Punk Rock

Punk Rock: An Intro (Body and Blood)

Photo by Joel Muniz on Unsplash

To say that my teen years were wild would be a gross understatement. Insane is probably the word which hits closer to the mark. (I wrote a YA (Young Adult) literary novel about these years which I’ll likely publish for paid subscribers at some point.)

I was a privileged kid living in Ojai, 90 miles northeast of Los Angeles, 12 miles east of coastal Ventura. I started high school in 1999. I had thick dirty blond hair, was an avid surfer (and looked like it), wore braces, loved reading, had a few really close buddies, had done Kenpo karate for many years, and had, even in my pre-teen years, a strange fascination with trouble. I was attracted to people who pushed the limits.

I attended a Catholic, college-prep high school in Ojai you had to test to get into. Freshman year I had no friends, so I hung out with the designated nerds. We sat on the low two-foot-high brick wall along the multicolored pebble driveway—cars’ tires making that pebble-spitting sound as they passed—during lunch, observing the rest of the 250 kids comprising the entire school, sitting on various meshed blue tables perched on the verdant, expansive, perfectly mowed lawn. Across from us perhaps 200 feet was the polished white St. Augustine statue, an emblem of the campus.

I hated sports. (Still do.) I was an average student, except for English, History and Civics, which I enjoyed and excelled at. I hadn’t wanted to go to the school to begin with; I’d wanted to go to Nordhoff, Ojai’s only public school. I knew some of the kids who went there. I felt lonely and bored and disgusted by my fancy prep school. It seemed like my path was supposed to be obvious: SATs, good college, career, marriage, two kids, picket-white fence. It was all in front of me.

But fate intervened.

Sophomore year I met a kid—we’ll call him Devon—who changed my life. He was one grade above me yet one year younger; a brilliant kid from nearby working-class Oxnard who’d gotten into the school via a full scholarship. He was tall, thin, pasty white, and totally punk rock. Because of his stellar grades, he got away with a lot, such as spiking up his jet-black hair into “chaos spikes” and wearing a studded motorcycle jacket and tight torn jeans instead of the boring, dumb uniform we had to wear. (Khakis, tucked-in collared shirt.)

Mornings I’d get to school early and park in the back lot and see Devon in his old beat up leather jacket—I always imagined him smoking a cigarette, but that never happened on campus—talking to another kid who’d equally change my life, a tall thin blond-haired, blue-eyed guy I’ll call Liam.

I’d started listening to punk music probably around age 11 or 12. It started with my best friend Jason. We discovered the one little music shop in Ojai called The Music Box. An old hippie guy worked behind the counter. The place was tiny and always reeked of pot, patchouli and sweat. We cherished it. We’d been listening to the trendy pop-punk bands of the 90s before then, Pennywise, Strung Out, No Use for a Name, Lag-wagon, etc. But it was here, somewhere around 1994 or 95, that we discovered the Ramones and the Sex Pistols. It went from there and morphed into mostly late 70s, early 80s LA punk classics: Social Distortion, Agent Orange, DI, The Adolescents, The Germs, Black Flag, Channel 3, etc etc. We became obsessed.

But there was something different between me and Jason. While he appreciated punk music, for him it stopped there. It was different for me. As a kid, I’d had a wonderful upbringing as far as being provided for, loved, etc. But there were issues, too. I won’t get into that stuff here, but suffice to say that I had some trauma. Unsurprising given my mom’s lurid backstory. Ditto my father’s. Clinical depression, alcoholism and other issues abound in my family. There was family trauma, one might say, which had been handed down. Mental illness was not foreign to our clan.

All this to say: By the time I hit my teens, I was angry. I didn’t, back then, exactly understand why. But I felt it like a mounting rage, like an inner atom bomb, just waiting to explode. Around age 10 or 11 I’d started not smiling much around my parents. Even then I felt angry. Like I said I couldn’t explain why, but clearly some deep core emotional element within me was not being nourished.

Devon turned out to be the kid who lit the fuse of that bomb.

