More Fun in the New World

We never thought we’d be writing a sequel to Under the Big Black Sun.

When John and I set out to write our first book, which chronicled the birth of punk rock in Los Angeles, specifically spanning the years 1977 to 1982, we went into it with a purpose: we were intent on making sure that if we were telling the story of the roots of L.A. punk, it be told by multiple voices of folks who actually lived through it. It was important that it didn’t become a tale from just John’s perspective but rather an overview of a time that was noticeably becoming, at best, a victim of revisionist history. Its origin and ensuing years had been thinly documented on any global scale, especially compared to the concurrent New York and UK musical revolutions.

When we first pursued a deal to write what would become UTBBS, our goal was very simple: pen the history of the West Coast punk rock movement. Once we actually signed a deal to publish the tale, we realized that in order to make it cohesive, it would be best to devote the narrative, historically, to those first five years. The perfect year to end it seemed to be 1982, just as punk rock was really entering the consciousness of the US mainstream.

I wish I could tell you with confidence that we knew what we were doing when we undertook writing Under the Big Black Sun, but blissfully we didn’t. We asked a handful of participants to write chapter-length essays on specific topics, tales that suddenly would—to our surprise and delight—evolve into mini-autobiographies that painted the feel of a city, a scene, and its inhabitants. These writers—a select group of varied architects and chroniclers of the punk scene—individually and collectively led us into this fabled underworld, where drugs and sex and violence lived side by side with art, camaraderie, desperation, quests for fame, quests for self-destruction, and, of course, self-expression. As we collected these chapters we quickly discovered that—with a little added narration and color commentary—an actual story was forming.

Jane Wiedlin, guitarist and songwriter of the groundbreaking Go-Go’s, was the first person to submit her chapter for what would become the inaugural volume. Jane’s chapter, “The Canterbury Tales,” is an unflinching, unapologetic, honest, funny, and sometimes brutal account of living in Los Angeles during the evolution of punk culture. It made both John and me take pause and realize that we might actually be able to tell this story as it should be told. The illuminating essays began rolling in, written by musicians Exene Cervenka (X), Dave Alvin (The Blasters), Henry Rollins (Black Flag), Charlotte Caffey (The Go-Go’s), Jack Grisham (T.S.O.L.), Teresa Covarrubias (The Brat), Mike Watt (The Minutemen), Robert Lopez (The Zeros, El Vez), Chris D. (The Flesh Eaters), and Pleasant Gehman (The Screaming Sirens) as well as journalists Kristine McKenna and Chris Morris. Suddenly we had a book; the chapters sequenced effortlessly into an engaging tale better than anything we had hoped for.

The book met with immediate positive reaction from both press and the public; the response surpassed our wildest expectations. Under the Big Black Sun spent seven weeks in the top ten on the Los Angeles Times hardcover nonfiction best-seller list, and even nabbed a “best spoken word recording” GRAMMY nomination for its accompanying audiobook, which featured every participating author reading their own chapter.

Still, we never figured we’d be writing a sequel.

It was toward the end of the promotion for the first book that the story suddenly felt unfinished, and it began to seem logical to tackle the next five years—closing our tale in the confines of a decade of musical revolution. We are grateful that the unexpected success of Under the Big Black Sun gave us the opportunity to really explore the concept of finishing what we started. With this volume we hope to contribute to the currently limited—but growing—historical documents that exist on this era. Without rewriting history, the prospect of completing the “real” story—which essentially can be summarized with “and then hair metal won the L.A. Sunset Strip civil war”—seemed depressing, if not historically accurate. Certainly the world knew the victors—punk rock didn’t die, but it was seemingly relegated to the fringe, forever represented by the few who had established sustainable touring careers or moved on to some sort of mainstream notoriety.

It was a casual conversation with our mutual friend Krissy Teegerstrom that really set forth to define what this book would become. It gave us a story arc we felt we could wrap our heads around while trying to tell this tale of the second half of Los Angeles’ original punk rock scene. It was Krissy’s impression, after reading the first book, that the first-wave pioneers had thrown seeds and that those seeds had taken root. Watching the discussions that would unfold, she was overwhelmed to discover the influence this scene had—not only on musicians but also on so many aspects of contemporary art and lifestyle. She was the one who suggested we not craft this story as the end of a once-important regional music scene but rather let it evolve into more of a historical study of the scene’s importance to international culture.

