Erstellt am: 12. 3. 2011 - 11:34 Uhr
Today's Webtip: The Decline of Western Civilization
I can still clearly remember the day I turned my back on mainstream American culture. It was a Friday in seventh grade. 1981 or 1982. I had already been listening to music from Iggy Pop, David Bowie, The Clash and the Dead Kennedys for a couple of years, thanks to the unwitting help of a friends older brother.
But 7th grade was the year I actually started discovering contemporary bands on my own. With a little help from some new friends. Michael Attias was a year older, and his european parents had no problem with him hanging around in record stores downtown. He wore black jeans, cool boots, eyeliner, and had the coolest haircut I had ever seen.
My parents hated him.
We had been at some school party, where they were playing typical 80's top 40, and me and my very small circle of friends were standing around trying to figure out how we could get some better music on the system when he came up to us and invited us to his house. I dont know if he mentioned seeing a movie, but it really wouldn't have mattered. We packed up our stuff and followed him out the door.
When we got to his place he put on some music and said we needed to get ready. We were going out. The next thing I knew he had lent me some black jeans, spiked my hair, and shown me how to put on eyeliner. And then we were out the door, headed toward the city.
The UPtown wa our local arthouse cinema. I had been there several times, wasting entire Saturdays watching triple features of bad science fiction films. But I had never been there on a friday night. When we walked in the door I was floored. The place was filled with the most colorful collection of individuals I had ever seen. Leather and spikes, and mohwaks and fishnets, goth girls and rockabillies and disco punks.
It was beautiful. The first film was Dance craze. A documentary about the british Ska revival featuring bands like The English Beat, Bad Manners and the Specials. That soundtrack ended up defining my internal image of urban nightlife. That was where I wanted to be. Someday. BUt it was very far away.
The second film was a bit closer to home. It was a documentary on the LA music scene beteen 1979-80. It was raw, and loud, and very rock and roll. And it was somewhere I could be now. I was surrounded by the same scene in that movie theater. It quite literally changed my life.
The film? The Decline of Western Civilization.
I ended up getting hausarrest because of it.