She said: Only if you do the Decline box set first. She hung around the LA music scene, she was very familiar with the clubs and the people, and so she knew there was an audience, a huge appetite, out there for those films. The movie is about the Los Angeles punk rock scene and was d. With punk all the girls had looked like boys, but with metal the boys all looked like girls. Spheeris got her start with filmmaking with her company, Rock N' Reel, that specialized in music videos. 5. His websiteMusicdayz (opens in new tab)is the worlds largest archive of fully searchable chronologically-organised rock music facts, often enhanced by features about those facts. Future Publishing Limited Quay House, The Ambury, he was a pretty cool dude hes doing the same exact shit he was doing back in the day but has a job. Inside 10 Iconic 'Decline of Western Civilization' Scenes. She was lookin for bands that were staples on the LA music scene, and Odin certainly was that. We track down the stars of classic car crash metal documentary The Decline Of Western Civilization Pt 2: The Metal Years. Share this: Best of Chicago voting is live now. Check them out. I knew it was going to be just soul-searching psychologically freaking out., Fox ultimately convinced her mom to do the soul-searching work by giving her an ultimatum. Read the New York Times review of this book here. That was our first show together. I asked Anna to come work for me because I needed help with some other things with our life here and she said, I will come to work for you but only if the first thing we do is put the Decline DVDs out,' Spheeris recalled. The couple spoon and squid they had got into an argument because dude was cutting another girls hair she got jealous and stabbed squid with the scissors. At the end of 1995 the band came to an end. Bath And every one of them may accelerate and intensify the coming collapse while increasing the difficulty of recovery. IndieWire is a part of Penske Media Corporation. After years of what she describes as paralyzing anxiety surrounding the films she considers her lifes most important work, Spheeris finally did something about that queasy feeling in her gut. Shellenberge agreed. Depending on how drunk you were when you watched it for the first time, The Decline Of Western Civilization Part II: The Metal Years is either an uproarious celebration of the 80s Sunset Strip scene in all its hedonistic glory or a fist-gnawingly embarrassing parade of idiots, bozos and no-hopers who didnt have the brains to tie their own shoelaces in the morning. Guitarist Lizzie Grey (born Stephen Perry) was the bands linchpin, while Nadir DPriest, aka Nadir Munoz, was their frontman during the Decline period. And then she was similarly inspired for 1998's The Decline of Western Civilization III when she saw packs of kids walking down sidewalks in L.A. "I looked at them and said, 'Jeez, that looks like a whole other punk movement going on,' so I stopped them and said, 'What's up with you? As far as how we were and what we did, how we lived, it was pretty accurate party all the time. ", At a certain point, Spheeris started seeing "these guys with the torn-up jeans, bandanas and long hair with hairspray"; she and her friends would laugh at them, watching punks and metalheads brawl in parking lots. Death of the Soul: From Descartes to the Computer, by William Barrett. Essaying the pop culture that matters since 1999. The promoter said we didnt have to play, so we just hung out and played basketball. Fri., 7:30 p.m. $10. That one cost five-hundred thousand. If I was still drinkin Id be dead now. But I like that it's done. 1912: The Republic of China - Fueled by western-educated revolutionary Sun Yat-Sen, the Xinhai . Its not the moneyfuck the money. The Decline of Western Civilization Parts I + III plus Penelope Spheeris in Person! "I was always going out the clubs and seeing the punk bands," she says of how the first 1981 doc came about. Muslims were introduced to modern Western philosophy during the time of Western colonization, when they were not emotionally or mentally ready to absorb it and were generally skeptical of anything Western. Mostly, it means that after all those years, shes finally overcome her pastand restored it to cinematic perfection. Youre stealing my soul. And I'm like ah fuck, 'I can't do it man.'" While its predecessors focused on punk music and musicians, this latest episode concentrates on the audiences -- kids who weren't born when the original film was released. Every day the staff of Intellectual Takeout come to work eager to do their part to restore and improve our great nation. Here are three that help explain what is happening with our culture. Now, when I see people in young bands I tell them not to trust each other. Spheeris: "Some people are put off by that, they don't get the joke, they don't get that it was totally tongue in cheek. It was accurate. Stay on top of the latest breaking film and TV news! 2. Blooms tour de force recently celebrated its 25th anniversary. 90-95% of kids from churches have been indoctrinated by the secular education system to doubt and not believe the Word of God beginning in Genesisbut to believe the pagan religion of evolution as fact. Heres how it works. Decline Of Civilization Quotes. My first reaction was, oh my God, I cant handle it. It is a lament on the impoverished state of modern thought and discourse that has disconnected itself from the Western tradition that sustained it until a generation or two ago. So I quit my job and bought a one-way ticket for a hundred and nine dollars from Chicago to LA-X. Nadir DPriest: In the mid-eighties a lot of other bands saw us as a threat because we had such great ideas. In 1981, the LAPD Chief of Police Daryl Gates wrote a letter demanding the film not be shown again in the city. The promotional poster for The Decline (and the record cover of the soundtrack album) featured a close-up frame of Germs singer Darby Crash supine on stage with his eyes closed. Spheeris resolved to ignore it. The arrival of "The Decline of Western Civilization Collection" as a pristine extras-filled box set from Shout Factory this week is to budding punks what a new "Star Wars" movie is to . Doug Casey: Western Civilization has its origins in ancient Greece. And because it was not my band, I really enjoyed being able to kick back a bit and be more carefree. An editor at Partisan Review in the 1930s and later a literary critic for the Atlantic Monthly, the New York University law professor wrote some of the best popular books on philosophy and literatureIrrational Man, TheIllusion of Technique,and Time of Need. I'd ask my daughter to come to work with me and she goes, 'OK, but the first thing we have to do is the Decline DVDs.' "Let me just say I think it's gonna be kind of jaw-dropping.". If we told you wed have to kill you, Spheeris joked. 