Its an honour to review this photo book as back in the day when I visited the USA I was exposed to Marla’s photos be it from bands or in fanzines etc and this inspired me to start taking photos of bands. Probably the only thing I was good at as I couldn’t play an instrument or sing to save my life!
The book centers mainly around the Punk and Hardcore scene in the 80’s and there’s a huge list of them! In no particular order some of those American bands featured include Black Flag, Seven Seconds, X, DOA, Bad Brains, Social Distortion, The Pandoras, The Bangs, Minor Threat, Youth Brigade, Social Distortion, FEAR, Dead Kennedy’s, The Misfits and Suicidal Tendencies.
See! This book is a great hardback book filled with lots of American bands that you all love and many of these photos you wouldn’t have seen and thery capture the moment with style!
If that wasn’t enough there’s a few British bands featured in here such as trhe Angelic Upstarts, The Damned, GBH, the Toy Dolls, The Varukers and the UK Subs. These shots are taken in both the UK and USA. Its strange to remember how young we all were! I’m 56 and seen better days!
Yet there’s more!
There’s a fans section and shots taken in the audience and even the police hassling young punks and harcore kids. Its strange how upset the American police get upset with the punk scene! I ended up on Gang Suppression in 1992. My crime? I laughed at some one throwing a bottle at a Klans man.
I really can’t recommend this book alone! As I said Marla Watson’s photo’s because she showed you didn’t have to be a trained photographer. Many of these photos capture the moment and that’s what makes them real! That’s what I’ve been doing myself for twenty years!
It works!
If you want a book to remember the good times or maybe you’re a youngster wanting to know how the scene was back in the day then I highly recommend you pick this book up!
My Punk Rock Life is fantastic!
Street Voice UK 
Leave a comment