Plus, receive recommendations and exclusive offers on all of your favorite books and authors from Simon & Schuster.
Resident Punk
How I Smoked, Drank, and Stumbled My Way Through the '70s Punk Scene (and Beyond)
Table of Contents
About The Book
Part memoir and part cultural history, Resident Punk offers a no-holds-barred expose chronicling the iconic and unforgettable music scene that would become defined by bands like the Ramones, Blondie, Television, the Heartbreakers, and Talking Heads.
In 1975 at just 19 years old, Legs McNeil—alongside John Holmstrom and Ged Dunn—cofounded PUNK magazine. In doing so, they inadvertently chronicled the start of a movement. McNeil’s role in the whole thing? To be their resident punk, embodying the zeitgeist the magazine was looking to capture, often by getting f*cked up with musicians, artists, writers, and hangers-on . . . and sleeping with a different girl every day of the week.
Now, just in time for the 50th anniversary of PUNK magazine, Legs tells the stories behind the stories in a sleazy, star-studded adventure. The coauthor of Please Kill Me, Legs invites readers along for the ride as he tussles with musicians and artists, groupies and writers, Golden Age Hollywood film stars and legendary figures of ‘70s New York. Featuring untold stories about Joey Ramone, William S. Burroughs, Patti Smith, Alan Vega, Martin Rev, the Dictators, the Dead Boys, Elvis Costello, Nick Lowe, and Poly Styrene, this book is an immersive look at the punk music scene as only a true insider can tell it.
What’s more, Legs shares the raw meat of his life, starting with his gritty suburban childhood, and the teenage wasteland years that put him on a path to punk. Join him as he steals David Bowie’s hubcaps, wrestles with Norman Mailer, and lives life on the edge, and wrestles his own demons—eventually setting in a small Pennsylvania town, where he’s very much still the Resident Punk.
Product Details
- Publisher: BenBella Books (September 15, 2026)
- Length: 304 pages
- ISBN13: 9781637749470
Browse Related Books
Raves and Reviews
“Legs McNeil revisits his hard-knock adolescence and run-ins with Lou Reed, the Ramones, and Talking Heads with a finely honed sense of mischief. Essential reading for anyone who came along too late for CBGB—or arrived on time but can’t quite recall what happened.”
—Graydon Carter, former editor of Vanity Fair and cofounder of Air Mail and Spy
“Having read this propulsive, gasp-inducing mosh pit of memories, I’m not 100% sure that 100% of Legs lived to tell this tale. But what’s left of him has written a knockout book.”
—Patton Oswalt, actor and comedian
“Legs is a true original and he was THERE, baby. Personally, I can never get enough of this . . .”
—John Taylor, musician and author of In the Pleasure Groove: Love, Death, and Duran Duran
“Legs McNeil has made a profession out of inviting mockery. Few have been able to resist accepting, but among his admirers have been Sinead O’Connor, Norman Mailer, and a sexually disadvantaged elderly rich woman in the vicinity of Cheshire, Connecticut. I did love finding out about his childhood. Eddie Haskell (look him up) was a kindred soul. Obsequious ineptitude, with a suburban-swamp dash of surly, as survival tactic and comedy engine. The Legs is still standing. You have to salute him. Viva Legs!”
—Richard Hell, rock star and poet
“Legs tells a story I remember well;
through a haze of heroin and coke-soaked lenses told in utterances that stink of puke and stale beer,
when Times Square was a real red-light district temple to vice and depravity and the Bowery had real ‘dive-bars.’
The music was as raw, violent, and dangerous as the streets.
Literature came out of pulp paperbacks.
Politics came out of Screw Magazine.
And art came out of underground comix and fanzines.
It was a time when we were all innocent before our fall from paradise.”
—Joe Coleman, artist
“Legs McNeil has always been the coolest guy in the room. He’s also a brilliant writer. Resident Punk is a heartfelt, hilarious, hell-bent journey through a downtown NYC that’s been lost forever. A fantastic memoir.”
—Elizabeth Hand, award-winning author of A Haunting on the Hill
“The sordid story of a dissolute youth.”
—Roberta Bayley, photographer who shot the Ramones’ first album
“I have known Legs for half a century. Always thought he was a keeper. This funny, wise, autumnal yet still dukes-up autobiography proves it. Punk roots here!"
—Mark Jacobson, author of The Lampshade: A Holocaust Detective Story from Buchenwald to New Orleans
“I’ve been way too busy making a living, but I finally finished Legs McNeil's stupid book. Now I know way more about him than I would ever care to, so thanks for that! Despite the trauma, I really enjoyed it. I still can’t believe Legs can form whole sentences, never mind put enough of them together to make a paragraph."
—Elaine Aaronson, comedy writer for The Larry Sanders Show
Resources and Downloads
High Resolution Images
-
Book Cover Image (jpg): Resident Punk
eBook 9781637749470
