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

Brendan Mullen (Editor), Don Bolles (Collaborator), Adam Parfrey (Collaborator)

Book Description

Publication Date: April 15, 2002

"Lexicon Devil is, pure and simple, the finest volume on punk to have seen the light of print. (Yes, folks: that includes Please Kill Me.) Great book!"—Richard Meltzer

Production has started on the documentary feature based on the book.

Editorial Reviews

From Library Journal

Since his heroin overdose in 1980, Darby Crash has become a symbol of punk irreverence, but his posthumous fame has tended to overshadow the seminal work of the punk band he fronted, the Germs. Mullen (who coauthored We Got the Neutron Bomb: The Untold Story of L.A. Punk), along with ex-Germs drummer Bolles and writer Parfrey, quickly deconstructs the myth of Crash (n Jan Paul Beahm) to reveal an embattled and confused soul who struggled with drug use and his homosexuality. Featuring raw quotations from Crash's peers in the burgeoning 1970s West Coast punk scene, the book offers both positive and negative views of the singer and the scene that raised him. Crash's fans were known for their cultish reverence, and Crash himself is shown to be a self-conscious misfit who used psychological ploys to enlist followers. It is unlikely that this book will reach a wide audience and thus imbue Crash's legacy with more humanity and, in turn, the Germs with more respectability, but it does strengthen the growing literature on American punk music. Recommended for popular music collections, especially as a complement to We Got the Neutron Bomb, which covers similar ground and whose oral history format this book replicates. Robert Morast, "Argus Leader," Sioux Falls, SD
Copyright 2002 Reed Business Information, Inc.

From Booklist

This intense oral history traces the life of a rock icon so enigmatic that few knew he was gay. The Germs had released only one album, G.I., before their leader, Darby Crash (ne Paul Beahm), 22, OD'd in a suicide pact (the other participant survived). His death, covered in detail here, just enhanced the Germs' cachet as protopunks. The book's compilers--Germs drummer Don Bolles is one of them--also serve up a lot about early West Coast punk, reported by a virtual punk who's who, sans, perhaps refreshingly, Henry Rollins, but including Jello Biafra, Exene Cervenka, Phranc ("America's Favorite Jewish Lesbian Folksinger"), and two who figured massively in the love triangle that, among many other factors, precipitated Darby's last exit, Gerber ("Queen of L.A. Punk") and Rob Henley. Evocative as hell of the punk ethos ("Part of the $400 [for the overdose drugs] was my rent money," mourns Ella Black), not least because of scads of photos of baby-faced adolescents (some nude) trying to look ugly. Mike Tribby
Copyright © American Library Association. All rights reserved

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Product Details

• Paperback: 312 pages
• Publisher: Feral House (April 15, 2002)
• Language: English
• ISBN-10: 0922915709
• ISBN-13: 978-0922915705
• Product Dimensions: 9 x 6.1 x 0.7 inches
• Shipping Weight: 1.1 pounds (View shipping rates and policies)
• Average Customer Review: 4.0 out of 5 stars  See all reviews (33 customer reviews)
• Amazon Best Sellers Rank: #385,336 in Books (See Top 100 in Books)

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20 of 21 people found the following review helpful:

4.0 out of 5 stars An important oral history of Darby, the Germs and LA punk, May 15, 2002

By 

Trent Reinsmith "Trent Reinsmith" (Baltimore) - See all my reviews
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This review is from: Lexicon Devil: The Fast Times and Short Life of Darby Crash and the Germs (Paperback)