*

At the time I drove my mom’s hand-me-down 1993 sparkling green Jeep Cherokee. I’d plastered punk band stickers all over the back of it. Devon drove a cheap old 90s white Saturn which always made me think of the DeLorean in Back to the Future. His car, too, was covered in punk stickers. Looking back I remember constantly wondering at how cool Devon was. Cool, tough, bright and intimidating.

I wanted to impress Devon with a punk T-shirt, proving my punk rock bona fides. For some reason lost to me now I didn’t think of just ordering a punk shirt online or going to some music store and buying one. So instead I ordered a plain white shirt and did a screen-print, T.S.O.L., the infamous LA early 80s classic punk band, True Sounds of Liberty. The plan was to make sure Devon saw the shirt, hoping to gain his attention.

I knew his every move. I’d watched him for what felt like eons. I knew exactly when he rounded the corner near the lockers between second and third period. I arranged to “bump” into him. It was corny, and silly, and it worked.

That day Devon rounded the bend and so did I from the other side and we literally crashed, collided into each other. At first he seemed pissed, but then, recovering his bearings, he eyed my shirt, and said, “Do you even know what that stands for?”

I smiled. I’d been waiting for this moment forever. “True Sounds of Liberty.”

Devon seemed truly shocked. He told me to meet him after the last bell at his car in the lot. I was beside myself with adrenaline and joy.

*

After class the two of us drove to my house. The place was empty. Dad was at work and Mom was who knows where; probably at the store or something. Quickly, we entered my room, I changed into something non-Catholic college-prep high school, and we jumped into his Saturn. He screeched out of my driveway, burning rubber, and I worried about marks on the asphalt. But now was no time to worry. Mom would wonder where I was. This was the year 2000. We didn’t have cell phones. This was pre-Smart phone. Pre-social media.

Devon absolutely flew south along Highway 101. We didn’t talk: He blasted a band called Government Issue at unconscionable volume, both our windows all the way down, the rushing cool air assaulting our faces, which looked like they were melting as if wax.

We parked in front of Devon’s house. His dad—a pasty-white eccentric high school English teacher—was not home. We hiked up the thin, narrow stairs to his room. It was a glorious disaster in there; giant punk posters were all over the place, including one of the 1979 punk documentary The Decline of Western Civilization, showing a drunken, marker-scrawled, flat on his back on stage, clutching the mic in his palm Darby Crash of the Germs. His room smelled of beer, sweat, and bad body odor. Also dirty socks. I loved it. Something about it all felt totally right. Perfect.

He pulled out of a bag in the corner a huge bottle of beer. He uncapped the gold top and glugged the golden hops. Wiping his chin he tossed the thing to me.

“That’s called Old English. Drink up,” he said.

The bottle was warm. I’d never had a drop of alcohol before, though I’d smoked pot with some surfer friends a few times at the beach. Swallowing, my heart punching against my chest, I twisted the gold cap, put the opening to my lips, and glugged. The warm, frothy golden liquid felt nasty going down. Terrible. But within seconds I felt a light warmth spread throughout my whole body. I beamed. I grinned. Something was changing inside me. Some nascent awareness. Some calculated yearning. An understanding.

We brought the bottle and got back into the DeLorean. We were heading to another guy’s house near Port Hueneme. He raced us there, the music once more so loud I could barely think. He told me to keep glugging from the 40-ounce bottle so I did. I felt buzzed and warm and snuggly and alive. The music pumped within me like a hammer. It felt invigorating. Life!!!!! Finally, I thought, I’m doing something. Living. Experiencing something. Feeling something other than parental or high school or social oppression.

It felt good. Really good.

Devon parked along the curb going 30 miles an hour, skidding us to a stop. The guy drove like a lunatic. It terrified me but it was also fun. Danger and risk had always appealed to me, but this was the first time I really did it.

