or something.

- When you write a
record, if you give a fuck

what you're doing,
you want to write

a good fucking record, you
want to write what's going on

in the moment, or
in between records,

or wherever you're at.

And you don't want
to repeat yourself

and you want to, you
know, you're on something,

so you wanna, but, and you
wanna keep it buried too.

And it's like,
fucking, you gotta,

you gotta think night
and day, you know.

If you give a fuck what
you're doing, you're up,

I mean, you get, you
have a relationship,

it goes to shit.

Everything goes to shit
when you're writing.

You turn into a freak, not
that you're not already,

but it just goes outside,
and then, I mean,

the arguments and everything
that goes with it.

The no sleeping,
the band arguments,

when you take something
there, you got a concept,

these guys got another
concept, you know,

it's a constant feud, but
it's all for one cause.

And everybody knows that.

They thought we were going to
kill each other or something,

that's the way we write.

- [Voiceover] They
didn't get the fact

you were passionate
about your art.

- It's not passionate,
it's just being pissed off

and standing behind
what you want to do,

and the way you want it to be,

and then he wants
the same thing,

and then it's all about
who's going to give up

half his change in
his pocket, you know.

And that's what
we'd do, you know,

and that's okay, you know,
that's the way we write,

and there's plenty of
shit to write that way.

Anyway, with all these

independent record
companies and stuff,

you can only do
the dirt so long,

I mean, you can only
wash dishes so long,

that's all I'm fucking
capable of doing.

I skateboard, that
pays my rent right now.

I'm 36 years old, I'm the oldest
paid skateboarder there is.

I've doing that all my life.

My bones are fucked, I
can't even go in the cold.

They freeze up, when
I go in the cold,

because I'm not
ready to pack it up.

♪ Dirty invitation
is a rotten vacation

♪ Dole Heights,
Chelsea Hotel dive

♪ Born sick in this
spoon, shouted out

♪ I'm the last of the true

♪ Sidney

- There was a lot of drugs.

- [Voiceover] After you were
pushing to have a concert?

- Um, a lot of sex
going on afterwards,

a lot of picking
up, a lot of drugs,

and you know, drugs
on stage, as well.

A lot of drugs, there was
bottles of amyl nitrate

being passed around--

- [Voiceover] As the
performance was--

- Yeah, yeah, sure.

- [Voiceover] Would you
say that that helped

gel the band together?

- I don't know, I really
don't know. [laughs]

A lot of alcohol,
I know from myself,

I got fist fucked for
the first time backstage

while I was watching
Ax, you know.

Yeah, while they
were performing.

Yeah, and there was a lot of
sex going on, a lot of sex.

- [Voiceover] In
the audience or in--

- On the sidelines,
yeah, yeah, definitely.

And, yeah, it was a
big, the thing was

to lose yourself to expression.

Lose yourself to your
desires and your expression,

however you want to express it,

and if anybody will join you
and be involved in it also.

And it was very dark,
it was very dark.

You know, there was the
whole candle ritual going on,

where you'd start the show,
and there'd be a big candle

on somebody's hand and it
would, they'd light it,

and by the end of the
show, their hand would be

completely covered in wax and
the flame would be way down

and that wax would have
been poured on other hands.

- [Voiceover] So the infliction
of pain, and the endurance.

- Yeah, exactly.

I couldn't believe
it one morning,

we were having breakfast and

Offspring comes
on, no, Green Day,

it was around the same time,

and I'm going, and then
my son was over, too,

and he goes, "Yeah, this
is the punk music now."

And I go, took it off, I go,
"No, it's not, it is not.

"This has got nothing
to do with punk."

Punk is about anarchy.

That's where it comes from.

Not being a part of the system.

The very fact that
this band is on MTV and

copying the music slightly,

they can't even do it really
properly, it's too smooth--

- [Voiceover] Right, it
didn't have any jagged edges.

