Never Mind the Pollacks Page 16
“How I long to lose myself,” she said, “in a sea of possibility.”
“I long for a blow job,” Pollack said.
“How old are you?” she said. “Grow up.”
Pollack looked at his watch, which he’d stolen recently. He studied the minute and second hands very carefully. Maybe the answer to her question was embedded in the watch face somewhere. Then he remembered.
“I’m thirty-four,” he said. “I’m old. Very old.”
“I’m so young,” Patti improvised, twirling and twirling. “I’m so young. I’m so goddamn young. I’m so young. I’m so goddamn young. We created it: Let’s take it over.”
“Shut up,” Pollack said.
Patti flopped next to him. She pounded on her chest, and then his. “You shut up!” she said. “I hate you! I hate you!”
In a far corner of the loft, a hideous she-creature stirred beneath a great mound of black clothing. On either side of her, a Ramone snored. The creature raised herself, her face smeared with horrible multicolored goo. She was wearing the same dress she’d worn all week, had been asleep for two days, and she was hungry. Her blurry eyes saw two shapes entwined across the room. A little focus revealed that the shapes were wrestling, and not happy. She lurched toward them.
Pollack and Patti looked up at her.
“Oh, Nancy,” Patti said. “You’re awake.”
“I’m starving,” Nancy Spungen said.
“Go back to Philadelphia, you whore!” said Patti.
Patti resumed hitting Pollack.
“I hate you!” she said. “I hate you!”
Pollack’s erect penis protruded from his pants. Nancy leapt upon it like a jungle beast. She began sucking. Patti tugged at Nancy’s hair.
“Get off him, bitch!” she screamed.
Pollack moaned with pleasure. He slipped a finger into his ass, and then inserted his whole hand, as he was wont to do. Patti beat at him and Nancy simultaneously. In a distant corner of the loft, Arturo Vega was painting a Day-Glo swastika on the wall. Joey Ramone grabbed the spray can from him.
“Cut out that Nazi shit, you fascist!” he said.
Vega hit him in the head with the can. Two other Ramones were swinging guitars at each other for no reason. Iggy Pop burst out of the bathroom. He broke a window and started cutting himself with the glass. Two people who no one had ever seen before fucked under a blanket in the middle of the room. Nancy Spungen sucked harder and harder. Pollack felt himself soaring toward the brink of something.
Johnny Thunders burst through the door.
“Hey, everyone!” he said. “Guess what? I’ve got heroin!”
The fighting stopped. So did the sucking. Patti’s arms dropped to her side.
They all began licking their lips.
Two hours later, everyone lay on the floor of the loft, looking at the ceiling, except for Pollack. He sat on his mattress, staring coldly at the wall.
“Ohh,” he said. “I think I have an infection.”
No one paid him any mind. The world was for the young now. He was getting old.
On July 16, 1975, the Neal Pollack Invasion played its only show ever. Pollack had formed the band from castoffs from other bands that had never played live. It was the most authentic collection of working-class musicians ever assembled. His bassist worked as a security guard at the Fresh Kills landfill. His lead guitarist was a gravedigger, and his drummer a copy editor at Harper’s. They had no money, no identity, no talent, and no hope.
They got a gig at the Coventry, a club in Queens, opening for the Dictators, who Pollack described as “the greatest rock ’n’ roll band of all time,” a superlative he only handed out every two or three years.
At first, the Dictators had been reluctant to book the show.
“No,” said Andy Shernoff.
“Please please please please please?” Pollack said. “I’ll write about you….”
Unfortunately for Pollack, on that same night, Blondie, the Ramones, and the Talking Heads played a show in Manhattan for the opening of CBGB’s first summer music festival. In Queens, Pollack looked into his audience. There were seventeen people, all of them wearing cotton headbands. They’d obviously been lured in by the “Free Headbands” promotion.
“Let’s make some rock ’n’ roll!” Pollack said backstage. “Let’s give ’em a night they won’t forget!”
Handsome Dick Manitoba drank beer from a can.
“Let’s get this over with so we can go home and watch TV,” he said.