Personally, after the last book I found the majority of comments I received were from folks who related to my story of discovering punk at the end of its first five years, citing identical personal revelations. As much as any of the prose, many specifically made note to me of the book’s dedication, where I thanked the members of X for altering everything my young brain thought it knew about music and art. This was—not surprisingly in retrospect—an experience shared by so many. It didn’t matter if you were from L.A. or what gender you were or if you came of age in the 1970s or the 2000s—if you got a taste of the poison, it seeped in and became part of a shared DNA.

In a chapter of the first book devoted to regional punk rock art and photography, I wrote that the style of the time—captured primarily in show flyers and spearheaded by the likes of art pioneers Raymond Pettibon or Robbie Conal—most likely inspired the work of twenty-first-century icons like Shepard Fairey and Banksy. In a very kind post scripted upon the book’s initial release, Fairey wrote, “I was incredibly honored when DeSavia describes the importance of flyer art and the ubiquitous flyer culture of the time and accurately points to how this untraditional art form seeped into the creative minds and souls of artists—both music and visual, and inspired the likes of me and Banksy. That’s very true; I’m not sure if he’s heard me mention flyer culture as an inspiration in interviews, but if the connection seemed obvious to him intuitively, he was correct.”

Krissy’s suggested narrative began to reveal itself as thus: along with the participants of the time featured within these pages, we asked a few select folks to write about their own bond with the music and the time, often from the experience of how it affected their own art and helped them define and celebrate their individuality. The first person we reached out to with this concept was Shepard. He is an unapologetic and vocal fan of the time and a torchbearer of the ethos of punk. Fairey enthusiastically drafted a chapter detailing his inspiration that came from punk culture and the courage it gave him to pursue the then-misunderstood/oft-criticized street art culture that helped define and establish its prominence. We’re completely honored that Shepard, along with legendary pro skater Tony Hawk, acclaimed film director Allison Anders, and renowned actor Tim Robbins, contributed essays to this volume on punk rock’s influence on their art and individuality.

Seeds were thrown, for sure. What was essentially hiding in the shadows moved from a whisper to a scream in rapid-fire time. This late-twentieth-century cultural revolution—or artistic mutiny, depending on how you perceived it—aided in altering the way we looked at music, art, fashion, gender roles, authority, and almost all aspects of a post-sixties counterculture subtly and, ultimately, so significantly. In the eighties the former hippies—who generationally had laid the groundwork for what would become punk—represented a then enemy; a new establishment composed of bohemian free spirits was suddenly rapidly evolving into a bunch of Reagan-era “greed is good” stereotypes. The punks ditched the harpsichords for something decidedly aggressively melodic, if melodic at all. It was a less-discussed generation gap, steeped in both political unrest and economic uncertainty but ultimately one that historically created a wider chasm than that created by the clashing of Sinatra to Elvis. In the early days any of the minimal mainstream coverage of the West Coast’s music scene primarily focused on safety-pin stereotypes and the threat of violence it seemed to promise. Now that musical uprising is culturally celebrated in museum exhibitions and coffee table art books. Pretty groovy.

By 1982 the impact the West Coast was having was undeniable, evidenced by the records released that year: The Descendents’ Milo Goes to College, The Misfits’ Walk Among Us, Flipper’s Generic, Bad Brains’ eponymous debut, Bad Religion’s How Could Hell Be Any Worse, Angry Samoans’ Back From Samoa, FEAR’s The Record, The Circle Jerks’ Wild in the Streets, T.S.O.L.’s Beneath the Shadows, Rank and File’s Sundown, and X’s Under the Big Black Sun, to name a handful. Around the globe suburban kids were now becoming converted to the ways of punk, thanks to The Clash, who released Combat Rock, their fifth and best-selling album (eventually going on to sell two million copies in the US alone). Throughout the next five years the L.A. punk landscape was splintering into a dizzying array of genres that engaged and thrilled Angelenos. Regionalism was alive and well, and we had it in spades: the press identified the scenes as “cowpunk,” the “Paisley Underground,” or “power pop,” all sourced from the various elements that birthed punk in the Gold Rush State: country, the blues, fifties rock ‘n’ roll and sixties garage rock, Latin music and culture, and on and on. Bands as diverse as Lone Justice, The Long Ryders, The Bangles, The Red Hot Chili Peppers, Blood on the Saddle, The Dream Syndicate, Fishbone, and many more started to dominate and redefine the local musical landscape.