- No, no, no, it's, I
doubt if they even know

what the word anarchy
means, you know.

And I put on some Dead Kennedys
and some old real stuff,

and I said, "This is what
punk is, don't believe it,

"don't believe it."

'Cause the punk
thing was never about

being a part of the system,

it was about creating
something outside of it.

- The sooner the corporate
entertainment industry window

closes the better, as
far as I'm concerned.

It is not any sort of
victory for what punk

originally meant to people,

to hear a hard core thrash
song in a Taco Bell ad.

I don't care, it's still
not going to get me

to go to Taco Bell, it
may get me dead sick

of that particular song,

the same way I get sick of

♪ Like a rock

You see this redneck-mobile

crunching around on the
mountains and stuff,

with some had-act
country guy inside

singing about his
truck or something.

- Punk rock just happened
to be the vehicle

for those people that were
doing that stuff at that time.

Do you know what I'm saying?

Like I said, it could
have been disco.

Okay, Saturday Night Fever's
a punk rock movie, man,

you know what I'm saying?

They're fuckholes,
you know what I mean,

they're little disco crew,

they were going
around kicking ass.

And I think, it's like
rebels, it's whatever.

And whether it's rap.

I was so stocked on the
rap stuff when it came out.

I thought, yeah, that's
fucking punk rock, man.

The first time I heard N.W.A,

I said, "That is punk rock."

That is just fucking,
that rules, you know.

- [Voiceover] Punk
rock can be in a myriad

of styles of music or sounds,

as long as it has the
actual spirit of rebellion.

- Right, or the whole thing,

or just doing something
that people don't like.

People going against
whatever it is.

It's like I used to
tell people, you know,

I had my hair done
like Marilyn Monroe

with a tube top and a dress,

playing lounge music with
a fucking cello behind me,

and I'd look at
these guys and go,

"You think what
you're doing's punk?"

This is punk, this
is fucked up, man.

And now, I think a lot of
the stuff now, you know,

it's hard to tell who's
on your team, now.

'Cause anybody can sound--

- [Voiceover] Like,
watch your back--

- It's like, yeah, because
the music, it's so,

it's Goddamn, punk rock today,
it's a Sprite commercial.

You know what I
mean, it's fucked.

I look at these kids, I got
in a fight with these kids,

I looked at them, I said,
"You fucking idiots."

You learned your life from a
fucking Pepsi commercial, man.

You dress like it,
you fucking drink it,

you listen to that sound,
that MTV punk rock sound.

And you think it's
punk, it's not.

It's not, it's a fucking joke.

- One thing that broke
my heart about the early,

my early times in San
Francisco was seeing some of

the greatest bands I
will ever see in my life,

playing some of the greatest
shows I've ever seen in my life

and nobody was recording them.

Nobody had any money
to make records.

And so I felt like if
I ever came into money

or walked in to see
there's a trust fund baby,

or something like that,
this is what I would do,

is would try and get
these bands on tape

before they blew apart.

I mean, The Avengers could
have made three albums

worth of songs, all of which
would be classics today.

Same for The Screamers,
same for The Sleepers,

and the rest of them.

It's some of the best
music I've ever heard,

was lost to history
and I didn't want

that to happen anymore.

So when Dead Kennedys
got well-known and
popular in England

it was just a fluke, a
sheer stroke of luck.

When we went to the east
coast and lost our shirts

on a little tour before
we'd even put a record out,

we left a few of
the early copies of

California Uber Alles that
Ray had pressed up behind,

and somebody from Fast Records,

who was a hot label in
England at the time,

whose first few singles were
by bands with names like

Gang of Four,
Mekons, Human League,

and they wanted to re-release
California Uber Alles on Fast.

And so it took off like
a rocket in England,

it was like nothing England or
Europe had ever heard before.

For the most part, except for
The Ramones and The Dickies,

they were completely unaware

of what American punk
was about, let alone,

that it was because
it had been squashed

underground for so long, it had
become a great deal heavier,

more demented and more
insane than British punk

has ever been.

