WTF with Marc Maron Podcast - Episode 990 - Allan MacDonell

Episode Date: January 31, 2019

Writer Allan MacDonell shaped his writing style at the punk magazine Slash, refined it while working for Larry Flint at Hustler, and turned it all on its ear with his trilogy of memoirs. Allan tells Marc how his life was shaped by a David Bowie concert, how he immersed his life in the LA punk scene, and how he almost ended it all in a fit of rage at God. They also talk about the slipperiness of truth in nonfiction writing, which is why Allan killed himself off in his new memoir, and he also divulges the real story of how Hustler got Congressman Bob Livingston to resign. This episode is sponsored by This Is Not Happening on Comedy Central, the New York Times Crossword App, and 23andMe.com. Sign up here for WTF+ to get the full show archives and weekly bonus material! https://plus.acast.com/s/wtf-with-marc-maron-podcast. Hosted on Acast. See acast.com/privacy for more information.

It's hockey season, and you can get anything you need delivered with Uber Eats. Well, almost, almost anything. So, no, you can't get an ice rink on Uber Eats. But iced tea, ice cream, or just plain old ice? Yes, we deliver those. Gold tenders, no. But chicken tenders, yes. Because those are groceries, and we deliver those, too.

Along with your favorite restaurant food, alcohol, and other everyday essentials. Order Uber Eats now. For alcohol, you must be legal drinking age. Please enjoy responsibly. Product availability varies by region. See app for details. Hi, it's Terry O'Reilly, host of Under the Influence. Recently, we created an episode on cannabis marketing.

With cannabis legalization, it's a brand new challenging marketing category. And I want to let you know we've produced a special bonus podcast episode where I talk to an actual cannabis producer. I wanted to know how a producer becomes licensed, how a cannabis company competes with big corporations, how a cannabis company markets its products in such a highly regulated category, and what the term dignified consumption actually means. I think you'll find the answers interesting and surprising. Hear it now on Under the Influence with Terry O'Reilly. This bonus episode is brought to you by the Ontario Cannabis Store and ACAS Creative. What the fuck, buddies? What the fucking ears? What the fuck sticks? What's happening? What the fuckettes? How's it going? I'm Mark Maron. This is my podcast, WTF. Thank you for

listening. Today on the show is Alan McDonald. Alan McDonald is a writer. He's a guy I've known for many years from the Secret Club. He's written several books. He wrote years ago, he wrote a book called Prisoner of X, 20 years in the hole at Hustler Magazine. He's also written a book of pieces, memoir pieces mostly, I believe, called Punk Elegies.

And his newest book, Now That I Am Gone, a memoir beyond recall, is written from the point of view of him as a dead guy, he's dead but he's one of the dark wizards and he's uh he's been around a long time and he was been you know kind of dug in here in los angeles through the uh 70s and the punk scene in the 80s and i don't know man i just it's been a long time coming in terms of me talking to him because we had talked about it years ago and now uh he will

be here he will be here for your dark enjoyment mr alan mcdonald hey um i told you about those uk dates i'm going to tell you again i tweeted them out and now i know that they are selling quite well so i wanted to make sure that i told you again and pronounce things right. I'll be at the Lowry in Salford, England on April 4th. I'll be at Royal Festival Hall in London, England, April 6th. I'll be at the Rep Theater in Birmingham, England on April 8th. And I will be, this is an Irish date, not a UK date. I will be in Ireland, in Dublin at at Vicar Street on April 11th, okay? And for you people who are LA bound or LA in or live here, bound or bounded by, okay? Dynasty typewriter dates are

coming. February 10th, February 17th, February 24th, March 17th at the Little Dynasty Typewriter Room, which is great. And I'll be at the Wheeler Opera House in Aspen on March 23rd and the Boulder Theater in Boulder on March 24th. All those tour dates are available for you to peruse and link to tickets at WTFpod.com slash tour. OK, dig it. Also, quickly, if you're in L.A. tonight, Thursday the 31st. There's a 31 days in this thing? Is that where we're at with this? Yes. Thursday the 31st, my buddy Sam Lipsight will be reading from his new book, Hark, here at Skylight Books tonight.

It's at 730 tonight, and that's at 1818 north vermont avenue all right go go see sammy okay now addressing other things i know a lot of you are cold out there i mean like fucking scary cold like shit the steam is freezing as it hisses out of my radiator and falls on the floor while I'm under nine layers of blankets in Chicago, New York, D.C., wherever the fuck you are. I'm sorry you're going through that. But things are changing climate wise. And I just want to reach out again, as I usually do to my listeners. into the next election cycle if your primary concern isn't the survival of the planet and you choose your personal taxes and just a terrifying fear of of brown people as your priorities again i will say you're a shameful stupid person uh and i think maybe if a few of you are still

listening and you're in sub-zero temperatures in Minneapolis, far beyond anything like before, maybe you ought to take into consideration these things that maybe the priority should be, hey, can we still live on this rock? Can we? All right, that said, that out of the way, let's get on to important things like the reaction to my statements about Steely Dan. Now, I know that I was surprised. There are things I talk about on this show that I think are mundane or just part of my life or just weird moments. That's what gets the feedback. That's what people get worked up about.

It's not like after I told you that I turned a corner on Steely Dan that I've spent the last three days nonstop, hour after hour, listening to Steely Dan all over and over again. I just had a moment. It wasn't like I'm like born again Dan. You know what I mean? So I get this type of email. again dan you know what i mean so i get this type of email this is and now mind you this is because i said i i turned a corner in enjoying or being able to enjoy steely dan subject line you lost me

i've been a fan for years and have found your cultural analysis to be interesting and often spot on i may not always agree but i follow logic. Today you said you had a big revelation regarding Steely Dan. You also put in two commercials before the payoff as to why you changed, which, by the way, was effective because I listened to both.

Fine. I get why people like Steely Dan. I just personally have found it boring and sterile and lacking soul. Their music hurts my soul to consume. You turn the corner to the dark side today. And while I will continue listening to your podcast, it's likely most good things that have happened to you in the last few years will go away as a result of this revelation. That makes me sad for you, Dave. Do you think, Dave, do you think dave do you think that steely dan has some sort of dark mystical power

to extract something from my my soul and my mind and and also my the the sort of the past do you think that you you feel that i have signed or stepped into some contract with the dark Lord. Believe me, I know what those feel like. This didn't feel like this. And I, and, and fuck you day for cursing me. God, how dare you curse me? You put that in my head. Most good things that have happened to you in the last few years will go away as a result

of this, as a result of me enjoying a Steely Dan song. Shame on you, Dave. The curse is upon you, Dave, for throwing around bad mojo like that. God damn it. But then there were plenty of emails that were like, good for you. Welcome. Yeah, it took me a while too. I'm not even going to dwell on it. I'm not even going to dwell on it.

I'm not even going to dwell on it. There's been a couple of interesting emails. This one from someone, a woman named Sam, just said, Maren, Maren, I really hope you figure it out soon. I'm getting tired of listening unless you have. And the show is a mirage. unless you have and the show is a mirage love sam sam isn't it all a mirage come on figure what out i just figured out that i kind of like the steely dance song a little more than i used to and now i've been cursed by a guy named dave cursed he heaved some bad mojo my way sam i have figured it out this is a mirage the mirage is part of figuring it out come on sam come on oh this is a good one. Here we go. Subject line, crowd work. Hey, Mark, listening to the Brad Garrett episode made me remember experiencing some of your crowd

work. I saw you in Bloomington last year working out your new stuff, and at one point you got up from the stool, walked to the side of the stage, looked at me and said, how's it going? In that moment, I thought you were asking how I was doing. So I said something along the lines of good. You said, okay, went back to the stool and continued on with the show. It didn't hit me until later that knowing you as I do from the show and your struggle with insecurity, what you were probably more likely asking was the show good. The answer is still yes. It was a great show and a highlight of 2018 for me. Just wanted to share and I hope to see you on the road again in the future.

Jake, Jake, I got to be honest with you. The way you describe that, I know exactly what those moments are for me on stage. I don't know if you were at that show alone or you were sitting with people or either way, you were probably sitting very close to the stage and I probably looked at you a couple of times and you weren't laughing and or I thought you might be a scary person. Like you might be like not only not laughing, but maybe ready to pounce or shoot or I'd sent something that rubbed you the wrong way or you weren't paying attention. But usually it's me disarming what i perceive to be a threat of some kind so i don't know if you look scary or maybe you were you're a very intense

person but usually if i'm checking in like that it's literally to make sure that uh that you're not a scary or mad person mad meaning crazy or mad. So you weren't quite right, but you were a little right. It was a little bit about insecurity either because you weren't laughing or because you might kill me. Okay. Now let's do a heavier email since we're in it. Your help with my opiate addiction. Mark, I want to keep this short and sweet. I know you're a busy man. I've been a heroin addict since I was 20 and I am 29 now. And I've been an avid listener for about a year now, around the time I decided to get on methadone and put down the needle. I listened to your conversations almost every day on the way to the clinic. I'm recently divorced

and decided to kick the methadone cold turkey. And I'm certain I couldn't be doing this without your talks. It keeps my mind off this demon I have on my back for the rest of my life. I feel a kindred spirit in you in some ways, you with your own addiction issues and your love of nicotine and caffeine. Basically, thank you. Keep doing what you're doing. You help people every day more than you may know. Thanks, Mark with a C. Sincerely, your fan, Al. Al, God damn it. Tryincerely your fan Al. Al.

God damn it. Try to stay off it man. Try to stay off it buddy. I know it's hard. It's a fucking hard one. God damn it. I'm glad to help out. Seriously.

Glad to help out. Now on an unrelated note. I got two emails about my streetlight. The new streetlight. i talked to you guys about the streetlight on the street that they put up because there were people hanging around under the streetlight in their cars i would never have thought about this but i got two related so here we go um streetlight and in parentheses lurkers hey mark just a heads up that you should find out if that shady area slash street happens to have a Pokemon gym and or poke stop nearby. As an avid player of the popular GPS-based Pokemon game,

I've been that suspicious person and had to explain myself a time or two. I've even had an angry older gentleman explain to me that if he sees any of these things, imaginary cartoon pocket monsters, in his yard, they would get the business end of his 12 gauge. So I try to keep my habit only in public spaces, parks, and such, because I am now aware that playing the game can create a side effect of creepiness in residential areas. The shotgun incident happened in my own neighborhood at the opposite end of the street that I live on.