The Neal Pollack Invasion took the stage. The crowd booed, except for one girl, maybe fifteen, who moved her head to a music that hadn’t even started yet. Pollack knew then that he’d reached her, and that he’d done the right thing. Out there, he knew, were dozens like her, maybe hundreds, sad smart kids who needed him to express their unheard hopeless voices.
America was a desperate place, plagued by rising unemployment, decaying, bankrupt cities, and rapacious, impersonal corporate greed. The land careened toward imminent ecological catastrophe. Government was in the hands of buffoonish, plutocratic dinosaurs obsessed with power and self-preservation. Popular culture had become loud, clownish, distracting, hideous in its lack of meaning. People were afraid, and they expressed their anxieties through blind, stupid, meaningless patriotism. Unknown enemies seemed to lurk around every corner, waiting to wrench away the comforts of empire with unholy apocalyptic fire. There was fatality in the air, decay, oblivion, disintegration, and a secret longing to die.
It was nothing like today.
Pollack climbed atop a speaker. He said:
“Here’s our generational anthem!”
The band kicked in an incoherent grind, and Pollack moaned, shrieked, gurgled this:
New York City is a pile of shit!
New York City is a pile of shit!
New York City is a pile of shit!
Ahhhhhhhhhhh!
New York City!
Andy Warhol is a pile of shit!
Andy Warhol is a pile of shit!
Andy Warhol is a pile of shit!
Ahhhhhhhhhhh!
Andy Warhol!
CBGB’s is a pile of shit!
CBGB’s is a pile of shit!
CBGB’s is a pile of shit!
Ahhhhhhhhhh!
CBGB’s!
Fidel Castro is a pile of shit!
Richard Nixon is a pile of shit!
Jalapeno bagels are a pile of shit!
Barbara Walters is a pile of shit!
The whole damn world is a pile of shit!
Fuck you, David Bowie
You’re a goddamn
Suck-up whore
Pile of shit!
Pile of shit is a pile of shit!
Pile of shit is a pile of shit!
Pile of shit is a pile of shit!
Ahhhhhhhhhh!
PILE! OF! SHIT!
Pile pile pile pile
Pile of shit!
Pile pile pile pile
Pile of shit!
Pile
Pile
Pile
Pile
Pile pile pile pile
Pile of shit!
Pollack stood center stage, arms extended, drenched in sweat and blood. The crowd silently moved toward him, emitting a low, sinister hiss. Their eyes were crazed and evil. The band dropped their instruments and ran like hell. The girl Pollack thought he’d touched opened her mouth wide, extended her right arm. She pointed toward Pollack.
“KILL!” she said.
They charged toward him, ready to tear him apart. He looked around. They were closing in on all sides. He dove, smacking a boot into some kid’s midsection. Arms flailing, he descended into the swarm. Then the cops came, batons flaring, and the crowd’s rage turned on them. Twenty people kicking the snot out of the cops, Pollack thought. Now that’s rock ’n’ roll.
Pollack squirted from the crowd and headed for the exit.
“My work here is done,” he said.
As they
ran down the street in terror, the box office manager handed Neal his night’s take, ten dollars, and a telegram that had come to the theater during the show.
Pollack read it:
NEAL. NEW YORK IS DEAD. YOU’RE NEEDED IN
LONDON. COME IMMEDIATELY, AT YOUR OWN
EXPENSE. MALCOLM.
Pollack rubbed his chin thoughtfully. He pulled his cats Max and Kansas City out of his duffel bag, where they’d been suffocating. They panted feebly and scratched at him.
“Well, kitties,” he said. “London again! Won’t this be a delightful adventure?”
Neal Pollack sat atop a box, which was atop another box, which was atop another. The boxes were all painted black with the letters S-E-X in white going down their fronts. They were supposed to have spelled SEX, naturally, but someone had arranged them wrong, so they actually spelled out XSE. Still, for London, late 1975, that was pretty radical.
Pollack wore a black rubber vest, no shirt underneath. His eyes were ringed with black eyeliner, and he had a red clown nose on. At either side of him sat his cats, also wearing rubber. Their fetish suits were lined with fish oil to keep them from complaining.