Why are you the only
good band in America?

I'm saying, "No, that's
not true at all."

There's DOA, there's Black
Flag, there's Flipper,

there's the Bad Brains,
there's Circle Jerks,

et cetera, et cetera,
et cetera, et cetera,

so I figure at that point
we've got to resurrect

Alternative Tentacles and
put out a compilation album

to blow open Europe for
the American Underground,

which is what Let Them
Eat Jellybeans! was.

And ironically, it then
spilled back around

and got well known
enough in America

that it helped crack open
the United States as well.

Because, of course, people
could take that record home

for the Dead Kennedys
song and then realize

that there was a band
right in their town

who was doing equally
important things,

and maybe it's time
to get off their butts

and support them.

["Sex Bomb" by Flipper]

- I was lucky enough to be in

three of the
biggest bands in LA.

- [Voiceover] I mean,
they sound fucking good.

- Nothing, it's what's
really funny though,

is not one of them ever
did anything outside of LA.

- [Voiceover] But they
spawned other groups--

- 45 Grave toured, but
it was never really

much outside of LA, it's crazy.

I don't know why.

It couldn't, I tell you why.

From The Germs to Vox Pop
to 45 Grave, Celebrity Skin,

and even more recently to
a band, the 3 Day Stubble,

that I played with, it
doesn't translate quite

as well to record as it could.

The Germs were the
closest, I think.

But, it's a live thing,
you had to be there.

It wasn't just about
a bunch of guys

on a stage playing music.

It was a thing.

It was a whole thing.

And whatever it was, it not
something that was translatable.

[upbeat music]

- I met all these people
that kissed me 'cause

in The Times one time,
there was this big quote.

I said, "Getting
hurt is healthy."

And it is, I think back,
you know when you're a kid,

you're jumping on the
bed, and your parents say,

"Hey, hey, stop, stop."

And it's like fuck,
you're going and going

and they're going, "Look,
you're going to get hurt,

"stop, stop, stop."

And you go, you go, you
go, and then you bounce off

and you crack your fucking head

and split your head open, right?

So you get hurt, but the
point of the whole thing is,

is that you pushed
the envelope of fun

as far as it could go.

You couldn't have any more fun,

'cause you had got an injury.

You'd sustained an injury.

So I used to think, look,

if I don't come home with
an ice pick in my neck,

or a fucking, you
know what I mean,

I didn't push it as
fun as it could go.

You know what I mean?

If I'm not over in Emergency,
getting stitched up,

then the night was unsuccessful.

- I'm down with the working
class and all that crap,

but I don't want to be
part of the working class--

- [Voiceover] You're an artist.

- I've got my little
fucking backyard label,

I'm happy with the living.

If I can just make ends
meet, I'm fine, man.

If I can keep my head just
a little bit above water,

and breathe most of the
time, I'm fucking fine.

- [Voiceover] Do you
find anybody that
you respect anymore?

- Yeah, Shane MacGowan
with Flying Colors

and Keith Richards, um,

but Keith Richards is a hero.

I mean, outspoken,
it makes me want,

I mean, fuck it makes
me want to grow old

because that, to me,
is fucking genius,

living proof that
everybody's wrong

and all the doctors are a lie.

'Cause I tell my chick,
if I ever get cancer,

or any of that shit, you
better let me fucking die,

because I can't
afford to stay alive.

And that's what part of
this fucking thing's about.

This whole system set up
for you to fucking lose.

Done it all my life, I've
been every kind of freak

you can think about, you know.

- [Voiceover] Go back
to what you were saying.

Individuality, to
me, is really missing

in United States
of America now--

- Bad, I mean, if you can just
stick out like a sore thumb

and what, just
because you're out of

the Haight district
in San Francisco,

or some fucking place
where it's like Long Beach.

That's why I live there.