But unfortunately, there are a lot of players who give us all a bad name with a slew of bad manners slash habits, some even worse than the one which might be happening in your neighborhood. Anyway, if you install the app on your iPhone or Android device yourself, you could figure it out pretty quickly.

Otherwise, look for your nearest neighborhood teenage slash 20-something. They will most likely know thanks matt matt i see what you're doing with this i see what you're doing with this earlier i had dave cursing me because of my steely dan uh shift and now you're trying to suck me into the world of pokemon i know what you're doing i know hey man if you want to know, just download the app. And then I'm one of those guys wandering around, going in circles on corners. I get it. I'm no dummy. I wasn't born yesterday. Here's the other one though. People parking. Hi Mark, in the Brad Garrett episode, you mentioned mysterious people parked in cars down your street. I had the same issue about a year ago. And after seeing some of them

get out of their cars and wander around while looking at their cell phones, I started thinking maybe this is a Pokemon Go hotspot. A couple of days after I had this thought, I was out for a bike ride. I saw two guys in their late 20s walking around that area. So I asked them if this was a Pokemon Go hotspot. Yeah, it is. They confirmed my suspicion. I told them I thought they were either selling dope or catching Pokemon. We all had a good laugh. Then I bought some pot from them. Just kidding. There are still cars parked regularly down my street. Who knows? Maybe you are living next to a Pokemon Go hotspot. Ask a gamer to check it out for you. Sincerely, Mitch.

So this is a better way to go. Now I just have to find a gamer. Like I got a feeling that on my street, it wasn't those guys. They seemed older. There were definitely women sometimes in the cars and they were leaving drug paraphernalia on the street. Now, unless the monsters are druggies

and that's what happens when you play Pokemon. I don't know i don't but i appreciate that the idea that maybe that's what's going on maybe it is i do not know so this brings us to our guest right alan mcdonald's as i said earlier is a guy i know he's written a few books but he's a guy i wanted to talk to because he's lived one of those lives sort of in the shadows of punk rock and CDLA. And I don't get a lot of the history of LA trip from that point of view. I've had a few musicians on that come from that. But Alan was really there through all of it in this approach to memoir, which is his new one, which is Now That I'm Gone. A memoir beyond recall is available wherever you get books. As I said, he's also the author of

Prisoner of X, 20 Years in the Hole at Hustler Magazine and Punk Elegies, True Tales of Death Trip Kids, Wrongful Sex and Trial by Angel Dust. But that being said, because of our familiarity with each other and because I like the guy, we were able to sort of jump right into it, man. Jump right into it like a couple of members of the secret society are able to jump right into it because we got a shorthand, man, an emotional, psychological, storytelling shorthand with each other. And so this is me talking to Alan. Enjoy. Hi, it's Terry O'Reilly, host of Under the Influence. Recently, we created an episode

on cannabis marketing. With cannabis legalization, it's a brand new challenging marketing category. And I want to let you know we've produced a special bonus podcast episode where I talk to an actual cannabis producer. I wanted to know how a producer becomes licensed, how a cannabis company competes with big corporations, how a cannabis company markets its products in such a highly regulated category, and what the term dignified consumption actually means. I think

you'll find the answers interesting and surprising. Hear it now on Under the Influence with Terry O'Reilly. This bonus episode is brought to you by the Ontario Cannabis Store and ACAS Creative. creative. Just to risk your life. When I die here, you'll never leave Japan alive. FX's Shogun. A new original series streaming February 27th exclusively on Disney+. 18 plus subscription required. T's and C's apply. How many records do you have? Yeah, I haven't counted them. Like about?

About thousands. Thousands. I'm pretty sure I have thousands. I had a period about nine years ago when I had kind of a mental breakdown. Thousands. I'm pretty sure I have thousands. I had a period about nine years ago when I had kind of a mental breakdown. Yeah. And I got rid of

like 2,000 records. What'd you do with them? I gave them away. I sold some and I traded some for other records I wanted more. But my feeling was

I wanted to be more mobile. Yeah. And I had this giant wall and I had these cupboards upstairs all full of records. And I thought, well, if I get rid of this portion of them then I can be more mobile with Yeah. And I have this giant wall and I have these cupboards upstairs all full of records. And I thought, well, if I get rid of this portion of them,

then I can be more mobile with this whole, which is absurd. Ridiculous. Yeah. Now, do you regret it? You regret it?

I regret certain records. Like what? There's like, like some reissues that I had. Like I had these Miles Davis reissues. Oh, yeah. And I had these John Coltrane reissues. Yeah.

And I had these Eric Dolphy reissues. Oh, yeah. And I thought, well, they're just reissues. Right. But you I had these John Coltrane reissues. Yeah. And I had these Eric Dolphy reissues. Oh yeah. And I thought, well, they're just reissues. Right. And now. You miss them now.

Yeah. Now I miss them. And, but I also, I, there are some records I thought, why don't I get rid of that? And now that there's Spotify,

I can play that record. And I go, oh, I see. Yeah. You know, so I'm not so. It's weird when you get into the vinyl thing where,

where like, I don't want to listen to it any other way now. Like, I mean, I like, I can listen in my car and stuff, but when I'm home, I'm just going to put the vinyl on. I do believe you can tell a difference. I think you can, too.

But if you have people over, like you're having a party or something, I've got a New Year's Eve where I would play a side of an album, side of an album, side of an album. And then you've got to be on top of that all night. So what have you been doing, man? I haven't seen you in a while. I read a bunch of Punk Elegies uh i read a bunch of the new book i i could i didn't have time to get through both of them is that gonna be a problem no not to me i mean i'm going to i feel you may i'm going

to i know you read the first one you read the first one all the way through uh-huh and then i you i was on air america with you yeah and we talked about it which one the house were the hustler one, yeah. Well, yeah, I mean, that was a while back, though. That was like 2006 or something. Holy fuck, was that out here? It was out here. It was out in the valley.

It was in the valley. That's where I have PTSD about that whole period. I bet you do. Because, yeah. What I remember the most was when I was over. And plus it's live radio, so I was over. And that place was live radio. So I was worried. I have to say something now.

I have to say something now. At 10 at night. We were like, it was late at night. It was like they put me in this weird placeholder situation where I had to wait around if there was a Clippers game on. Because I had to wait until it was over. Yeah, wait for overtime. You just.

Right. Yeah. But when I came out, Maria Bamford was outside waiting. To go in? Or something. Yeah. And I was like, so Bamford was outside waiting. To go in? Or something. Yeah. And I was like so like sort of starstruck. Yeah?

So you knew who she was back then? Yeah, yeah, yeah. Because of the TV. She was on some, there was some sort of TV, you were on some show as well. Was I? A comedy thing? It was some kind of comedy, sort of panel talk thing. Oh, yeah, yeah, yeah.

You would be on there. Occasionally. Yeah, yeah, yeah. Right. And maybe that's where I'd seen her as well yeah but she was funny you know she was she if she appealed there was something about me oh no i love her i had in common with her yeah i love her i mean there's something about the the the sort of like um there's nobody like her and then she can access the the the sort of emotional insanity that some

of us experience and it just speaks directly to us whereas other people think like i don't get it yeah but i get it exactly it's not exactly universal but it is kind of a widespread yeah like there's a disquiet that people are now realizing that that's because of the political situation people are realizing there's this disquiet yeah and society and being somewhat of an other yeah and she had that from there yeah from there and that's i kind of had that earlier so she was always another that's the weird thing about reading the older books i mean the housework book what is that called again uh prisoner of x prisoner of x that's right but the i hadn't read the the punk elegies one and it's like once you start reading it and i know

you a bit i've known you a bit for for years but then I got a picture of you like kind of sweaty and raw and fucked up like way back. Deluded. Very deluded, yes. Incredible. Like I was just fault for everything. Oh, you mean you were a sucker? I was a sucker. Like this certain image.

I thought, oh, this is going to change my life. This is going to make so much better. I know, but you were there at the cusp of something like there's something exciting yeah but there's something about los angeles that i can't wrap my brain around i realized coming back i was in new york for three weeks and i was coming back and i was driving in from the airport i'm like i got no fucking love for this city and then when i read i well i didn't come up here you know and when i read your book i'm like these are the people that love this city. I do love this city. Because this city used to be, like, if you have a handle on it and you, like, know the nooks and crannies and you sweat it out in this city for 40, 50 years or your whole life.

Yeah. I mean, it's- I've been here since I was eight years old. You came from Canada? Yeah, from Canada, from the west coast of Canada. So, west coast my whole life. Right. But this city, like, the traffic and the parking will kill you.

Like, the traffic and the parking, the you. Like the traffic and the parking, the only times I really hate this city is when I'm looking for a parking spot or I'm like battling traffic. Right. But I feel like this city is, like it draws oddballs. Like there's still a lot of oddballs here.

Like people come here to become famous in certain different ways. That's right. But they come in as different kind of oddballs. Yeah. New York to me,

like the last few times I've been in New York, it's very conformed. Now, yeah. Yeah, now, there's so much conformity there. We're the smartest people, come to the smartest people, we're the smartest people are in the smartest place. I know, but is it, like, I was working around, I mean, I don't even know if that's the case anymore.

No, it's just, everybody's a millionaire. It's just, here I am, I'm a millionaire, and I'm going to dress like this millionaire, and it's sort of the very uniform kind of dress code. Right. And it used to be you would go to New York like in the early 80s. So the first time I went was the late 70s. Yeah. And it was oddballs.

Oh, no, down the Lower East Side? Yeah, all over the place. I went to see this new Warhol show, and it was actually great. And I've seen a lot of that stuff, and I thought I've seen it all. But they curated something at the Whitney and pulled together some stuff. It was just beautifully put together. And there was stuff i'd never seen before but they had this video running of the factory one of those kind of like dancing kind of velvet underground and i was looking at these people and the and just the hair and the sweat and the freedom of it that these

eras that that you lived through in the 70s but in the 60s like, like there were, people tried to reproduce them all the time, but there's no, there's nothing like being at the source of that. And that'll never, it's not so much, it'll never happen again. Something different may happen again, but this particular thing,

you can't reproduce it. But it was so human and sweaty and full of fluids and goo and drugs. A certain kind of hope. Like you really thought things, like the start of the punk rock, everybody really thought things were going to change. We... The start of the punk rock. Right. Everybody really thought things were going to change.

