Country: USA
Genre: Non-Fiction/Memoir
Page: 237
Henry Rollins has a method to his madness. He's always employing the same formulas, but the content of his shows/books changes so much in themes and moods from one time to another, that he keeps things fresh. Over the last ten years, his literary publications have been all the same - journal entries. It might dull the senses for some, but I find it's cool because Rollins has such an eventful life, things are radically different from one year to another. If The Dull Roar/Preferred Blur/Mad Dash trilogy was about loneliness and alienation in the city, Broken Summers is about justice and the personal implication of an enormous good deed. Trying to bring justice to the West Memphis Three. For those who aren't familiar with the case, go there and do a little bit of reading. As it's not clear if Damien Echols, Jesse Miskelley and Jason Baldwin killed those children (although I think it's highly unlikely), they haven't received a fair trial and Broken Summers is the story of Rollins' effort to raise money to bring them justice.
It starts with the production of the album Rise Above: 24 Black Flag Songs For The Benefit of the West Memphis Three, which consist of Black Flag songs, played by Mother Superior (the somewhat surrogate Rollins Band), with an array of guest vocalists that includes Tom Araya, Lemmy, Ice T, Hank Williams III, Iggy Pop, Casey Chaos, Corey Taylor, Mike Patton and many others. The project encounters many difficulties, going from shitty managers (you wouldn't believe how hard they tried to reach Zack De La Rocha for this) to singers pulling out and just the plain fucked-up L.A that wore Henry down. Then, during the second part of the book, they go on tour to raise more money. Those who read some Rollins books before will be familiar with this merry-go-round of cities, venues and fucked up people. It's always enlightening to read about touring conditions for bands that are not U2 or Metallica (read here: THAT KEPT THEIR DIGNITY).
This was an amazing book for Rollins' standard and I think I have found the reason. Thirty to forty percent of the journal entries have been written while he's in L.A. The man wears anger with style and class and he admitted himself it's a city that keeps him mad. He quoted Iggy Pop when he was asked how he kept the anger going: "I work at it". His observations on L.A, work and his intimate moments with some of the co-stars of Rise Above were for me the highlights. One afternoon after they finished recording Thirsty & Miserable. Lemmy invites him over to his apartment and it's something else. The godly frontman of Motorhead is obsessed with history and tyrants and his pad is a museum to totalitarian art. Especially Nazi art and memorabilia. Another intense moment is when Henry reads the letters of a girl who was supposed to cross the country to try and meet him in Los Angeles. The girl died three days before her flight, in a car crash. It's sad, but also very beautiful. Somewhat of an echo of Invisible Woman Blues he wrote twelve years before.
I'll say it again, I think Rollins is a very underrated writer. Part of the problem comes from that he's not very confident in his talent himself. His literary (self) publications come from an effort of self-branding mainly and the limited attention he gives it kind of hints on the fact that he prefers concentrating on other areas. Like the spoken word shows which is the bulk of his legacy. Nevertheless, his incendiary prose is a feast for my mind. It's straightforward, but it's bulldozing through the pages. Broken Summers is not his most artistically inclined book (you have to go far back to find them. Black Coffee Blues era and such) but his anger dances on the page and makes his text come alive like a few writers can. If you're not into Rollins at all, Broken Summers is an excellent place to start and if you're already a fan (like I am), it's a mandatory landmark to stop by. A great, short and intense read. There's a set of killer photos on top of it.