Carrying the bottle, I followed behind him. He knocked. The blond-haired, blue-eyed guy from school opened the door, a big smile on his face, dimples, red thin lips, his golden fro wild and curling. He wore tight torn blue jeans, scuffed Doc Martins, and a black ripped T-shirt that said, in white, FUCK YOU.

“Liam,” Devon said, with an attitude and a swagger in his edgy voice, “This is Mike. New recruit.”

“What’s up?” Liam said, his blue eyes sparkling with violence.

“Hey.”

We entered.

The first thing I saw was three punk dudes to my left—in a disheveled living room—all wearing tight stitched up plaid pants and leather jackets, one guy with a foot-high blue Mohawk, injecting something into their veins.

I tapped Devon on the shoulder. In a whisper I said, “What’re they doing?”

Devon grinned, planting his palm on my shoulder. “China white, kid.”

“What’s China White?”

Devon laughed, punching me playfully in the shoulder. “Junk.”

When I still looked confused he stepped forward and whispered into my ear, tickling my ear canal with warm beer breath, “Heroin.”

I was floored.

Then Liam had his arm around my shoulder. He shoved a fresh—this time cold—40 ounce of Steel Reserve into my chest and told me to drink. These guys were demanding. Suddenly music started playing, really loud, and I recognized it as T.S.O.L. I chugged from the 40. It tasted good to me now. Almost holy. Like the body and blood of Christ.

“Do you read?” Liam said, half yelling. It was like being at a concert.

“Sometimes.”

He jerked his chin up at me. “What do you read?”

I felt the crimson creeping into my cheeks. “Uhhhh, well, The Redwall Series, about a kingdom of mice who…”

“No!” he yelled, seeming somehow both angry and happy and entertained all at the same time. “I’m talking about real books.”

“What do you mean?” I took another swig of the forty. I felt drunk now. The room seemed to pulse and purr, morph and vaguely spin. I was so out of my element.

“Literature,” Liam said.

I shook my head. “My mom has a big library. I’ve tried reading some of the books. Like F. Scott Fitzgerald.”

Liam laughed, guffawing, throwing his head back like a drunken hyena. “Naw, man. Serious books. Fitzgerald was an old alcoholic dead-beat. Ok. Here’s the deal. You gotta read three books: 1. Brave New World; 2. 1984; 3. Please Kill Me.”

“Alright,” I said, half confused.

Liam threw his arm around me again. “You’ll get the hang of things my man. Deconstructing your boring middleclass life takes time. Your parents have brainwashed you. Ditto the school. And you live in fucking Ojai, for Christ Sakes. You need some punk education. Some street experience. Some real life. That shit your folks present to you: That isn’t real life. That’s the boring bourgeois bullshit they ram down your throat trying to make you like them. They want you to be some capitalist robot. Fuck them. Read dissident books. Think independently. Be an individual. Forge your own path. Live your ultimate truth. Fuck the system, man!!!”

And suddenly he was circling the open area between living room and kitchen where we’d been standing, a familiar T.S.O.L. song blasting from across the room. He grabbed my shoulder and the two of us were “mosh-pitting” together at some imaginary punk show. He threw his fists into the air, screaming the lyrics like a madman. I got caught up in the chaos, the absolute sonic anarchy and circled with him. I felt like some drunken shaman, or like I was part of some ancient Indian tribe circling the fire. It felt sacred somehow, new and original and different. I belonged. For the first time in my life I felt like I belonged. It was inexplicable. I hadn’t understood much of what Liam had said, about the middleclass, about the books, about “dissidents” or about “capitalism.” But it all felt right.

I remember taking a massive last swing of Steel Reserve. I saw Devon appear, his face like a detached hovering punk rock moon. And the three guys who’d been shooting dope appeared. They introduced themselves to me. One of them pointed at me and laughed, saying I was wasted. I just chortled. I was having the time of my life. Liam shoved me, hard, and then Devon shoved me and then the three other guys and they were somehow a circle around me. But they weren’t hurting me. It was like some kind of ritual. Hazing or something. I smiled, being pushed around in the circle. I drank.

And then I blacked-out.