Director Penelope Spheeris was already a veteran of music film when she made Decline I, having been a pioneer of the music video in the early ’70s, and she went on to direct Wayne’s World among many other classics, but the Decline series holds a special place in the hearts of punk and metal fans, for much more than simply the music. And now, for the first time ever, all three films are available as anthology on DVD and Blu-Ray via Shout! Factory. “People have been asking for this for years, ever since I finished the third one, but I never did that before because I think I knew instinctively how much work it was going to be,” Spheeris says. “And it was a huge amount of work. There are a lot of extras on there and a lot of stuff we had to go through. My daughter Anna Fox came to me four years ago and said ‘Mom, you’ve really got to do these things.’ I said ‘Okay you come to work for me and we’ll do all this other stuff and she said ‘No, you’ve gotta do the Decline DVDs.’ So I said ‘fine, you do it!’ So she and I have been at it for four years now.” The process involved sifting through all sorts of media formats, some of which didn’t age too well, given the volatility of tape and film. “We picked up a cassette that disintegrated in our hands,” Spheeris says. “They didn’t all fall apart because we salvaged a lot of it but Anne had to borrow various pieces of equipment. She knows a lot of rock and rollers and she had to borrow a DAT player from Matt Sorum from Guns N’ Roses. She was going to give it back and he said ‘No, keep it, I have no use for it.’”
Decline offers a rare look at the offices of influential punk zine Slash in its chaotic heyday, as well as performances by the likes of Circle Jerks, Black Flag, Fear, Germs and X, back when punk was dangerous. “You hear about how amazing Paris was in the 20s or whatever: I feel like I was really fortunate to be a part of the punk scene in Los Angeles during that time, and especially associated with the people doing that quintessential magazine that represented that scene. It was a pretty special time but what’s interesting is that when something is special you don’t really realise at the time. It’s only in retrospect that you realise that it was special.”
Decline II is famous for its depiction of a drunk Chris Holmes of W.A.S.P. floating in his pool guzzling vodka from the bottle while his mother looks on, and for its scenes of rock’n’roll excess with superstars like KISS and Ozzy Osbourne as well as bands that never quite made it, like Wet Cherri and Odin. It’s prime “Where Are They Now?” material. “ didn’t think Chris Holmes would end up happily married in France, having stopped drinking,” Spheeris says. “Dave Mustaine’s trajectory has been nice and constant. I’m surprised he ended up a Christian but I’m glad for him if that works for him. I’ve heard the guys from Odin feel like they can never live it down. One of them says it’ll be on his headstone: it’ll just say “Odin… Odin… Odin…” He’s living the high life in Vegas. He hasn’t told me this but judging from his car and his $2,000 boots he’s got a very rich girlfriend. That’s just me guessing because I don’t know where the record sales are coming from! I saw Ozzy the other night and he seems to be doing fine. He’s getting older but so am I.”
But Decline III is the most touching, raw and heartfelt of the three films, focusing on homeless teen punks in late 90s LA. “It’s a pretty heavy movie and I think that’s why I couldn’t get any distribution for it when I made it, because it’s really hard to watch and absorb. And that’s why it’s the most important work I’ve done because it makes a statement about how responsible parents need to be, because half these guys were children!” It’s a topic close to Spheeris’s heart, since part of the reason she asked Fox to work with her was to keep a close eye on her after a period of prescription drug addiction. “It was as if we re-met each other. Our whole relationship was reborn and it needed it. About five years ago well all figured out she had a drug problem. I wanted to keep an eye on her. She stepped up and now she’s addicted to Red Bull and cigarettes but at least she got rid of the drugs, and I’m really proud of her for that.”
Spheeris is now at work on a fourth Decline film, “I can’t say what it is because everybody’s got a camera these days and honestly, there are a lot better filmmakers than me out there, so I just have to be quiet and do it, y’know?”
BY PETER HODGSON