We all thought we were going to become millionaires. This is part of the deal. That was what you were gunning for back then? Yeah. Not necessarily gunning for, but you just figured it was inevitable. How old are you? Because you were so far ahead. How old am I now? Yeah.

I'm 62 now. I'm 55. So you're like seven years back. So you were really in it. Yeah. I'm the same age as the Sex Pistols and the guy from Joy Division who killed himself. Like that age. Like that year.

I tell you, man, in all your writing, there's always somebody who's about to kill themselves. Somewhere in the corner, someone's hanging from a rope. My generation was like a mess. Because we're right after the 60s people. So we have all the drugs, all the- Well, let's go back though. So you come down from Canada. Eight years old.

And what, you were in Vancouver, but you have any recollection of that? Oh, yeah, yeah. I have a lot of- Well, you wrote a bit in the new book. The new book's structure is very interesting to me because you call it a memoir. But so in the way you frame the first part of the book, you know, which was broken up in little bits and pieces of your past, is that sort of your life flashing before your eyes?

Fairly. Yeah. There's a chapter called My Life Flashing Before My Eyes. And then there's also like my introduction to death. Like the first time I learned about- Well, I saw that too. But like those bits and pieces, I didn't know the title heading, but- Yeah.

And then all of a sudden you're dead. And then all of a sudden I'm dead. And now you're looking at your wife and her friends and your friends and how they're moving through your absence. Yeah, how they carry forward without me. How do you, like, why do you call that a memoir? Well, because they call it a memoir. Like, that falls under memoir. And part of what I want to do is I want to illustrate that every memoir is, in fact, got an aspect of fiction.

Of course, yeah. Because once you make aspect of fiction uh-huh because once you make yourself the the hero of the story yeah once you make yourself the protagonist yeah it's fiction right now whether you're talking at a bar or somebody else whether you're on stage right giving a spiel whatever it's fictionalized of course and so this one is like half of like like there was a review this review said you know it's going to be it's something about how it's hard to it's hard to judge the veracity of parts of this book. Veracity. Meaning the parts when the narrator is dead, right?

They want to judge the veracity of like, oh, my dog, this is, this is, this is being narrated by my dog. They want to judge the veracity of my dog's narration. How does that, how do you, how do you, how do you, how are you qualified to write a review if you, if you're going to judge the veracity? Of the dog's point of view? If you have trouble judging the veracity of a dog's point of view. So you shifted the point of view?

Here and there, yeah. Because at the beginning, it was sort of like there was an omniscient point of view. Then all of a sudden, you're talking. So then we go to the dog. Did you write it like the sound and the fury? Was it just colors and the smells and sounds? No, he's a pretty aware dog. He's a pretty aware dog. He's a pretty aware dog.

And he has a giant penis. So he's named Bulger. Oh, yeah. And he's a good dog. And these are your real dogs? My dogs don't actually talk. No, but I mean, are those the names of your dogs? No, no.

My dogs are called Tippi and Casper. And you changed the name of your wife, who I know? I changed the name and also a lot of details. it does because of the fact that it is so fictionalized all the same she has not read it and she's not been able to read it and she like theresa right yeah yeah and she she won't recommend it i find that happens with a lot of writers i know even writers of fiction i recently talked to my buddy Sam and his wife is not thrilled about the new book. And it's like, it's so not offensive, but people, they think about themselves. So they're going to take it personally. Also, you worry what someone else might think about it. Or you,

are they going to look at you weird? Like your friends are going to read it. Or family or somebody, they're going to read it and go, oh, this is what he really thinks of you. When it's not what I think of any of these people like does she know that yes she knows that good but everybody i know knows that like like if there's a character and it has like that there's maybe there's some characteristics that are akin to someone i know yeah that's a skin yeah and all the the motivations and the various failings those are mine yeah right right those are all it's populated with my- Projection.

Yeah, my faults, my whatever. Yeah, and also how you see those people. I stop seeing, once I'm writing, I stop seeing them once I do the physical description. And it's not them anymore. No? I have this physical description, and then basically everything that fills it out,

I've realized now, it's just overflow of my own kind of neuroses or my own projections or what I would be like if I was in this situation. Well, it's interesting. I realize that framing as a memoir makes sense. Outside of the fictionalization of what's happening after you die, when you start exploring these characters, if they are real, you are doing a lot of past because you can build these characters out from the point after you know the present when you're dead but as soon as you go back then you're dealing in this sort of somewhat reality frame in a way but i have like a like the wife in the book

there's this circle of friends around her yeah and none of those people really behave in a way that that if people go oh look that looks like me, that the people who it might look like have behaved in the past. It's totally, even the past, it's like it's my kind of resentment and stuff. You went out of your way to have one of the characters that you

renamed in Punk Elegies appear in the new book and she kept the name that you gave her in Punk Elegies. Yeah. Was she a real person? She is a new book and she kept the name that you gave her in punk elegy yeah yeah yeah yeah was she a real person she is a real person and she is uh a bit of a composite she's more than one real person right because i know i know some of the people you know so i'm you know kind of bending my brain to well some of the people like like in the punk elegy it's like there's this guy black randy black randy's a real human being you know there's a there's a joe strummer there's this guy, Black Randy. Black Randy's a real human being, you know. There's a Joe Strummer, there's an incident with Joe Strummer at the Roxy. That actually happened. Sure.

You can find that. And the guys from Slash Magazine, those are real guys. Yes, yes. But okay, so going back. So from Vancouver, which I think is like one of the greatest cities in the world, you know, you come down here. Do you ever go back up to Canada? Do you have people in Canada? Well, they're all dying off. But yeah, my sister moved back. One of my brothers moved back.

We used to go back every year. The last time I went back was probably about four years ago with my wife. We went to Vancouver Island. Yeah. We went up to- Pretty, right? It's really pretty. We went up to this place up in the north of the island.

Was it Tofino? Tofino. It was Tofino. Yeah, Tofino. I want to go there, man. They have a hot springs. I know. I know.

There's hot springs. You got to fly a little plane up there? We flew the little plane back. We took the boat to and flew the little plane back. Is it great? It's amazing. It's amazing. But you think you could have appreciated it when you were 20?

Yeah, in a way, because I used to like to go out into nature and smoke weed. Yeah. Well, maybe when I was like 15 more than when I was 20. But yeah. So we went up to, also we like 15 more than when I was 20. But yeah. So we went up to, also we visited my dad because my dad was in a nursing home in a place called Ladysmith

on Vancouver Island. And then in this book, Now That I'm Gone, there's this section that's the people that have stayed behind me. Yeah. And it's like my dad and my wife's mom. Yeah.

And my wife's mom lived with us for probably like eight to 10 years after she got dementia. Yeah. And my wife's mom lived with us for probably like eight to ten years after she got dementia. Yeah. And so it's like those two characters, my dad in this nursing home after he'd had

like these strokes. Yeah. So it's like, you know, it's as far out as you're going to get while you're alive. Yeah.

It's like the far end of life, of consciousness. And then interacting with me but now that I, it's told kind of from the perspective of this narrator who's, you know, departed. But now that I, it's all kind of from the perspective of this narrator who's, you know, departed.

Yeah. It feels like at the beginning when I'm reading it, because, like, I'm 55, but it feels like that, you know, the way you think about death and the way you experience it and what you've experienced of it as, you know, you've moved through the circles you've moved through, it's kind of pressing. You know, but you're, like, I feel a wrangling with the reality of it.

That's the way it goes. Because with my textured past, there's been people dying since I was a kid, since I was 16. And then a lot in the punk thing. But now it's not suicide and it's not drug overdoses. It's just natural causes. And I was saying that pretty much exactly what you said recently It's not suicide and it's not drug overdoses. It's just natural causes. Yeah. And I was saying that pretty much exactly what you said recently is death is no longer a theory.

Right. It's like it's a reality that you kind of, you grow into this reality. And it becomes like, like I've always thought about death. I'm kind of, I don't know if I'm morbid, but it becomes like this part of your living process. Yeah. There's this awareness that people are dropping all over. Well, yeah. Someone connects with me on Facebook from high school.

Two years later, he's gone. It's really wild. Yeah, and I've seen a lot of people go to, I mean, kind of natural causes. But when they're natural and you're not 60 yet, they're dubious natural causes. Right. You know what I mean? Right. But you sort of said something at the

beginning of the book about how it's just always there like i've always intellectually dealt with it and i've had a fear of it but i had i you know only rarely have i had a terror of it right like you know because you try to intellectualize it like you know i know it's going to happen and but if you really sit there and think about it which i think you do in some points in the book like if you're just laying there in bed and, which I think you do in some points in the book, like if you're just laying there in bed and you really put yourself in the place. Most nights I go to sleep wondering like, is this it? That's how I put myself to sleep.

I don't really have a tear of it though. No, I didn't feel that. But like you say that after a certain age, it's just always there. Yeah. It's always lingering like right there. And then also like it kind of forces you into your life. Yeah. Because it's not that you live harder to shut it out.

It's just like why waste a moment? Why waste up? But do you really do that? I mean, do you think that way? To some extent, I believe I don't sit down down and tell myself i give myself a little pep talk saying you know you need to look you know you only got so many moments yeah go out but if it is i can i can i can recognize it i can see it like like i don't hold a grudge as much as my wife maybe you know i hope i don't just jinx myself but but i don't i don't want to ruin my day i don't want to ruin an hour i don't think you can jinx yourself you have a certain amount of control over holding a grudge.

It's not like... But no, but something can happen that I'll go back to. I'll go back. I'll revert. Yeah, I'll revert. Back to... I don't want to revert. Yeah, I find that if I hold a grudge now after being sober as long as I have,

that it's just the way it's going to be. There's not many of them, and they're not that active. But if you let me think about it for a minute, I be like oh yeah yeah but it's good like one way to deal with it i heard very early my sobriety it's just like uh that person just make sure that person ceases to exist for you right detach with malice yeah detach with erasure yeah well yeah but there was some other thing that the other sad thing, and I think it's something I share with you in terms of thinking that, like, there was a moment in the book after you die where somebody said,

like, he was just getting happy. He was just starting to get the hang of it. You look like you might turn around. Things might come together. But that's another thing about when you get to this certain age and people are dropping off. Yeah. It's like you make that turn.

You've got to make that turn. You know it's also great is that you can see the uh evolution and and the sort of um you write uh you know more confidently with more space you write differently more poetically between the elegies in this book there's definitely something more thoughtful there there are spaces that weren't there before. Maybe. Yeah. I mean, I feel like every time I finish something, I think, wow, I've almost got it. I've almost got it. Like there's a bit of an improvement. And then I look back a little later and I see everything where I feel like I fell a little short. But I'm pretty happy with it.