Inside the shop at 430 King’s Road, Malcolm McLaren tapped a table loudly. In front of Pollack, in a circle, sat a dozen or so young men, middle-class or working-class, angry, desperate, malleable, and ready to party. They were all named John. Pollack looked down at them. I’ll be running this country within a month, he thought.
“Now, kids,” McLaren said. “We have a guest speaker today. He’s a great rock critic from the United States of America.”
“Ohhhhh!” said the boys.
“He knows David Bowie,” McLaren said.
“Ohhhhhhh!”
“And he has many important things to say to you about fashion and politics. Please welcome Neal Pollack.”
Pollack rubbed his chin thoughtfully.
“The Queen is a cunt,” he said.
The Johns gasped.
“And the world is lit by fascism. Your government is trying to destroy you. If you still have parents, they don’t understand you, and they’d rather see you dead. We are puppets, pawns, automatons, shivering fearfully in the shadow of the machine. The ground is poisoned, and the air is foul. The British empire has been revealed for the farce it always was, and we’ve been thrown the feeble scraps.”
Now the boys were sobbing.
“But there is an answer,” Pollack said.
“Hooray!” said the boys.
“It’s called rock ’n’ roll.”
“Ohhhhhh.”
“If the world becomes fucked up, only a raw protean yawp from youthful bowels can save it.”
One of the Johns raised his hand. He was wearing a white Pink Floyd T-shirt. Above the logo, he’d written “I HATE.”
“What are you talking about?” he said.
“You have to start a band,” said Pollack.
“Anger is an energy,” said John.
“Yes, yes,” Pollack said.
“I am an outcast and unwanted.”
“I know, I know.”
“Because my friends and I are all extremely ugly, our only recourse…”
The Johns began to buzz. Their innocent faces had taken on revolting sneers. Before Pollack’s eyes, they were transforming. They rose and began to pace the store restlessly. Malcolm McLaren rubbed his hands. His eyes took on the glint of an entrepreneur. Excellent, he thought to himself. They’re furious and they don’t know why. My master plan is working.
“Who wants benzedrine?” Pollack said.
A few months later, Pollack, by now an established columnist for New Music Express, was at the 100 Club, nodding off in the back with Chrissie Hynde. McLaren walked by him.
“Hey, Malcolm,” Pollack said.
McLaren ignored Pollack and moved away. A male ghost with bristly hair walked behind him. He kicked Pollack in the shins. The club was crowded, so Pollack figured it was an accident. The guy came back. He kicked Pollack again.
“Who’s that guy?” Pollack said. “And why does he keep kicking me?”
“That’s Sid,” said Hynde.
Pollack popped two bennies.
“Screw him,” he said.
Sid was following Lydon around like a shadow. Lydon came up to Pollack and pushed him in the chest. Pollack pushed back. Lydon pushed back in return.
“What’s all this shit you’ve been saying about us in the papers, then?” Lydon said. “You’re trying to get us banned, aren’t you?”
“It’s good to get banned,” said Pollack.
“Balls! I didn’t go to art school just to get banned!”
Pollack put a finger to Lydon’s lips.
“Shhh,” he said. “This is part of a plan.”
Johnny Rotten bit down on Pollack’s finger, hard. Pollack felt a little crunch of bone, and a snapped tendon. He dropped to his knees. Rotten and Sid squirted away, leaving behind a legacy of sneering, angry, macho violence.
That night the Sex Pistols performed a new song:
Never mind the Pollacks
Never mind them all
Kick them in the bollocks
Punch them in the balls
Pollack is a tosser
And so’s his sainted mum
London Bridge is falling down
So kick him in the bum
Neal Pollack!
Neal Pollack!
Neal Pollack’s dead!
We haven’t got a future
We haven’t got a past
We haven’t got a byline
Kick Pollack in the ass!
Neal Pollack!
Neal Pollack!
Neal Pollack’s dead!
Pollack heard from the back. He ripped toward the stage. Someone had written a song about him! Someone cared! He needed this! Sid stood directly in front of him. Pollack tapped him on the back.
“Excuse me,” Pollack said. “Could you move over?”