Anyone that has any passing interest in LA/American punk has heard the names Darby Crash and the Germs. The songs of the Germs (Darby Crash/Pat Smear/Lorna Doom/Don Bolles) have been heard for almost 25 years. The image of Darby and the Germs live in the film Decline of the Western Civilization has been visible for almost as long. In the years since his death in 1980, many tales have been told about Darby and the life he led. This book attempts to clear up some of the confusion and offer the story of Darby from people who where there with him. Band members, family members, hanger on's, hustlers, and scene makers all contribute in this recount of the life of Darby Crash.
The charm and allure of this book is that it is not a one-sided biography of Darby. Lexicon Devil is not presented as a "this is how it was" history. Instead, the three co-authors Adam Parfrey(Feral House founder), Brendan Mullen(founder of the Masque) and Don Bolles(drummer for the Germs, Vox Pop, 45 Grave and Celebrity Skin) compile a huge number of recollections and piece them together in chronological order. Lexicon Devil shows how a young man transformed himself from Paul Beahm to Bobby Pyn to Darby Crash and finally to death. This approach bears spectacular results. It allows the reader to see the same occurrences through multiple eyes and perspectives. And while this approach may not be the norm in the world of biographies, it is a style that works in this case; Darby Crash didn't live a life that can be pinned down in a one-dimensional conventional biography.
So was Darby a Manson like cult of personality? Was he a David Bowie glam rock wannabe? Was he a troubled genius? Was he a drunk? Was he a junkie? Was he gay? Was he a suicidal mess? Was he a hustler looking for a handout? Did he create his own myth? All these questions and more are asked during the course of this book. And they are all answered, sometimes by more than one person and sometimes in contradictory terms. So where does the truth lie in regard to the life of Darby Crash? I have no doubt that the real Darby can be found in the pages of this book. Lexicon Devil provides the reader with a few versions of "the truth" and then leaves it up to them to define their version of the real life of Paul/Bobby/Darby.
The folks that contribute to Lexicon Devil read like a who's who of the early LA punk scene. Members of X, the Weirdos, the Screamers, Black Flag, Dead Kennedys, Black Randy & the Metro Squad, Go-Go's, the Runaways, TSOL, the Dils, the Bags, the Zeroes, Fear, Angry Samoans, as well as other early scenesters all contribute. Also included at the end of the book are short profiles of each contributor.
In addition, this book includes 140 never before published photos, Germs lyrics, a Germs discography, as well as a list of gigs and key events. As a whole, the quality of the book is at the same high level that has come to be expected from any Feral House release.
This book is an important oral history of a person, a band, a time long past that will never be repeated. Today, when "punk" is heard on the radio and seen on MTV or reduced to a hairstyle and mall bought clothes, it is important to remember where, how and why this movement started. The creators of the LA punk scene started something special; Lexicon Devil tells their story and history while they in turn relay the story and history of Darby Crash. (TR)

12 of 12 people found the following review helpful:

5.0 out of 5 stars hot times, March 15, 2007

By 

Robert B. Morgan "rmorgan" (kentycky punk) - See all my reviews
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This review is from: Lexicon Devil: The Fast Times and Short Life of Darby Crash and the Germs (Paperback)

this book is super but be warned, i bought it years ago and loved it, bought a copy recently and it has been censored..nude photos are re edited and i worry the text has been altered..not cool..try to buy an old used copy to get the orignal...bob

9 of 10 people found the following review helpful:

5.0 out of 5 stars Spengler was right, May 7, 2002

By A Customer

This review is from: Lexicon Devil: The Fast Times and Short Life of Darby Crash and the Germs (Paperback)

Rest assured, this riveting chronicle of the brief rise and ugly eclipse of Jan Paul Beahm, aka Darby Crash, will not make you dream how romantic your life would have been as a first generation punk rocker in the late 70s. By the time the average reader has traversed the nearly 300 pages of damaged life documented here, they'll want to take a shower to wash off all the dried blood.
Wrapped with a stunning color photo (by Ruby Ray) of Darby in a filthy San Francisco dressing room, this book captures all the mayhem, the confusion, the broken glass and the shattered brains that a film like "The Decline of Western Civilization" only offered a fleeting glimpse at. Lexicon Devil is pure oral history, with the spit, vinegar and vomit right there alongside the vitriol. In this case, a thousand words are worth a lot more than one picture (although the book contains a goodly number of the latter that have never been seen before).
It's no wonder the cesspit of HelL.A. played home to a tragic tale of this sort. It's the stuff California is made of-the slime behind the hippy new age façade. In their few years of existence, the Germs captured something almost profound, although they themselves might not have realized it at the time. This book captures the Germs and Darby Crash in a way that will not likely be surpassed.