I'm pretty happy with the way it came out. And the different things, because a lot of the things I'm trying to express there like they can come off as really like self-pitying and modeling and yeah i don't know and i don't want to do that like i'm trying not to i'm so i'm like very conscious of trying to communicate something without being uh like a bummer well yeah i don't want the book to be a bummer well you know it's weird you do you know because i don't know you that well that you know and what i know of you you and what i've known of you for the last you know, it's weird. You do, you know, because I don't know you that well that, you know, in what I know of you and what I've known of you for the last, you know, 15 years or whatever, it's just, you know, passing moments and physicality, you know, so like I'm just inserting a younger you into these tones. I guess to me, you know, there's that weird thing where it's sort of like, are we being objective or like, I mean, because there are people that like don't think about this shit. And I don't really understand them. I sometimes wish I were them.

And as I get older, some of the stuff that used to plague me or consume me just faded away. But I still think that the more outside stuff, right? Like, well, yeah, I mean, people's opinions. Yeah, yeah, Well, yeah. Like other people's opinions. Yeah, yeah, yeah. Yeah, but like the sort of basic nature of like, why are we here? What is this struggle worth? Like when I see really old people

just kind of like trying to get down the street, I'm like, that doesn't seem like the big payoff that we're waiting for. You know what I mean? It's like- But there's gotta be something else going on too. There's a strange thing with really old people is uh like their history gets erased like when you look at them you don't see their history at all yeah you don't see what they've been you don't see

like if they were in world war ii you don't see but you dealt with someone with dementia i mean i guess i've been i don't want to use the word blessed because it's not really blessed i've been uh spared you know both my parents are still alive you know i've blessed i've been uh spared you know both my parents are still alive you know i've i've i've been you know you know fortunate in my life uh health-wise relatively speaking up to this point but i mean i i know in the book you certainly have lost people i know but to deal with somebody with alzheimer's for a decade i mean it's got to be just relentless and horrifying in a way except that she it was such a sweet person yeah like you see a lot there's a lot of people so there's a repetition of sweetness yeah okay here it is

i'll give you an example christmas morning right i don't go hey eva merry christmas she goes it's christmas it's christmas merry christmas oh she gets really happy 15 minutes later i go in forget hey merry christmas even she goes it's christmas she gets so happy so i mean it's kind of like like that's like one day. You're just sort of like giving her a hit. You could just do it all day long. You could do it all day long. But also like her core was really kind of like a sweet person.

So she didn't become menacing or weak. She didn't become menacing. Oh, that's good. She didn't become all angry or resentful. And then I think she also, she was so appreciative of her daughter. And that her daughter brought her in and was taking care of her. Like she was very, she had had this sort of core gratitude as well that kind of like,

it helped. And it stayed there. It stayed there. Oh, that's great. It stayed there. It's there still. She's in Montrose right now and she's in a place in Montrose.

Oh, yeah? And it's still there. So where in Los Angeles did you grow up? We grew up out in, what do you call it? San Gabriel Valley. Like, Covina, West Covina. Oh, yeah? I wasn't crazy about it. did you grow up uh we grew up out in uh what do you call it stangerill valley yeah like uh covina west covina oh yeah and and like i wasn't crazy about it well the way you captured in the

book just because i i don't you know i don't know those areas and i don't live those areas just the weird sort of sparse suburban nature of it i mean that that's really where the the la kind of you know punk aesthetic sort of got pulled out of right in some degrees yeah but there was no imagination out there like like because I'm talking about the East Valley Valley to the East yeah like the valley to the north and the west like a lot of people there their parents worked in the movie industry or the entertainment maybe they were just gaffers or whatever I worked with in costuming or but they were starting they

were part of the dream they saw there was this bigger yeah where I was from didn't even have that. What was out there? Nothing. There were the real estate offices. What do you call it? Mortgage companies. I don't know.

Just nothing really. Yeah. A lot of smog. They had this inversion layer. A lot of smog. Not much imagination. What did your dad do? He sold real estate.

He sold houses. My mom worked at a retail store. So you were just out there listening to townie music? Well, I was... I guess it was early enough to where at least the music that was mainstream or consolidated,

you were there for like just post the birth of the new shit twice, I guess. Yeah, well, I liked a lot of, you know, like Bowie and Roxy music

and T-Rex. But before that, I imagine when you were a kid because when I was a kid, so you were a kid. Well, I had this stuff, yeah, I had like that, like the proto-punk a kid, because when I was a kid, so you're a kid. Well, I had this stuff. Yeah, I had like that, like the proto-punk kind of,

like the Electric Prunes and the Standouts and the Rolling Stones and the Beatles when they were both fantastic. Right, like in 69, how old are you? Like, I'm six.

I'm 13. So that's all getting planted in your head. Oh, yeah, my hormone, my testosterone, whatever, it's all going crazy. Yeah, and then you get the Beatles.

And that music is very going crazy. And you get the 60s. Yes, yeah. And you don't have older brothers or older siblings. had an older sister but she was more um scholarly oh so she didn't have the records necessary to get you through well even then it was radio like the am radio was was when you at that time you know you got like paint it black would come on yeah paint it black at that age blasting out of your little transistor radio, it's very...

Crazy. Well, it just makes you feel great. But so that's going into you when you're 13, so then you were actually... Also, I'm reading. Yeah. Like, I'm reading, because I started reading really early.

I started reading, like, I was reading Dickens when I was, like, maybe 11. Like, I read Oliver Twist, which is not like a... Like, it's not a... It's a trigger-warning book. I mean, like, kids get hanged. Kids trigger warning book i mean like kids get hanged kids get hanged and as kids get hanged other kids go and pick pockets of the people spectating at the

hanging you know it's like yeah dickens was some dirty shit in a way he was great he also he like validated my because i had the suspicion that the people in authority yeah we're kind of full of shit and that they they didn't really necessarily have my best interest at 13 yes yes and you weren't brought up with any religion, really? Catholic. You were? Catholic, yeah. Well, at least it's a rich tradition of weirdness. Well, Catholic as well.

It's like you reach this point, a lot of Catholics do, where you reach this point, it's like, who are these people to tell me what is what? How do they know more than I know? They don't. And you reach this kind of point where it's sort of like, good and evil, right and wrong, like you know they exist. Yeah.

But it's not necessary for someone else to tell you what they are. It's a, I mean, the mafia is very Catholic. And look what they do. Well, yeah. Well, they are actually very Catholic. Yeah. No, I get it. And they execute because they, you know, it's like, you can't tell me.

They have an incredible ability to compartmentalize, Alan. Maybe there's some of that. But I feel like I integrated. I didn't compartmentalize. I integrated it all. Well, of that but I feel like I integrated I didn't compartmentalize I integrated it all well that's why I feel like

it had a great effect on this whole Catholicism thing like it kind of like I feel like it did get so I mean I know there's a whatever

but I feel like it did get kind of a moral code like there's sort of like this what do you call it honor culture honor culture

honor culture yeah a lot of honor culture people are Catholic yeah yeah and it's sort of like a moral code why do you think that? Honor culture. Honor culture, yeah. A lot of honor culture people are Catholic. Yeah, yeah. And it's sort of like a moral code. Why do you think that is? Well, because if you violate the code, you know, you're in hell. You're damned. Yeah, you're gonna get hell. So even if you don't buy that

shit anymore, the system that was put in place, you know, within your little world, yeah, I get that. I actually become sort of like mildly obsessed with the logic and the intent of the seven deadly sins. Like, to me, you know, I've just become fascinated with the idea. Because I once talked to Christopher Hedges, and he said to me, he said, you know, they weren't put there as a roadmap to perfection. They were put there as a barometer for your behavior.

There was never any idea that you were going to nail this shit. They're like the guardrails. Yeah, exactly. But how did they pick those fucking seven? They're so solid, man. It's not that you're ever going to get rid of all those, but you know the shit you're supposed to keep in check because any one of them or a mixture of them, once they get out of hand, you know the shit you're supposed to keep in check because any one of them

or a mixture of them once they get a hand you're gone you're gone you're you're you're in either the spiral or the straight out slide with or without hell i mean i'm not even a hell guy no no because hell's alive hell's what you do to yourself hell is what happens to you because of what you fucking did we're in it yeah if you if you're in hell it's right there with you yeah it's not it's not waiting for you in some distant place. No, or else you get sucked into somebody else's hell, on a personal level, a cultural level, a political level, a national level. I mean, there's plenty of hells, man.

Yeah, but I believe the seven deadly sins, that was really well thought out. I don't know if it was done by committee or if it was one fucking, like, you know, really visionary human being. It's beautiful. And it's like, you know, that and the Ten Commandments

is like, this is how society exists and this is how individuals don't destroy themselves. Yeah, yeah. Here you go. Yeah, yeah. You know,

it's crazy. You could be okay. Yeah. You know, deal with this, you could be okay. And then maybe like the, like the four absolutes.

What are they? That's how you behave with honesty, purity, unselfishness, and love. Oh yeah yeah i think i have that layer that i'm on top i used to i used to go to work and i would work at hustler yeah and i would put hpl on top of my my little calendar every every morning just to like to the four absolutes yeah yeah yeah keep you in check just to you know not the seven deadly sins just those you don't want you don't want to feel guilty i I'm kind of dealing with those.

I'm kind of making some, I'm making my money off of those. But this other thing, perhaps I'll work with it. It's not on you, man. You just put it out in the world. So, okay, so you're growing up out there. And then so you're 13 and you get your mind blown by that music. And also the things I'm reading. Dickens.

And then like I got carowack pretty early i got broke like i dug i somehow like i burrows you got to keep going back to man like you know it's just like you're in a mire of like you you know it's a lot and you know that like you know everything's in there but you know sorting it out is no easy game nico launch was on a rem and it was on a cutout table at pickwick books and i got my mother to buy it it for me. Yeah, she didn't know. Yeah, she didn't know. She bought me that, and she bought me the Essential Lenny Bruce on the same day. That's great.

The Essential Lenny Bruce is just- The paperback? Yeah. Yeah, those are great. The Naked Lunch paperback too, right? No, the Naked Lunch was a hardback. Oh, yeah? Yeah, Grow Press hardback,

which got stolen from me at the Canterbury when I was a punk rocker. But the Lenny Bruce, it was his bits, all his routines. No, I know. Yeah, it's great. Really. Yeah, I have a- And again, that was like Dickens. That was like a Dickens No, I know. Yeah, it's great. It was really. And again, that was like Dickens.

