I love oral histories and I thought that would carry me through, but I think more familiarity with the bands and band members is important.

Really innovative and really interesting...entertaining...I like it ( )

I loved this. At times it was hilarious, others it was disgusting and at the very end, increasingly tragic. It put me through a whirlwind of emotions and it was written and compiled engagingly. I loved it. ( )

I read this book years after my teenaged experience with punk music in the late 70's - early 80's. It was fun to relive those years and learn all about the stories behind the music.

Can anyone who is not part of the Blank Generation really get this book? As the little brothers and sisters of the Baby Boomers, we were musically abused by them.....they tried to brainwash us into believing that their music was the "be-all, end-all, best ever, forever, amen" and punk was just the thing to throw in their faces. If it hadn't been for punk I might have believed them and these days I would be one of those sad, middle aged people still buying tickets for Journey and Styx concerts. To this day I cannot listen to the Beatles.....the Baby Boomers totally ruined it for me. (also, can't stand Grateful Dead either....oh my god, yuck!!!!!)

People might criticize their nihilism, but years later, I can see how the Clash and the Sex Pistols were right about everything. As for their hedonism and low survival rate, I say, good for them, rock stars should burn out and not fade away.....at least we have far, far fewer decrepit old wrecks still trying to imitate youth by getting up on stage and playing songs nobody really wants to hear anymore.

Anyone under 40 should not read this book or listen to classic punk....you have your own music, listen to it. ( )

devastated that I’ve finished, I never wanted it to end !!! ( )

Entertaining and informative.
Definitely gives you the feeling of being there. ( )

Totally engrossing, disgusting, harrowing, you name it. Also great pictures. This oral history of punk is mostly focused on the scene in New York City, but also works in the Sex Pistols. Depending on who is doing the recollecting, you may get various views. The surprising thing is that anyone can remember anything, given how many drugs they took. This is the only book where I have ever gone through the cast of characters at the end to mark off the additional ones who have died since the book was published in 1997. But of course, Iggy is still alive--which would seem to defy the odds. But perhaps it stems from the fact that as crazy as he was, he seemed to be enjoying himself and not having a death wish. Of course, by 2019, some of the folks have lived a normal lifespan. In any case, enough with the death obsession. This book provides fascinating stories about some of my favorite performers such as Patti Smith and Tom Verlaine, and it introduced me to some other performers I knew nothing or very little about. The book traces punk back to The Velvet Underground, the MC5, and the Stooges. I can't argue with that. Some sort of sequel is really warranted. ( )

Lots of sex, some drugs, not much rock 'n' roll. (If you read the ecstatic blurbs for the hardcover edition and encountered Jim Marshall's contention that this is the "best rock & roll book ever, and not a word about music", you probably got the same sinking feeling that I did even before you arrived at page one of the actual text.) Here and there you'll find a worthwhile fragment of information about the music itself, such as Dee Dee Ramone's recollection of writing "Chinese Rocks", but they're few and far between. Essentially, Please Kill Me is 446 pages of dreary scenester memories: the first time Iggy Pop got the clap, the cute shapes that the Dead Boys shaved into the pubic hair of a groupie, blah blah blah ad nauseam. Yeah, I get it--my friends were a bunch of drunk, horny pus bags too--and it's just not that interesting. Few of the participants are as forthcoming about their lack of depth as Malcolm McLaren: "(The prospect of managing the Stooges) didn't sound trendy-nice, there was no lipstick there. It didn't have that fashion element that the New York Dolls had, that fashion twist...It's kind of pathetic when I think about it now, all that tartiness, but that's what I liked. I always thought the parties were gonna be better, I always thought the scene was gonna be better. The Dolls just looked more attractive."

Hats off to the late Mr. McLaren for his honesty.

If you wanted to argue that the concept of subcultures is total nonsense--that there's no such thing as alternative values and that no matter where you go or what you do, the people you meet will be the same cruel, selfish, shortsighted assholes you knew in high school--then you could make one hell of a case with this book. Personally, I recommend that you bypass the disappointment and head straight for a volume of Arthur Schopenhauer's essays and aphorisms. One and a half stars. ( )

Amazing, fun read! ( )

This is one of the most inventive and surprising non-fiction books that I have read. I was really intrigued and loved the concept. It was a really informative and entertaining way of telling the story that relies so much on character and voice. I would definitely recommend this book. ( )

Sex, drugs and rock and roll. A very interesting read of the beginning of an era told through interviews with people that were there. So many behind the scenes stories and tales of debauchery. More a history of the new wave/punk than the hardcore/punk, but still an engaging read. ( )

While every teen has Punk is not Dead written in their notebooks, this book sports a cry from Punk itself begging to be killed. What could be more clever or Punk?
This book traces the punk (as scene, music style or movement) back to the 60's cultural explosion that allowed the creation of bands like Velvet Underground, which is rightfully acknowledged as square one for the whole thing.
The book is assembled as a documentary, entertwining interviews separated by subject, which I think that must be exaustive to execute, but makes an extraordinary result.
On the other hand, any teenage illusion about punk is destroyed, showing a scene with loads of drugs, no idealogy and lots of sex (from the USA side).
Great reading! ( )

Great oral history with cheeky editing that creates the appearance of an ongoing discussion about the development of the east coast punk scene, or what [author: Legs McNeill] has always insisted is THE punk scene.
I have read this a few times: never gets old. Read Please Kill Me with [book: We Got The Neutron Bomb], which handles the west coast punk scene in a similar manner. ( )

Goodreads defines the five-star rating as "It was amazing." I've given books five-star ratings before, then asked myself, "Was it amazing?", and then had to admit to myself that the answer was "no" and changed my rating accordingly. In the case of Please Kill Me I don't even have to think about it. It was amazing. I've read it three times and I'm sure before long I'll probably make it four. Greatest rock 'n' roll book ever and one of the greatest oral histories ever. ( )