Johnny Rotten lobbed a gob from the stage. Sid ducked. It hit Pollack in the monobrow and dribbled down his nose.
Sid uncrouched. He faced Pollack, his breath like hell-air. He had a bike chain in one hand, a knife in the other.
“I don’t like your trousers,” he said.
Sid cracked Pollack on the left temple. Pollack felt a hot flash on his right cheek; he swung out blindly, but Sid was gone. Blood poured everywhere. Guitars screamed into the night. Johnny Rotten screamed back:
Never mind the Pollack
He don’t really exist
A worthless alcoholic
He’s gonna slit his wrists
Neal Pollack is a junkie
He’s shacked up with the Queen
He mounts her like a monkey
He pissed in her canteen
Neal Pollack!
Neal Pollack!
Neal Pollack’s dead!
Pollack fell, awash in his own blood. He got up and dove in a bum’s rush for the stage, connecting with Johnny Rotten’s midsection. Someone tossed a burning cigarette onstage. Pollack stubbed it out on Rotten’s hand. Sid Vicious charged him, brandishing a crowbar. Pollack caught him with a leg sweep. Vicious sprawled, hitting himself in the face with the bar. He stood up, looked at the cheering crowd, and hit himself again. Fights were breaking out all over the room. The music couldn’t drown out the shouts of pain and fear. The police charged in, brandishing night-sticks. They started busting heads. Rotten looked at Pollack with nothing less than awe. This was the true essence of rock.
James Osterberg sat in his kitchen and gazed upon the ghost city of Berlin. Magnificent, decadent Berlin! Fading home of Weimar dreams! And, at last, a room of Iggy’s own. A tinpot stove, a bowl of cereal, a wooden table, stuffed parrot hanging above on a wooden swing, postwar wallpaper, prewar tile, a Kraftwerk album on the hi-fi, and a couple of chairs. These things made him happy, along with good-looking drag queens, which Berlin didn’t lack. Iggy Pop was breathing true freedom for the first time. Gone was t
he jail time in L.A., the 5 A.M. wanderings down Sunset Boulevard. Vanished were the ritual concert humiliations of a thousand tossed fruits and vegetables, the angry confrontations, the meaningless groupie sex. His mind was clear; a ten-minute walk in Berlin was as cleansing to him as any sauna. He was at home here. Nothing could tamper with his serenity anymore.
The doorbell rang. Iggy put down his copy of Christopher Isherwood’s Berlin Stories.
“Yes?” he said.
“Iggy,” said an unmistakable voice. “It’s me.”
“Shit,” Iggy said.
“Iggy! Iggy darling…I’m writing about you for Slash! Please let me in.”
“Go away, Pollack,” Iggy said.
“Oh, come on, Iggy. Please?”
“Leave me alone.”
“Iggy…I’ve got cocaine….”
No. He couldn’t let Pollack into his life. Not now. It would annihilate everything that he and Bowie had built there in Berlin, wipe out all shreds of joy, take him down that evil river of pestilence that he’d tried so hard to abandon. Not this time. No more tragic ballads. But he heard it anyway, in his mind’s ear.
From behind the door: “Iggy? Iggy. Let me in, Iggy.”
Iggy clutched his temples. “No!” he said. “Please, no!”
“Iggy…”
From deep within, Iggy felt a roar in his stomach. It wafted into his chest and blew up his windpipe, launched into his throat and emerged from his mouth full-throttle. He grabbed a cheap glass vase from a side table, threw open the door, and swung, hitting David Bowie smack in the jaw.
Bowie dropped to the ground.
“What’d you do that for?” he said.
Pollack stood next to prone Bowie.
“Hi, Iggy,” he said.
Then they were unleashed onto Berlin, Pollack and Iggy and Bowie. They pranced through deserted streets to the robotic drone of the Trans-European Music Express. They found themselves in a whorehouse cabaret called Long Tall Sally Bowles, lying faceup on an ermine rug while a six-foot drag queen, better looking than Jerry Hall, took turns grinding their nipples with her spiked heels.
“You are beautiful,” she said to Iggy.