That was like a Dickens thing because it validates. They were kind of rich like that. Well, it validates your perception that what I'm presented with by the authorities, the media, whatever, is not necessarily what's really happening in my life and the lives of people I can see around me. That's right. That's right. You're pulling the veil back a bit. Yes. the people I can see around me, you know? That's right. That's right. You're pulling the veil back a bit. Yes, yes. And because Dickens was really about class and Lenny Bruce was really about, you know, speaking truth to power.

Yeah. Right? Yeah. Because I got that book. I got a hardback first edition of the Lenny Bruce bit, The Essential Lenny Bruce, and I got it in a used bookstore in Phoenix, and there was a Brownies bookmark in it, like

that little Girl Scout, whatever the Brownies were. Because they must have had a book drive. Yeah, something. Something came from that. I have it. It's right over there. I love that thing. I love it.

So when do you realize something is fucking happening? Like, what is the thing that goes into your head? What was the radio station? How did you know that things were about to change? Because punk didn't happen for another five years, right? Yeah, six or seven years, yeah. But you weren't hip to the Stooges or anything like that yet, were you? Not long after, like, by 73.

Really? Yeah, well, because of Bowie. Bowie, like, let you know about everything. You know, Bowie, like, he produced that Lou Reed album, so then you got to go and grab all that Velvet Undergrounded underground yeah he worked with uh iggy on a raw power which is like one of the most amazing albums ever so you gotta go pull out all the you know there's all three of them here's the thing that happened on tv there was this uh big rock show yeah it was either from cleveland or cincinnati or some big outdoor show yeah and al And Alice Cooper was on it. Yeah. And Grand Funk, whatever.

And Iggy and the Stooges. They're having a little resurgence, Grand Funk. But Iggy and the Stooges were on it and Alice Cooper were on it. Yeah. And they were both so transgressive. Yeah. That when I went back to school the next day, I had to like dampen my enthusiasm for that. Because everybody else was like, did you see those sick fags?

Really? Yes. Yes. It was like, you couldn't just go hey i love this because it was it was sort of like reviled by a lot of people like rolling stone for instance if you can dig up the original review of of the iggy and the two just funhouse album yeah in rolling stone they just savaged it yeah they they felt it had no they had no excuse for existing really yes and the same with black sabbath paranoid really yeah i didn't know that They felt they had no excuse for existing. Really? Yes.

And the same with Black Sabbath Paranoid. Really? Yeah. I didn't know that. Yeah. Because you do write a piece that I read the other day about once Bowie became mainstream, that the experience of going to see him was different because the crowds were now- The crowd changed. They were not transgressive.

Yeah. Well, the first time I saw Bowie, it was probably, it was maybe 72 or something. When Rodney brought him here? No, it was probably like a season afterward. It was right after Ziggy Stardust came out. Yeah. It was at the Long Beach Auditorium. I was still in high school.

It was after Ziggy's. Because he came. It was promoting Ziggy. This was promoting Ziggy. Because he was, I think he came out here like before that, right after Space Odyssey. He came here and no one really knew who he was. i think he just kind of hung around i don't think he played any right no he didn't he didn't i just read a screenplay about that period the first i believe the first show he played was in santa marcus civic in 72 i didn't go to that one but i had the bootleg of that but when i went to the bowie show like i the the show was really

72 yeah at long beach like the show itself which is beautiful and it really like when he played um there were certain songs where he you know he got down on the stage and he really felt like he was talking to you and this song you hang on it's like don't commit suicide hang on you know it's like oh for the people who were freaks yeah yeah well then in the audience like I got out you know I'm going out and like I'm pretty young for the audience I'm probably in the lower, like youngest 5%. You're like 14? I'm probably like 16.

Yeah. 16 at this time. Yeah. 15 or 16. Yeah. And then the audience largely was like, like they were like, you know, they were sort of drug addicts, sort of like very creative people. There was a lot of gays. Yeah.

There was drag queens. There was, you know, Hollywood, like, sort of, like, you know, we're skeeves. We're very skeevy. And then I noticed that I wasn't afraid of any of these people, and I noticed that none of them, when they looked at me and when they recognized me, when they viewed me, had any malice toward me. Right. Which was way different than what I was experiencing every day out in West Covina.

Yeah. So, it was just like, I thought, you know, there's this place. It's going to be different. Yeah, these are my people. Yeah, it's going to be different. I don't know if they're going to, you know, I don't know if they're all my people, whatever, but it is a population that I can move among where judgment wasn't part of it. Yeah,

they're not going to judge me. And then if they do judge me, they're not going to like try to punch me in the face. Yeah. Just because you're not like that. Yeah, yeah, me in the face yeah just because they you're not like that yeah yeah yeah that's an amazing observation that was a beautiful event it must have been an amazing feeling it was it was it was really a pivotal event in my life was it was a you know a rock concert was a david bowie concert right because like all these different people and nobody's like you know hey you freak no nobody was at all and that was like after so in the music

too like there are some songs. On Ziggy? Yeah, I can't remember the name of the song, but it's like, but he goes, you know, something where he sits down, like touch me, or I'm with you or whatever. Yeah, yeah. I forget the lyrics, I'm paraphrasing, but I remember like just getting this feeling like,

you know, not necessarily him, but someone is, you know, someone is. And it was really. Someone was speaking for everybody there. Yeah, yeah. Yeah, I mean mean i went to see that that bowie exhibit at the brooklyn museum and i got i fucking cried the whole way through yeah i saw it i saw it too and it really was emotional right yeah i can't even understand

exactly why i mean i didn't have that experience that you had but you know when you go into that middle room where they have that thing of him as ziggy, I can't remember which song it was. And I'm watching him on the monitor. I'm just like, all of a sudden, I start fucking bawling. That's crazy. It was like, you forget how important he was in your life. I was lucky because I saw that in Barcelona. We went on vacation.

You saw what? I saw the Bowie thing in Barcelona. You did. But it was great because I don't speak Spanish. Yeah. So I'm there. And I didn't have to overhear anyone else's experience. I just had my own.

And then when I started bawling. Yeah, it was pure. Well, fuck it, man. They don't even speak. So even the placards were in Spanish, so you didn't even have to. No, they had them in different languages. Yeah, it was in different languages. Oh, that's funny.

So you didn't feel judged there either. No, no. Well, who was going to judge you? I mean, I found that the people. Yeah yeah the people were great yeah yeah like you know you felt like you're like these are people who love that guy and then there's always those people and they're they're like there's too many of them now and they seem to be shamelessly destroying the world who just you know don't don't understand it don't understand any of it don't understand like this sort of need for connection and connection is the valuable thing yeah and and you were able to see that like you know at the

at the root of it i mean because rock and roll i mean in and of itself like was something different because a lot of those you know meatheads and gearheads and and you know people you know they sort of acclimated to rock and roll pretty good that was understandable that that sort of um that protest you know, you know, that breaking away from whatever the Eisenhower 50s was. But for some reason, a lot of them didn't make the jump in the late 60s. Well, there's the violence in the music, too.

Like, there is actual violence in, like, Under My Thumb. Sure. Like, so many of those. Yeah, yeah. Those are violent beats, you know? So, like, there's, like, the jockey, whatever. Right, yeah, yeah. Yeah, I don't know. I'm not sure. Yeah yeah that's what they are these are the word that one of the

words are used yeah you know but you talk a little bit about that and I think in this in the new book about you know sort of when you feel ill-defined or like an outsider in high school that you you start to accumulate or at least in you know inform yourself about what music is going to give you entrance into certain circles. And I remember that very distinctly that you had the freaks, you had the jocks, you had top 40, and then there was a couple of weirdos who like Beefheart and Zappa. And then when punk started happening when I was in high school, it didn't get to Albuquerque

until the late 70s. New Wave happened in albuquerque until like the late 70s like new wave happened in albuquerque before punk really took hold because i don't know we had to be mainstream first before people went back well it's funny because like the new wave it's uh like it was sort of simultaneous with punk like Like it was like people would separate them out. Cause maybe it was a little bit like people were calling Nick Lowe new, new wave. Right. Right.

Right. Yeah. Like I think he produced the first dandruff and he was like there before. He was there before. Yeah. He became new wave. It was a strange definition that, that new wave thing.

Well, yeah. Like the hardcore, the more hardcore punk. Yeah. Like that was something that a lot of the people who were originally were in the L.A. punk scene, a lot of them moved out when that happened. The hardcore? Yeah, the hardcore came in and like people who like, let's say suburban lawns, like suburban lawns were at odds with the hardcore.

Why? Because they were more. Because the hardcore people didn't like them. Oh, yeah. And they were like, you know. So that was sort of a schism where sort of the more elegant and beautiful elements of what Bowie was doing, you know, sort of became that ethereal, new wavy kind of, there was a whole world of that. In a way, but also like Sid Vicious, there's a famous photo of Sid Vicious with the David Bowie t-shirt when he was going to the David Bowie show. The guy from Joy Division,

Ian Curtis, loved David Bowie. Yeah, well that makes sense. Like the David Bowie t-shirt when he was going to the David Bowie show. The guy from Joy Division, Ian Curtis, loved David Bowie. Yeah, well that makes sense. Like the David Bowie influence on punk I think is really, it's impossible to overstate. And I think, I guess,

I think Mike Watt, when I talked to him, really explained it, that whatever people call punk rock now that has become a certain sound, whatever it is,

that really wasn't what, that was just a strand of it. I mean, it seemed that, It was way more open initially. Right, that's right. That's what Mike said. It was, it didn't have's a very that was just a strand of it yeah i mean it seemed that it was way more open initially right that's right that's what mike said it was it was it didn't have a sound it was just a a realm in which anyone could do whatever they wanted the same with the look yeah with the look and the same with the personality that you could bring in yeah same with your demographic so what was that when did you uh like what what happened how did punk happen here the first thing i saw was this band called The Screamers.

Yeah. And they were, they did their, what do you call it, their debut show at a loft or a warehouse, whatever, for a magazine called Slash. Right. And then I was attracted to Slash. How long had that been around at that time? Maybe two issues.

