Resident Punk: How I Smoked, Drank, and Stumbled My Way Through the '70s Punk Scene (and Beyond)

A wild ride through a vital chapter in rock ’n’ roll history. — Publishers Weekly

Time-travel to the punk scene of 1970s New York and beyond, as seen through the eyes of its chief reporter known as “the original punk” who gave the movement its name.

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 .