Hardcore was growing stronger and more global. It split into curiously overlapping camps that embraced violent, political, and straight-edge cultures. It grew more sophisticated and influential in the hands of local bands like Suicidal Tendencies, D.I., The Adolescents, The Vandals, The Crowd, Middle Class, China White, The Stains, and Jody Foster’s Army as well as more established bands like FEAR, The Circle Jerks, Black Flag, Saccharine Trust, The Minutemen, and T.S.O.L. It was building what would eventually become punk’s strongest and most enduring following.

A West Coast punk-led spoken-word movement began to rival that of the East Coast through the voices of local poets and writers such as Wanda Coleman and Harvey Kubernik as well as the emerging literary voices of musicians Exene Cervenka, Henry Rollins, and Jello Biafra, and including folks like Doe, Dave Alvin, Chris D., and many more.

A new crop of independent record companies formed, joining and/or replacing the first wave of pioneering labels. And of course, the major labels came racing to the chum in the water, hedging bets on this untapped youth culture movement. All the while, bigger and smaller bands relentlessly toured the US, developing the live audience, venues, and indie/college radio circuit that would allow the later indie and grunge-era bands to make a truly significant impact on the under-thirty crowd.

Cutting-edge pop and rock, specifically new wave, firmly took hold of the mainstream, and it took hold fast. MTV had debuted in the fall of 1981, and with it came a tidal wave of this new alternative music—most of which were pop acts branding themselves to a young generation by adopting punk style. Yeah, video killed the radio star, but it also conditioned the USA for kids sporting then-shocking dyed hair or leather spiked chokers. Sure, parents didn’t like it, but they reluctantly had to accept it. An unexpected result was the beginning of the end for regional variations of new music because everyone saw the latest trends at the same time. New music, now in real danger of becoming a campy fad and stereotype, was profitable again. The end was nigh.

The early eighties fragmented our regional punk climate so much that our camaraderie of community began to crumble, while record deals and tours broke the gang apart. Punk began to splinter as the division between the hardcore kids and punk fans widened. As heavy and hair metal was taking hold, fans were drawing their lines in the sand.

Personally I was as excited about the prospect of this book as much as Doe originally hesitated: 1982 marked my first real foray into the punk scene, with my first X show at a club in Los Angeles’ San Fernando Valley suburb. For John I believe 1982 not only marked the beginning of the dissolution of the community but also excitement as the spotlight was starting to shine on this disparate group of musicians, artists, photographers, and writers. The future was bright and the future was terrifying—depending on the day, I reckon.

Like Under the Big Black Sun, John didn’t want the book to be about X or X’s view of regional punk rock; he wanted it to be everyone’s story… or at least as many as we could wrangle and fit. He fought against the photos of him and Exene on the covers—not out of a false modesty but a desire for them to reflect the community that existed. The community that eventually fell apart. The community that would remain tethered over the decades, either in celebration or brought together by loss.

Like the last book, we are incredibly humbled that so many agreed to join us on the journey of telling this tale; like the last book, we regret that we couldn’t invite every single participant from the era. It has always been our sincerest hope that everyone who participated, supported, or was moved by this moment in rock ‘n’ roll history is compelled to take pen to paper and write of their own experiences.

We are obviously very thankful that our friend had shared with us her epiphany about the seeds that were thrown during these monumental years. This book is about those seeds and how firmly those roots were planted…

Oh, and sex and drugs and loud, loud music.