You can go to the store
in your fucking underwear

and nobody gives
a shit, you know.

And it's like, you
can't fucking, me
and Chuck walked into

this bowling alley
in Salt Lake City

and the whole fucking
bowling alley stopped.

It was so fucking
white and inbreded,

I couldn't believe, just
milk and cookie land.

I've never seen so
many rosy cheeks.

And what the hell,
God damn is that.

- I'd say what my
work is about is to

express the truth as far as,

and I'm ever-searching
and hanging on to that,

the truth of being human.

The truth of being human
and within that human-ness,

to be a bubble of light.

I meditate and try to
channel from my god,

which is a god of
creativity and love.

That's my spiritual source

And that's what I do,
that's what I try to do

when I'm performing
live, recording,

I get all my information
from that source.

And that's what I am.

- I come from a working
class, you do what you do,

and get whatever reward
you get when you get it.

And you be happy with it.

And know a lot of these
millionaire rock stars

running around, crybaby,
I'm hurt, you know,

with the model girlfriends,
wrecking automobiles,

getting in accidents, trying
to find the heroin dealer.

And they're just not
happy, and it's like,

why aren't they happy?

It's because they don't know
what really is going on.

They just got caught
up in all this shit and

they went on this ride and
as they were going along

on the ride, they didn't
take time to take a look

at a lot of the things that
were going on around them.

- It's just one
big, long look at,

at egocentricity, about all
the, just the bullshit around,

and wanting to take this and
pierce it right through it,

and say, fuck, you know,

fuck the makeup, fuck the veil,

the curtain, get through
it to the other side.

'Cause what's going on today,

it's all just a pretty picture.

And behind that pretty
picture is a lot of fucking

egocentricity, narcissism,
and bullshit and lies.

- [Voiceover] Liars.
- A lot of lies.

Everybody, you know, I
sound really negative,

but it pisses me off.

- [Voiceover] I think
that what the humor

and the ability to point out,

"Hey, this is fucked
up in society."

And be able to articulate that,

in a fun, aggressive way,
I think is needed again.

I mean, you've got all
these serious chick singers.

And you've got all
these rap artists

who are talking
about fucking chicks.

And there's no humor any more.

- [Keith] Well, it's
not the flash life.

The eight ball.

- [Voiceover] And
the eight ball.

And the thing with the car and
the bikini shaking the booty

and it's like, "What
the fuck is this?"

I mean, there's
no humor anymore.

- And the thing is,
it's not like that.

If you go out into
the real world,

there's no girl dancing
around, partially nude

on the hood of my car.

- [Voiceover] [laughs]

- And I can't afford
an eight ball.

But I do hate the white man
just as much as the next guy

that comes along, just
like I hate anybody

in any organization,
or any group of people,

that will shoot their mouths
off and not back it up,

or go off and do
something about it.

- So I started aiming
my spoken word stuff

more and more as
infotainment and voila,

of all people, I wound up
being Tipper Gore's pigeon

for trying to send
somebody to jail

for the content of
their music album.

And then, all of a sudden,
people who dismissed me

as a paranoid lunatic
two weeks earlier,

were saying, "Wait a
minute, the guy's right."

And suddenly I had a
platform for my ideas,

a rare window opened in
the straight mass media,

to say this is how Tipper Gore's

connected with Jerry Falwell,

this is how she's connected
with Phyllis Schlafly,

and Pat Robertson, this is
what they really want to do,

this is why they want to
ban records that mention

homosexuality in them,
and things like that.

- [Voiceover] Is this when you
did the Oprah Winfrey Show?

- Yeah, that came a
little later, yeah.

- [Voiceover] A little later?

- Yeah, and so, um,

so what's happened
with Spoken Word,

is I made no
pretense about being

any kind of great literary
artist or poet or writer.

I just ram people with things

I think they ought to know
about, between the eyes,

for about four hours a night.

It's amazing only
half the people leave.

