24th July 2010

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We Never Learn: The Gunk Undergut, 1988-2001

… Then there was the contest between the Reverend [Horton Heat] and Dwarves drummer Vadge Moore to see who could have sex with the most people. “Yeah, everyone had some money riding on who would win,” Eddie [Spaghetti] says. “I bet on Vadge. He took down this really disgusting fat girl on the very last night we were there and won the contest. The grand total winning number? Two. So the ladies weren’t exactly breaking down our door.

This excerpt comes from a section of the book We Never Learn: The Gunk Punk Undergut, 1988-2001, by New Bomb Turk Eric Davidson. That’s Eddie Spaghetti from The Supersuckers talking about an insane-sounding European tour consisting of the Reverend Horton Heat, the Supersuckers, and Dwarves. Just one of many moments from the book that had me laughing out loud like a fucking asshole (the book didn’t make me laugh like an asshole, there’s just nothing I can do about that).

Obviously, a book like this couldn’t be more down my alley, and I probably would have been happy with anything, as long as the thing mentioned Billy Childish and the Mummies somewhere in it. But this thing is great. More information than I ever would have thought existed about so many great bands in the trash-punk style I’ve grown to enjoy so much. It’s got all that awesome “crazy story” stuff you’d expect in a Please Kill Me-style oral history of a subgenre of punk-rock, like the above excerpt, and it’s handled by a guy who was involved in the scene and really loved much of what came out of it.

Couldn’t ask for more in a book like this, really. Go buy it. It’ll be another reason for you to pull out your old Milkshakes and Oblivians records, and you’ll probably get hip to some other group you had no idea rocked as hard as they did.

Tagged: we never learnnew bomb turksit's... it's a psychobilly freakout!!reverend horton heatdwarvesstuck in thee garageobliviansmilkshakesmummiesbilly childish