One can't deny that this compilation of rambling interviews delivers what its title promises, especially if one is jaded enough to predict that "uncensored" goes hand in hand with "unresearched," "unedited," "unreliable" and "irrelevant." (I won't elaborate on the portion of the title that occurs before the colon; it is far too easy a target.) What this book denies the reader is anything close to a gritty, insightful, inside history of punk. It doesn't even seem to keep up its end of the bargain of being a "history" of anything, being more of a cross between a somnolent compilation of recently unclassified Pentagon documents and the "look who I (still) have the phone numbers of" attitude of a glossy New York noveau riche society rag than an A to Z of punk rock, or even an enlightening volume focusing on an unlikely slice of its supposed subject matter. Even if a reader has more patience than I with its relentless format of dull, watery dialogue, it's the speakers of the dialogue and the subjects they're pressed to speak about that are the crashingest bore anything associated with rock and roll could possibly be. I imagine a lot of druggy phone conversations being recorded, transcribed, and printed verbatim. The book leans heavily on the American side of things, almost ignoring the existence of the Clash, making a predictable choice in forgetting that the Sex Pistols made records and opting to make a beeline for their most thoroughly unmusical member (although the few pages containing Sid-related gossip are still more interesting than, for instance, Nico-related gossip, and there is a rather amusing anecdote about Johnny Rotten insisting on visiting an erotic leather shop in San Francisco). Most interview space is taken up by the New York school of "proto-punk" drudges telling tales on Johnny Thunders and John Cale and, for some completely incomprehensible reason, the Pretenders: top billing, maybe, but not what I bought the ticket for. ( )

I love this book & have read & re-read it many times since it came home with me from Half-Price Books in the U-District in Seattle. I was out of stuff to read last night & headed to the library today so I pulled this out to tide me over.

First, this is an oral history & I love good oral history. Studs Terkel has always been a huge hero of mine & Legs McNeil is way on up there with this book.

Next, this is a wonderful collection of words & musing about the American punk scene. I particularly love that it starts with the Velvet Underground and proceeds through MC5 & on to Iggy Pop - these are 3 of my favorites.

Then the New York Dolls & Television & The Ramones. Having spent a lot of time with this music & its ethos this book flat does it for me. ( )

An incredible study of some of the most decadent and original music ever written and the people who characterized it. ( )

In Please Kill Me, interviews with over 100 musicians, promoters, artists, and groupies overlap each other to paint a graphic picture of the punk movement in the U.S., from the rise of The Velvet Underground at Andy Warhol’s Factory in the early ‘70s to the fall of Dee Dee Ramone from The Ramones in the late ‘80s. Along the way, inhuman amounts of drugs are ingested, everyone has sex with everyone else, and some amazing music gets created and played—and largely ignored by the general public.

It was hard to find anyone likeable in the pages of Please Kill Me—most of them came off as sexist, racist, self-absorbed, self-destructive asses—and I was often flat-out horrified at what these people did to themselves and each other. If even a tenth of what they said is true (and I think everything related in the book needs to be taken with a grain of salt), it’s not the high number of early deaths that come as any surprise, but that people like Iggy Pop and Richard Hell are still alive.

Please Kill Me is fascinating and disturbing. It’s hard to look away. While I would recommend it to anyone interested in the punk movement and the ‘70s underground scene in New York, be prepared to see your idols shattered. In a warts-and-all portrait, this book is mostly warts. ( )

I couldn't actually finish this book. It was well researched and excellently compiled from primary sources. I also found the topic interesting, the birth of punk rock. I love punk rock. Unfortunately I have trouble readings books when I don't like any of the characters in them, both fiction and non-fiction. And well, most the people were or were portrayed as people you don't really want to relate to. There was little discussion of the music and a great deal of discussion of the drug use and groupies...and really my greatest complaint about punk is that it was just as misogynistic as previous movements. If your interested in the music and the scene you should check this out, but don't expect to come away with your hero's intact (which is probably a good thing) ( )

I started listening to and playing punk pretty early (around 1985, Black Flag, Dead Kennedys, Minor Threat etc...) and it was interesting to watch the scene change over the years, but it wasn't until I read a review of the New York Dolls that I got really interested in everything that was going on before I showed up.

This book pretty much covers it all. Being (originally) from Detroit it was cool to hear that we made our huge contributions to punk music in the form of Iggy and the MC5. To hear about Bowie starting out and the whole Andy Warhol gang was also really cool. This is a no punches pulled book. Massive amounts of drugs, lots of sex and probably the saddest part, nearly half the characters die in the end (and many in the middle).

There’s a quote about all musicians being a$$holes and after reading the book it sounds about right. Not all the time of course but more than mean spirited divas many of them just seem pitiful. I guess continuous ingestion of copious amounts of drugs and alcohol can do that to a person.

If you enjoy VH1's Behind the Band type stuff you'll probably like this. It doesn't focus in on any one band but a couple of the major players take up large sections of the book (Ramones, Sex Pistols, Patty Smith, Velvet Underground etc..) ( )

Read it if…
--You love punk.
--You enjoy nonfiction or history.
--You mourn CBGBs, either having been there or having missed the chance.

http://reviewingwhatever.blogspot.com/2007/02/please-kill-me.html ( )

One of the best books on punk rock origins out there. Most lit in the punk history genre focuses on the birth and death of punk rock with the rise and fall of the Sex Pistols, which is historically inaccurate.

A definitely recommended read for anyone interested in the real origins of punk rock from its detroit conception with Iggy and the Stooges to the 80's pop take-over by the likes of the Talking Headsand Blondie. ( )