[laughter]

- [Voiceover] I know that
probably doesn't bother you.

- And, no, but what
it does, I mean,

I miss the cathartic energy
of the live music shows,

of course, I mean, I
still go to music shows

all the time, write songs,
record songs, et cetera.

But with Spoken Word, the
people who come there to listen,

you can penetrate at
a much deeper level,

then with a
two-minute punk song.

You can go into a
lot more detail.

To the President of
the United States,

and all '98 election winners.

Lungren, the Gray Davis man,

wake up, get real,

the way we're going

in 2001 we'll be
like Russia is now.

Call off the drug war.

[cheering and applause]

- Oh, I'm proud to
have been a part of it,

and still be a part of it,

because I think that
it's a great thing,

and I think that the
LA punk rock movement

was probably,

maybe the second-greatest
musical movement

that's ever happened.

I mean, I would liken it
almost to the British Invasion.

- People say, "Why have children

"when the world
is so fucked up?"

And I say,

"You pass on the
things that you know"

You teach your
children the truth.

They know the truth.

Both of them do.

They know, they're honest kids.

When I drop out of the picture,

they're going to go on,

and they're going to
go on with the spirit,

with the punk spirit.

- And that's what I think
the difference, man.

The old punks wouldn't
let that shit go.

A bouncer fucking
takes a swing at a kid,

you fuck him up.

The cops come and they try
to get one of your buddies,

you fuck 'em up.

You throw bottles, you
do whatever it takes.

If the club owner's a fuckhole,
you burn his place down.

- [Voiceover] So, your
kids and your wife,

you do you feel
about your family,

and how it affects your music?

- Well, I love 'em,
you know what I mean?

It's like, I haven't been in
jail nine years 'cause of them.

Which is nice, yeah.

I mean, I don't know, I
try to teach my daughter

to try to have some integrity,
you know what I mean?

To try to see past
this shit, to be open.

And it's cool 'cause the
experience that I've had,

it's like, I came from
an abusive family.

I've never laid a
hand on my daughter.

I've never hit my
daughter, you know.

I reason with her, I
talk to her as an adult.

And it's cool, it's
like I go through

a bunch of different hair
colors, you know what I mean?

I don't know, whatever,
respect, or whatever it is.

And I encourage her to
not listen to people.

I encourage her to not dress
like the other kids at school.

Don't follow that crap.

Don't buy those shoes
'cause this guy's got shoes.

Do what you want.

- [Voiceover]
Individuality in America

is what it's based on.

- Right, right.

- Oh, there's always a
possibility for something

that scares the living
daylights out of people

to the degree that the Sex
Pistols or whoever did,

but I warn you, it may
be you who gets scared.

[laughter]

What I can hardly
wait for is when these

pierced and tattooed
parents have to deal with

their rebellious children
spending their allowance money

on plastic surgery and
having devil horn implants,

elephant man faces,
and designer tails.

[laughter]

How many older people who
claim they still like punk,

plug their ears when
their 10-year-old kids

put hip hop on?

- We don't know if
we're being liked,

we have no statements,

but I guarantee you we've
never been on the radio,

so I don't see
anything real being

really brought out to
fucking candy-coated America.

- Thomas Jefferson was a punk.

Go read what he said.

He said we should have a
revolution every 100 years.

Here was somebody that
these kids are learning

is supposed to be
this great guy,

and he's off saying this
country needs to be shaken up,

every 100 years let's
have a revolution.

- [Voiceover] Capsulize
this whole movement,

effective part, the
punk rock movement,

art, fashion, music, everything,

and now it's evolved.

What would you consider this
whole thing [background noise]

- Wow.

[sighs]

If I could do that, I'd
probably wouldn't have gotten

involved with it
in the first place.

I would have just said
in a sentence then

and stayed home.

And had a life.

["Solitary War"
by Gitane Demone]

["Spit Up the Rage"
by Jack Grisham]