Okay. Maybe one or two issues. Yeah. And then, you know, this is like, the Sex sex pistols didn't have an album out yet maybe the damned had had an album yeah but i'm not sure so like there were really no punk albums right there was a number of singles like the sex pistols that had two or three singles the dam had had singles the clash had had maybe two singles yeah and uh and the screamers were in a local band yes and then the ramones maybe had two albums.

I would say it started with the Ramones. Yeah. And I have a feeling that a lot of people from England would agree. Like the Ramones, whenever they're on a tour, and all of a sudden there was 80 bands. Yeah. So I guess it started with the Ramones. Yeah. And then here, it was like the Slash magazine became this sort of promotional vehicle. It was like the, what was the one in New York called

that Legs wrote for? Punk. Punk magazine, yeah. I have some of those too. Those are great. Yeah, so. So Slash was a little later than Punk magazine. Right.

Because Punk magazine was coming out before I dropped out of college. It was coming out in like the 70s. Early 70s? Oh, that late? Yeah, yeah, yeah. They may have even come out in 75, but I think the first I saw of it was 76.

And what were some of the bands that started to kind of surface right at that time? Yeah, in Los Angeles. The Screamers, The Germs. Yeah. The Weirdos. Yeah. The Plugs.

Yeah. A band called The Skulls. The Zeros. X, of course. Yeah. Circle Jerks? Circle Jerks were later. Circle Jerks were when Keith Morris got kicked out

and were fired from Black Flag. Okay. Like that was a... And Black Flag was one of them? Black Flag was a little later. Yeah. Black Flag was actually, you would,

like if you want to go wave, Black Flag was probably the start of the second wave. Okay. And Black Flag is what then, I would, Black Flag was like the spearhead of what became hardcore and like this giant, massive kind of influx of younger kids.

Yeah. Younger, like 17, 15, that age. And just wanted to burn off some of that energy. Yeah, they just wanted to bash each other up. But before that, it was a little more arty? Sort of arty. Yeah. Like a gay person did not hide

that they were a gay person. Yeah. And that was a new thing. Somewhat new, not new in the neighborhood because it was down in Hollywood. It was, you know,

right there on Hollywood Boulevard. So it was not, you know, the Gold Cup was right there. The Gold Cup, you got like, you know,

male hustlers, like teenage male hustlers out there. There's 50 or 80 of them. So in the neighborhood, you didn't have to hide. 50 or 80. See, like I,

you know, it would be more, yeah, it was crazy. It was like. Because by the time you didn't have to hide 80 see like i yeah it was crazy it was like because by the time you moved in like you when you were in venice and you were sort of distant from it yeah like i just i kept picturing you working at that fucking shoe store and i just so hung over and fucked up i can't i just can't imagine like the amount of drugs that you talk about doing in that in the punk elegies book i'm like i was getting queasy you know like how are you driving what is happening a lot of times i would have someone else drive oh yeah i would i had this one friend who

drove really well wasted and so he would drive a lot he was the designated driver was only designated because he could drive well fucked up yeah yeah yeah it wasn't like he designated to stay you know not to be high but so when he started writing, the first time you really did writing was for Slash? Probably high school, like in junior high. Like junior high is when I first got

some kind of, like sort of like feedback that made me feel good for writing. Yeah. And I wrote some story and the teacher made me read it in front of the class

and the class all laughed at the places where I wanted to laugh. Yeah. They thought I was kind of cool at the places they thought I was kind of cool. Was there a weird story?

Was that the time where your weirdness got celebrated no it was a story about um trying to play baseball with this kid like a pickup baseball game and how my at bat went yeah and it was just oh yeah and then it was just like my the my thought process as it was happening and then how it played out as opposed to my thought process yeah i think the slash magazine guys i think i saw them in a documentary recently maybe i don't know if it was the joan jett documentary i don't know because she was around too the runaways were around too right yeah yeah and because you write about you know going to a party and she was there like i just talked to her i can't imagine what like i just like that that la was so the word i was gonna

say rad but like it's not a word I use. But she was like an amazing presence. Yeah. She was really something. And she was at the house where the X had their first show and Black Randy had their first show. It was this guy named David Allen had married this woman named Kitra. Yeah. And her family had a house in Hancock Park.

Yeah. So they moved into this house in Hancock Park and that show was in the living room there. And Joan Jett was at that. I mean, she knew where to go. That was X's first show? X's first show and also Black Randy and the Metro Squad's first show. Wow. And it was just a packed house full of-

It was just a house, and it was in the living room. And it was just full of people. Like Joan Jett was there. Pleasant was there. Most of X was there. Well, they played, of course. I was just trying to picture who was there. Billy Zoom still had long hair at that time.

Yeah. He had hide it under a hat, so whatever. I remember like someone yanked his hat off so his hair came down. Wow.

And then someone else, they had a water bottle, you know, those big bottle, big, what do you call it, water dispenser full of wine. Uh-huh.

And someone got angry at someone else and picked up the bottle to hit them with the bottle so that the wine went guggling off across the whole floor. Just smelled like wine? Yeah.

I don't know what it smelled like because I was beyond smell at that time. You remember these little details. I remember a little detail here and there. I remember being up front. They had a little slope in the grass by the sidewalk. Yeah. I remember somehow I was prone on that. And I couldn't figure out how to get standing up.

So, there was that. But I remember like, you know, Joan Jett being there and thinking. She's something. She's something. So you wrote for Slash

for just a little bit and it was mostly so you could get into shows for free? Also, I thought somehow it would be a connection to something else.

Yeah. And then also free records. Yeah, I didn't know what. I figured, like, you know, maybe I'd be going around the world for Esquire or something. Oh, really? So you had the idea. I had the idea that this is- Hunter S. Thompson.

Yeah. This is going to make me really, you know, shine. And the drugs you guys were doing, like, I mean, I know X was into Speed, right? Probably. I'm not going to speak for them. Oh, right. But I mean, like, what was the scene doing? I mean, it was sort of pre-dope, right? Yeah. Well, it started out with Speed and pretty quickly went to dope. Oh, yeah? Probably. I'm not going to speak for them. Oh, right. But I mean, like what was the scene doing? I mean,

it was sort of pre-dope, right? Well, it started out with speed and pretty quickly went to dope. Oh yeah. Yeah. Which is, I believe what happens to most scenes.

Like it starts out, like a lot of alcohol, a lot of alcohol. Right. And then pills like Valium, some Quaaludes, of course. Oh yeah.

And then meth, black beauties. Everybody loved a black beauty. Yeah. And then there was green ones that were Benzene. So like time release. Yellow jackets, white crosses. Well, white crosses were kind of like a counterfeit.

They were just sort of backyard made pills. Right. But there were a lot of pharmaceuticals. And then needles came in. And so what you'd want was dope. But dope was very expensive then. In the late 70s? Yeah, in Los Angeles at least. It wasn't the black

dope yet? It was sort of like brownie, blackie, but it would be $25 a bag. And like in New York at that time, I think it was $5 or $10. Yeah. So it was really expensive and usually the potency wasn't what you were hoping it would be. Yeah. And this wouldn't just be

for novices. This would be all around the city. Oh, right, right. So it was just everywhere well so the first wave well it wasn't everywhere it was like it was you had to know someone you had to go to their house uh like like later on like in the early 80s all this time yeah all this in the tar and you could buy it on the street it was five bucks right yeah so the price went down from 25 to five dollars and you could everybody drive through it was a drive-through. It was a drive-through or a walk-through. Yeah, everybody could die.

Yeah, everybody could die. Luckily, by then, I was gone. You were out? I think I was out, yeah. So there was one bit, and I think it's Punk Elegies, where you see the Jams first show, and John Cougar opened. Yeah. Johnny Cougar.

Johnny Cougar at the time. And there was just this like the guys from the slash magazine were like this guy's fucking nothing they just they israel they took him up but they deconstructed him they deconstructed him there you know like under you know well that's the other interesting thing is that like by the time you get to that apartment building what was it called the canterbury arms the canterbury arms like i mean the way that like la was situated with like because like i remember you know hearing i kind of have vague memories of new york in the 70s but like i you know these different pockets

of la that were just chaos man they were just sort of like sexual chaos and drug chaos it was well it was a lot that area was a lot like um where was it square like hollywood boulevard yeah yeah hollywood boulevard around hollywood Cherokee. Right. And there's a number of blocks there where all the bars were dangerous, really. Yeah. Like looking back, like in retrospect. Right. Like we were out of our league everywhere we went. Right.

I didn't really realize it, you know, like out of my depth. Yeah. I was everywhere I went, but was so full of myself that didn't really realize it. Well, that's part of what LA is. Yeah. You know, you got to bring yourself to the table. Well, I went to school in San Francisco for a year or two. And I would go downtown and get really wasted.

And again, in retrospect, I realized how much danger I was putting myself in. Right. Because I would go into bars or- In the Mission? Oh, yeah, all over. Yeah. Or up around North Beach, Tenderloin. And I would go into alleyways.

I would go to bars. And I would be provocative to people. I'd be confrontational to people. And these are people, looking back, these are actual prison people. These are people who actually would smash someone's head in. Yeah. That's one thing I realized when I got sober and I tell people is that it's's not, you know, it's not just you don't just have to worry about dying from the drugs or alcohol. It's the you exponentially increase your possibilities of getting fucked some other way, whether it be in a car or by another human.

Yeah. When you're in the circle of those things. Because your behavior, you don't know what you don't know. And you don't know who you're buying from. You don't know what you're walking into. You don't know. Like, you know, and you do it. what that you don't know you don't know who you're buying from you don't know what you're walking into you don't know like you know and you do it yeah you do it all of a sudden you're you're in a hotel room with pirates and you know some guy with a gun and you're like

no you're like you're like i should light this newspaper on fire and then all of a sudden the newspaper's on fire and you're how did the newspaper get on fire and they're asking you you know it's like i don't know yeah yeah who who tore the mailbox out of the wall how the mailbox get torn out of the wall? You know, they're all looking at you like. Yeah. But it wasn't just me. Like that area, like we were all kind of over our heads, you know. Well, that, it seemed like.

