lexicon devil

   Twenty years ago this week, Darby Crash, lead singer of 
the Germs, killed himself in a premeditated, drug-facilitated 
suicide that many believed was meant to ensure his own 
legend at age 22. Had it been a different week, the media 
might have run with a myth-making "American Sid Vicious" 
story. As a punk PR event, however, Darby's exit was poorly 
timed. About 24 hours later, a disturbed young man murdered 
John Lennon. 

Lexicon Devil: The Fast Times and Short Life of Darby Crash and the Germs

By Brendan Mullen, with Don Bolles and Adam Parfrey

Crash's band the Germs turned out to be more influential than anyone could've dreamed at the time. Many music historians consider the Germs to be the first performers of hardcore punk, the genre that has given us Black Flag, the Dicks, Minor Threat, and influenced much American rock music of the past 15 years: Fugazi, Nirvana, and the Foo Fighters, who originally included Germs guitarist Pat Smear. 

For his part in all of this, Darby was one of the most relentless drug addicts in modern music, and there's a description in Lexicon Devil from his last year in which, though Crash is too high to open his mouth, "Germettes" are still feeding him pills. On the other hand, Crash is described by many people as extremely intelligent and occasionally even caring. He charmed as well as constrained people into following him around and doing what he told them to do.

Furthermore, the monster Darby Crash was nursed in an extraordinarily pathological environment -- the L.A. punk scene, which produced music as diverse as that made by X, the Go-Gos, the Blasters, and Joan Jett. The SoCal kids were out having fun as an act of rebellion, squatting in old Hollywood apartment buildings and gigging at the legendary Masque. Most of the participants describe the scene as carefree fun, but the pain, desperation, and degradation couldn't be more palpable. Male prostitution is central, and at one point, Crash's roommate is pictured servicing Hollywood Square Paul Lynde the night before the latter's death, which is attributed to amyl nitrate.

The career of Darby Crash lasted only a couple of years. He made one album that didn't sell very well, and then committed suicide by heroin overdose in 1980 when he was 22. You might wonder how that life could support a biography, but this book is about as compellingly readable a portrait of a personality and a culture as anything you're likely to set eyes on.