The Decline of Western Civilization

The film's title is possibly a reference to music critic Lester Bangs' 1970 two-part review of the Stooges' album Fun House, for Creem magazine, where Bangs quotes a friend who had said the popularity of the Stooges signaled "the decline of Western civilization". Another possibility is that the title refers to Darby Crash's reading of Oswald Spengler's Der Untergang des Abendlandes (The Decline of the West). In We Got the Neutron Bomb, an oral history of the L.A. punk rock scene collected by Marc Spitz, Claude Bessy, aka Kickboy, claims that he came up with the title. ==Plot==

Featuring concert footage of Los Angeles punk bands and interviews both with band members, the publishers of Slash fanzine, and with the punks who made up their audience, the film offers a look into a subculture that was largely ignored by the rock music press of the time. The promotional poster for The Decline, and the record cover of the soundtrack album, featured a close-up frame of Germs singer Darby Crash lying on stage with his eyes closed. Crash died from a heroin-induced suicide before the film was released. The poster was designed before his death. Bands included are Black Flag, Germs, X, Alice Bag Band, the Circle Jerks, Catholic Discipline, and Fear. The Germs' performance was replicated in the 2007 Darby Crash biopic What We Do Is Secret. ==Performances==

• Alice Bag Band (Alice Bag, Craig Lee, Rob Ritter, Terry Graham) • "Gluttony" • "Prowlers in the Night" • Black Flag (Ron Reyes, Greg Ginn, Chuck Dukowski, Robo) • "Depression" • "Revenge" • "White Minority" • Circle Jerks (Keith Morris, Greg Hetson, Roger Rogerson, Lucky Lehrer) • "Back Against the Wall" • "Beverly Hills" • "I Just Want Some Skank" • "Red Tape" • "Wasted" • Catholic Discipline (Claude Bessy, Phranc, Robert Lopez, Rick Jaffe, Craig Lee) • "Barbee Doll Lust" • "Underground Babylon" • Fear (Lee Ving, Philo Cramer, Derf Scratch, Spit Stix) • "Beef Bologna" • "I Don't Care About You" • "I Love Livin' in the City" • "Let's Have a War" • "Fear Anthem" • Germs (Darby Crash, Pat Smear, Lorna Doom, Don Bolles) • "Manimal" • "Shutdown" • "Richie Dagger's Crime" • X (Exene Cervenka, Billy Zoom, John Doe, D. J. Bonebrake) • "Beyond and Back" • "Johnny Hit and Run Paulene" • "Nausea" • "Unheard Music" • "We're Desperate" • "Sex and Dying in High Society" ==Soundtrack==

In December 1980, the soundtrack was released by Slash Records on LP. In the late 1990s it was released on CD. Germs singer Darby Crash appears on the soundtrack album cover. He died shortly before the film was released. The promotional images for the film and album release were designed before his death. ==See also==