1999-2021 PopMatters Media, Inc. All rights reserved. Troll was on an episode of Dog Eat Dog fairly recently, and Squid was stabbed to death by Spoon (IIRC) shortly after filming wrapped up. But Ozzys one of the funniest people alive. You know that feeling you get in your stomach thats like this fluttery kind of fear? she told Indiewire recently, describing the sensation that would wash over her when shed stumble across a bootleg copy of The Decline of Western Civilization, including the 1988 and 1998 sequels of the same name. In Part III, the answer is almost universally, Dead. If they can remember me at all then it would be for the Decline, she said. We already had this thread, lemme see if I can find it and give it to you. In 1918, Oswald Spengler published . The collection, which has been restored using 2K technology and includes commentary from Dave Grohl, extended interviews and more, marks the first time the films have been made available officially on DVD. Its not the taste that turns me off, its what it does to you. Bands included are Black Flag, Germs, X, Alice Bag Band, the Circle Jerks, Catholic Discipline, and Fear. Seven years later Spheers released The Decline of Western Civilization II: The Metal Years. Barrett was one of the great writers of . Here she finds the struggle of street kids and young adults in West Hollywood trying to make it day by day, fighting. And we faked the spilling of the orange juice. The new generation of "gutter punks" -- stumbling through a haze of gut-rock alcohol -- have no interest in street poetry, and they don't want to change the world. Decline properly introduces itself with the distorted bars of X's "Nausea" as the title card cuts to a roiling pit churned by the trunks and limbs of thrashing teenage bodies. So I came up with this idea for a website called Metal Sludge, where we would make fun of the eighties, a very affectionate piss-take. Western civilisation is a similarly slippery concept. You want hard core? By the time The Decline Of Western Civilization II: The Metal Years came out in mid-1988, the L.A. glam scene was under siege by grittier hard rock bands on the right and the thrash metal uprising . "It's been a year of pure hell," filmmaker Penelope Spheeris says with a laugh. After another 10 years Spheeris wrapped up her Decline trilogy and this time Spheeris shifted her attention again. Still, even without that, this is well worth your time and attention. After a few weeks the club was packed. 3 Imperial incompetence and chance could be added to the list. But between their notorious on-screen appearance in a hot tub and the films release, the band had broken up, with guitarist Jeff Duncan going on to join LA metal linchpins Armored Saint, of which hes still a member. The Decline of Western Civilization comes across as much more authentic than many documentaries with similar aims. I believe I was smokin hash with Dave Mustaine. Aside from a love of music and a desire to make a lot of money and bang as many groupies as possible, theres not much substance to the people of The Metal Years. Spheeris talks to homeless teenagers living on the street or squatting in abandoned buildings in Los Angeles, an unstable mother, Los Angeles Police Department officer Gary Fredo, and a paralyzed youth living on disability benefits. https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=cvEa_IFt9yg. You get two million and well handle everything else. But The Stones go: no, we want this long-haired guy and his team to handle our shit. The Decline of Western Civilization: Directed by Penelope Spheeris. Mike Myers is incredibly talented but he was also unbelievably difficult to work with. All three are now available in on Blu-ray in a fantastic new package from Shout! At least temporarily, they can find happiness in a few beers, the noise of a punk rock show, and a collection of people gathered at the one apartment they have between them. A punk named Stevie dies in a fire at a building where he's squatting; another, Squid, is killed, allegedly by his girlfriend, Spoon. I'm gonna make The Decline Part Three,' she recalls. But never say never.. Factory has a reputation for putting out comprehensive and well thought out packages, and this Decline of Western Civilization box set is no exception. Attempts were made to get me to include more of the mainstream, successful bands, but that wasnt really what interested me. Nikki Sixxs email address was in there. The third film, The Decline of Western Civilization III (1998), chronicles the gutter punk lifestyle of homeless teenagers in the late 1990s. Penelope was out on the Strip with her camera crew, and she walked up to us and started interviewing us and then got our contact information. That went on into the nineties, when suddenly along came the guys from Seattle. Penelope Spheeris' biggest commercial hit, Wayne's World (1992), gave the world some of the greatest slang and style choices ever committed to celluloid.But long before directing the cult comedy, she pioneered the art of the music documentary with her groundbreaking trilogy The Decline of Western Civilization.. Sign up for our Email Newsletters here. In the original "Decline," the talented denizens of L.A.'s punk rock scene -- Black Flag, X, the Germs, the Circle Jerks -- were budding activists and politicized poets too full of spit and fervor to lapse into despair (the exception was the Germs' front man, Darby Crash, whose suicide shortly after the first film wrapped was an anomaly). "But it's like, 'That's it, I'm never gonna be doing another box set in my whole life so I've got to get it right.'". But Greer's assumption is built on shaky ground because industrial civilization differs from all past civilizations in four crucial ways. Dead now thats like this fluttery kind of jaw-dropping. `` I 'm na... Metal documentary the Decline box set first the orange juice it would for! On into the nineties, when suddenly along came the guys from Seattle give... On into the nineties, when suddenly along came the guys from.... Of classic car crash Metal documentary the Decline of Western Civilization Pt 2: Republic... 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