We didn't really realize it. Somewhat of a lawless area. Right. Somewhat of a lawless stretch of blocks. And what was it? How was it? And what was the Sunset Strip like at that point? The Sunset Strip was a little more, I guess you could say upscale. Yeah. Like there was a little more i guess you could say upscale yeah

like there was a little more control right and then there were so many hookers on the sunset strip it was in and that continued for a few years like there's a kind of a uh what do you call it a squat that opened up next to where carlos and charlie's was and i don't know which is there now but like the mao maos moved in there and a other bands. But there were so many girls going back and forth that they would always be coming up and they would be getting high with us and then go back out. But it was literally at least 50 to 80

girls in a seven block route. Crazy. It was really crazy. And then I think it became Outcall Escort. I think the this is just pure speculation yeah but like the there's an organized effort yeah to to consolidate where the money came

in and right everybody became outcall and they were not seen on the 80s yeah yeah yeah i don't think it was a police i don't think the police managed to make that happen i think it was the different organized sure sure yeah the catholics yeah the that happen. I think it was a different organized. Sure, sure. Yeah, the Catholics. The Catholics did it, yeah. It was Catholic discipline, yeah. And what year did you write for Hustler? Hustler, I was at Hustler from 83 to 2002.

Were you sober at Hustler? After one year. Yeah. First year, no. Then after that, like I was, yeah, sober. 83 to what, 92? No, 2002. That's a long time. Yeah, First year, no. Then after that, like I was, yeah, sober. 83 to what? 92? No, 2002.

That's a long time. Yeah, it was almost 20 years. Pretty much, like my, when I wrote a book about it, I said 20 years at because actually the interview process started, if I judge, if I count from the interview process to when I got fired, it was 20 years. Now, when you look back on it, especially living in the culture we live in now and what, you know, Hustler was and then what he what Flint sought to represent in terms of, you know, constitutionality and freedom to express whatever. And then sort of like pushing the limits of taste on all levels. I mean, when you were working there, were you aware of that? I mean, was that part of the thing that you wanted to do?

Yeah, it was part of the whole appeal. Yeah. Was, you know, you're going to be on the front lines. It was very anti-celebrity. Yeah. It was very, like, anti-cult of celebrity. It was very sort of anarchist. It wasn't really anarchist, but it was really kind of holding any political power to answer, like holding them accountable.

Yeah. And then it was using the harshest terms available to you when you wanted to. So there was like with the photo sets, there was interacting with different kinds of creative people that was really kind of amazing to me, particularly a lot of illustrators. I met a lot of the illustrators. A lot of people used to illustrate, let's say four or five, were some of the original San Francisco underground comic book guys. I didn't read it a lot, but I mean, when I was a kid,

and like Hustler was like sort of like that was his real deal. They were holding him open. Yeah, yeah, yeah yeah and then the lights right on there and then i think sometimes like the the color was sort of yeah like it was insane like yeah and then the the paper that that paper was a higher quality paper right yeah it was shiny it was glossy paper the color separations who were done in europe by the same people who did color separations for the top jewelry companies. So it's like people who needed this gem to really show through in all its facets. That's who was doing the color separation for the Hussler Fulgur. So the labia and the clit could just sparkle.

Yeah. Not just that, but they would be delineated from one another. And you'd have this depth of field. Yeah, yeah, yeah. A lot of detail there was a lot of there was a standard of workmanship at housework yeah that that surprised a lot of people and you were mostly writing columns no i edited the whole i was running the thing i started out as a proofreader and then i was writing columns and then i was writing a lot of porn reviews and then i became uh what do you call it, like the articles editor,

so like the feature articles, I was editing those and recruiting writers and stuff. Then I got my own magazine, and I jumped to the top magazine, and then I kind of like did a little move, and I got control of like all the magazines. Were you there, you came in after Flint was shot, though. Yes, he was already in the wheelchair. But you had a pretty good relationship with him?

Yeah, for a long time. Yeah. Like he was at my wedding, I was shot, though. Yes, he was already in the wheelchair. But you had a pretty good relationship with him? Yeah, for a long time. He was at my wedding. I was at his wedding. I think he really loved me because we did this thing during the Clinton impeachment where we got the speaker-elect of the House of Representatives to resign from Congress on the same day Clinton was impeached. And so, look, the New York Times and the Washington Post would say, Clinton impeached, Livingston resigns. And what's, you know, what, why that matters is because like

the House of Representatives is the prosecutors in the impeachment trial, the Senate's the jury. So we had the lead prosecutor resign on the same day that Clinton was impeached. How did House of Representatives do that again? We hired, we put out an ad saying we want to know anyone that's fucking someone who's in the government. And people came to us with various stuff. And someone came to us with a name. Yeah. And they said, call this, call, it was an elected official came to us with a name.

Yeah. Call this name, this is Livingston's girlfriend. Right. And he's married, he has kids. We called the name and she hung up on us. Yeah. And then The Hill, the publication of Capitol Hill, they called me, and they said, we hear you have something on Livingston. Yeah.

And I said, well, you know, all the financial arrangements are in place, and so I can't really speak about it openly right now. Uh-huh. And he goes, we're going with it. Wow. And then he went, and I went, I go, I wonder if he's, he's obviously going to ask Livingston about it. Wow. And then he went, and I went, I go, I wonder if he's, he's obviously going to ask Livingston about it. And I'm like, what if, because what if Livingston does a preemptive resignation?

Because this guy named Dan Burton, also Republican. Yeah. Like a story was coming out in him in Vanity Fair. Yeah. And he preemptively confessed, did not, did not resign, but preemptively confessed. Right. And then within an hour, Livingston had confessed that he'd had this affair, but he wasn't going to resign. Yeah. And he wasn't going to give up his speakership. Yeah.

But then like a news crew came to interview me and they go, what do you have on Livingston? And I did the same thing. You know, the nondisclosure agreements are still in place. You didn't have anything, though, but a hang upup all had a hang-up yeah and he goes well we hear that he's having sex with a lobbyist while pushing uh that lobby's agenda on the on the on the house floor like that's interesting so then they put they mic me up and they go so what do you have in livingston and i said we were aggressively pursuing indications that he's having sex with a lobbyist while and then within an hour he resigned because it was true yeah yeah yeah probably yeah yeah because when the book that was a hustler victory that was probably our biggest And then within an hour, he resigned. Because it was true? Yeah, yeah, yeah, probably. Yeah.

So that was a hustle or victory. That was probably our biggest victory, I think. And then here's what happened. Beyond that, like Livingston's wife, because it was around Christmas, right? Livingston's wife calls Larry directly and says, you know, Bob has quit. You've won. Please don't give up what happened. Please.

And so Larry's able to say you know out of the goodness of my heart I'm not going to disclose the details yeah and he didn't have it he didn't have it so he got to go

because he's an amazing poker player he got to go this whole bluff and so then beyond that like anything we hinted that we had

yeah they had to believe we had it oh wow so it was it really kind of like like we feel, like I don't know if,

I'm speaking for me and my several sons. He's around still. Larry's around. Yeah, yeah, yeah. You still talk to him? No, he won't. No, there's a problem. There's a problem.

Because I, like in the, in the, excuse me, the Prisoner of X book, like it's, I performed at a roast of Larry. Yeah. That he asked me to perform at. He insisted I perform at. Yeah. And it's, he, I, I performed at a roast of Larry. Yeah.

That he asked me to perform at. He insisted I perform at. Yeah. And then I got fired from there and I haven't really talked to him since then. That's too bad. Yeah. He didn't like, he, his, he didn't go over this as well. What, you busted his balls too hard?

Well, I think that what did it, cause I, I did a bunch of stuff about him being cheap. Yeah. And he would love that. Yeah. But then I, I switched into this thing where I said that, in fact, you know, he, he has a, he has a good game. He about him being cheap. Yeah. And he loved that. Yeah. But then I switched into this thing where I said that, in fact, he has a good game, he plays a good game. Yeah. But in fact, he's the most pussy-whip man I've ever met.

Uh-oh. And then I went on some stuff about that and his wife. I think it really offended his wife. Oh, really? Yeah, because she stopped calling. She never called me again. She used to call me three or four times a week about various things around the office.

And that was it? That was it. You got her mad at you yeah kind of like and then i i don't think she's ever coming back oh no she's never coming back to the ellen mcdonough fan club oh well what are you gonna do i use you try and move on and just like you just like lay down every once in a while let me ask you a question about about that uh like you know because i can't one thing i can't that fascinates me, I can't quite get out of my mind,

was that there was some sort of like, and I think it is a hinge to, you know, what's happened culturally in terms of like the complete kind of,

and this is not a moral judgment, but in the 80s there was a concerted effort on behalf of Christians and conservatives to stifle porn. Yeah.

And then at some point, it's like no one talks about it at all anymore. And it's fucking everywhere. Like there is no like I never hear any kind of like, you know, right wing whack job ever. No one says anything about porn at all. And it's like crack. It's like everywhere. And it's like, you know, I'm not again, it's like crack it's like everywhere and it's like you know i'm not again it's not a moral judgment but i mean i i just don't know how they change your tune i guess what because it

becomes impossible i think it's because it serves a purpose now it does serve a purpose it's you know because otherwise these people who use they would be getting in relationships and they'd be having kids and you'd have these unhappy families oh you think that's the point well that's one point it really is i think it's like a narcotic i think it's a narcotic effect i think it's like it's something that that completely isolates people i i mean again it's not like i have no problem with porn i know people in porn but but it's like the fact that like it's you know i used to do a joke about it like some computers come with porn already on them. But here's the thing. Like these people who are isolated, they may be better off.

We may be better off with them isolated. Like rather than being out in the dating pool. And in the, you know. I just think it's interesting that it diminished as a moral crusade. Well, you know, it kind of would have, one of the things that happened is there was a, like a, like a coalition. Or a, between like the far right and then like feminists. Yeah. It was crazy because there would be these bills

in the past like in Minnesota or wherever, and it would be like certain feminists like really pushing it like in conjunction with some really far right person. Which what was it about? About porn. About how the harms of porn and just how it is towards society that it needs to be. So some feminists were on that page.

And then there was another faction of feminists that wanted to appropriate it and be sexual empowerment through porn. I feel like I have some memory of Trump saying something negative about porn when he was back in the election. I don't know. He seems like a complete. He seems like he'd be jerking off all the time. Oh, yeah.

No, I think he was. I also heard that he was upset that he couldn't watch porn in the White House. I mean, I don't know what's real, what isn't. Well, then. That seems to be the point. I believe everything we've just said. I believe that he would attack porn and then still be like jerking off on Air Force One. That's his genius.

The duplicitous bullshit element. His genius. Yeah. You know, the fact is, like, people don't realize he has a genius. Like, they, you know, because he's such an adult in many ways, or boorish, or whatever. Well, he, you know, he's an equivocator. So, like, everything's slippery, nothing is true,

and, you know, the people that it sticks with are all worked up emotionally, and they're making choices to pick and choose the worst of what he's putting out there. And then to other people, he just discredits it or he says it's not real or I don't know or whatever. But he knows that the 35 percent of the fucking angry, scary people are like, you know, we know what he wants. And in the meantime, he's dismantling the government. Totally dismantling the government, trying to protect his own ass. Well, trying to extend his duration.

It's his term. Someone told me that they... It's hard to figure out what exactly he's trying to do. Yeah, but someone who had worked with him, a comedian who had worked with him with some of his timing and shit, this person's

take was that trump is not sad he's not thinking this is an eight-year job oh you're talking about jeff ross i might be yeah yeah i talked to him about it yeah yeah he says he's not going anywhere yeah yeah and i believe that that like i like that was something that i started suspect during the election when i first started to think that he could win he's like he's not thinking that that he's going to have a two term or a one term. Well, no, and also the thing is

is that like, is that it's the only way he can protect himself now. Yeah. Because as soon as he's out of that job, you know,

it's just all going to come crumbling down. Maybe. What do you mean maybe? Why? You know, the state of New York is fucking,

you know, everyone's got a case on the motherfucker and the only way he can stay protected is if he keeps his fucking job and we're all in trouble because of it. Maybe the state of New York is fucking, everyone's got a case on the motherfucker. And the only way he can stay protected is if he keeps his fucking job. And we're all in trouble because of him. We're all in trouble. We're all in trouble. That's for sure.

So the new book, did you get some resolve around death in writing it? I think I did. Yeah? Yeah. Also, it kind of caps off my whole time in memoir, I believe. Because I have the punk rock one I have, and then moving on to the hustler and then this kind of post hustler in the, you know,

the digital world working and just how that went and then being dead. So like, I feel like unless I like come up with something like I cured polio or again or, or whatever, like I don't, I don't need to write another memoir. So what do you do to make ends meet? It's a tough, it's a tough? It's a tough road right now.

I'm kind of like mooching. I do a lot of mooching. I mooch here and there. But I'm writing. There's a different kind of scam here and there. Not a scam, but, you know, like trying to put together proposals. A lot of proposals, a lot of spec, a lot of spec work. Yeah.

And then, like, I wrote another book. I have a book that is pure fiction, short stories called Scary Parts. Oh, great. So it's that. Then I'm always looking for some kind of job. Yeah. How's marriage going?

Marriage is something that's... My wife would probably listen to this. Okay. But we did this, I talked to her, I had a conversation with her recently about it. Like marriage is not for the faint hearted. Yeah. It's a tough grow. You know, marriage is like you think, like people say, okay, you're going to have to compromise.

Yeah. And you think, oh, I'm going to have to negotiate better. Yeah. Right. But no, you're going to have to actually compromise. And so it's. Suck it up. Yeah. Yeah. And then, but not just suck it up because you have to be able to compromise and then still go it's like we were talking about earlier

we're realizing that death is real you know like you have to be able to like still go through and not just be going through the motions and actually somehow be present and be a contributor and you know recognize the other person,

what they're giving to you. Well, I think that, yeah, right, exactly. And that heartbreak is always present, always. Yeah. That it seems to me that, and this is realizations that I'm just having now, I've been married twice, I've been with someone a long time,

and you don't have kids either. You do realize, obviously, that, and having read the stuff, either you you do realize obviously that and having read the stuff like you've been through a lot of relationships and all relationships eventually hit a wall of some kind to where you have to be tolerant you know there's no there's no ethereal kind of perfect thing there's things you have to wait out right you wait out and also things that you know that like you know maybe you know whatever you're upset about or whatever you're not getting, maybe it's okay you don't get that. Yeah. That's the compromise.

Right. That's when you compromise. Right. But I've been with, we've been married for 22 years. So it's like the wall, there's been more than one wall. You know, you've been hitting the walls and you realize like, I don't know. And you're sober too. So at least you have a language to process some stuff.

It helps a lot. I bet. I mean, the behavior would be so much worse. I mean, the behavior would have nullified the marriage if I was drinking or- What made you get sober? I had a suicide attempt in a car. Oh. And then-

And then I had this hallucination afterward where I thought that- Because I totaled four cars with this one shot. And I saw dead bodies in these other cars and everything, and I just had this hallucination afterward where I thought that... Because I totaled four cars with this one shot. And I saw dead bodies in these other cars and everything. I just had this hallucination. Were there people in the cars? No, actually, they were not there. And you tried to kill yourself driving into cars? Yeah.

Why that way? Because it was available to me at the moment when I had the impulse. I was in the car. And you were high? I was a little high, yeah. It was.24, something like that. But it was intentional? Oh, a little high yeah it was 0.24 or something like that but it was intentional oh yeah no i was i was i was talking well i did it i was talking it was like i i had this realization earlier on that i ruined my life now because of my drinking whatever and you know

i had chances and now they weren't ever going to be happening well like but you like in reading the books i mean you know you you there was dope was dope, there was speed, there was angel dust. A lot of alcohol. That seemed to be the first love. And a lot of blows to the head. Oh, yeah? From falling down? Getting hit.

Yeah, and running into shit. Yeah, yeah. Okay. So I'm in the car. I'm coming from a party, whatever. I'm going on Franklin West toward the, you know, Ivor. There's a little hill. Then you come down to Ivor.

Oh, yeah. And I had this epiphany. I realized that I hadn't ruined my life, that God had ruined my life. Ah. And I hadn't had a thought of God, I don't know how long, and I haven't really had this direct of thought since. Yeah. But I thought, you know, you motherfucker.

Yeah. You know, I had so much going for me, you fucked me up. Oh, good. You motherfucker, you fucked with the wrong person. Yeah. And then I decided i'm going to come and spit in your face and then i took my car and i drove it into all these cars so it was it was sort of a dark white light moment it was a lamentation it was a very you know so you were

going to die because in that moment you believed in god and you were going to show him yeah i was going to face to face tell him off you ruined it. You ruined it for me. And then I had this hallucination that all these people were dead. And I thought, oh, my God. What have I fucking done? And then when the cops were able to convince me that I was the only human involved, although they didn't really consider me human at that point, I just felt I had this kind of elation in a way.

Were you busted up? No. No, not at all. My car was bent. My, elation in a way. Were you busted up? No. No, not at all. My car was bent. My car was bent in a V. You didn't succeed at all. No, I didn't succeed at all. But the police, like, I got stitches from the police

because they just beat the shit out of me. Because I guess I was talking. I thought I was dead, but I was still, I was the talking dead, you know. They didn't like what they were hearing. I would say a B. Yeah. But that's, this voice came to me and said, I'm going to get help. And then, I didn't even what they were hearing so they'd be but that's this voice came to me and said I'm going to get help

and then I didn't even know help existed but that's how long has it been it was like 34 years in the end of May wow so I was 28 that's amazing it was the pivotal point of my life

really that and the Bowie concert those two things but But this even more. Yeah. This even more. Because I was, you know, it was a kind of a desperate kind of like dragging through the days that was going on before that. Well, how do you like, because I mean, there's still, it seems like there's still some of that, you know, in the new book even that this idea that because like i i've reckoned with that myself that that it's nothing's

ever going to make me feel like i i did it but i'm i'm experiencing success to a degree that i didn't think would ever be possible so a little of that is diminished but it never there's always something if you're given to that way of thinking you're always going to find something to to exacerbate it yeah something's always wrong right even though nothing's really wrong but how do you do how do you do that how do you deal with that day by day i mean it's like it's an ongoing it's an ongoing struggle it really is but that's another thing like when someone writes a book and it's a drug memoir and at the end they have this this uh redemption like the whole redemption cycle and yeah like i i don't you didn't do that this isn the whole redemption cycle and yeah like i i don't

you didn't do that this isn't a drug memoir this is like i think this is a meditation on mortality yeah but right but the punk book like there's a lot of drugs yeah but it but it doesn't end with me getting you know this this this white light experience and getting sober and now i'm you know on a higher level because it's because i feel like I'm still in the weeds to some extent. And I kind of reconcile the fact that I'm going to be in the weeds to some extent. You know, like I have an unmanageable inner life. Yeah. And that's the problem.

My emotions and my intellect, like they tell each other things and they validate it. Like someone looks at me in a way I don't even know. It hurts my feelings in a way or whatever. That's the worst. I predict it. And then my intellect says, you know, you're completely right you're completely right yeah alan you're completely like everybody you know everybody is you know and then you're locked out you're locked out right people against you but most of the time they're not even thinking about you no that's it's like it's a complete misperception it's a projection yeah yeah yeah it's a lie it's lying to myself well it's just

exactly what you did in the car it's like like, you know, at some point at a pivotal moment, like you decided in some weird drunken state that you were going to blame God instead of yourself. Yeah. And that's what our brains do. It's sort of like those people are thinking this. And it's like we're the ones thinking it. Yeah.

But I always want this excuse to think that I'm unlovable. I heard someone else said this. Oh, yeah. This excuse that I'm unlovable and that I won't be taken care of. Right. And it's probably not true. I mean, I'm not certain. Not certain yet. The jury's out. But I'm going to war. I'm going to act as though, in fact, you are lovable in some way. And you will be taken care of. Maybe not exactly what I want, but

you know, more or less that's the best we can do man yeah yeah it's good talking to you man thank you very much for having me yeah buddy that was alan mcdonald his new book is called now that i'm gone a memoir beyond recall available wherever you get books and now i'm going to play just one i'm gonna it took me forever to get through these three changes in this riff that i played through the echoplex the old fender amp and the reissue Gibson gold top. It took me a lot of time to do it. And it's not perfect. It's still me.

Are any of us perfect? Let me just play this thing. Thank you. ¶¶ Boomer lives! We'll be right back. Order Uber Eats now. For alcohol, you must be legal drinking age. Please enjoy responsibly. Product availability varies by region. See app for details. Hi, it's Terry O'Reilly, host of Under the Influence. Recently, we created an episode on cannabis marketing. With cannabis legalization, it's a brand new challenging marketing category. And I want to let you know we've produced a special bonus podcast episode where I talk to an actual cannabis producer. I wanted to know how a producer becomes licensed, how a cannabis company competes with big corporations, how a cannabis company markets its products in such a highly regulated category, and what the term dignified consumption actually means. I think you'll find

the answers interesting and surprising. Hear it now on Under the Influence with Terry O'Reilly. This bonus episode is brought to you by the Ontario Cannabis Store and ACAS Creative.