Badsville

(Acetate) www.acetate.com

There's a hack blurb splashed on the back of the video box from the woefully misguided and properly named Jim Freek of the New Times LA, where he likens Badsville to that triumph of mental illness trapped on celluloid, "The Decline of Western Civilization." Well, you can forget that. No one here is nearly as young, or as stupid, as Omen or Seduce, and most of Badsville's participants have pockets filled with 24 hour chips from the local NA hall, so you won't find any Chris Holmes' style poolside vodka masturbation or Ozzy eggshell-omelet hijinks on display here. What you will find are the ragged survivors of the Los Angeles sleaze rock scene, aging pseudo-stars grousing about burnt record contracts and dirty deals. Although compelling, it all starts to seem invasive after awhile, like somebody snuck a camera into the confessional at the Graceland chapel. Sadsville,daddy-o. All except for Texas Terri, of course. She remains true to form, spitting out aimless vulgarity as her black clothed, balding band mates roll their eyes. She seems to get nervous if the conversation strays from her tits for too long. Commentary is kept to a minimum though, as the vast majority of Badsville's running time is taking up by performance clips, some of which are stellar. The entirely fuckable and infectiously catchy sleaze-pop of girl gang Loball, the hipster raunch and crime- jazz horns of Dragbeat, and the motor city burning testimony by fire of the Street Walkin' Cheetahs are all stand outs, but as in all great sinema, the money shot comes at the end. Bam Bam, the snake thin drummer for Dogs D'Amour (nowadays doing time with that Vixen chick in Bubble) recounts the infamous show when the Dog's drunk- star frontman Tyla eviscerated himself with a bottle on stage, and lived to brag about it. Seems he was oblivious to the fact that the broken bottle he was swinging around tore his belly open so badly that his intestines were hanging out. Lucky for us, there's grainy crime scene footage for proof. Tyla stumbles around, spraying blood all over the front row like a real-life Gwar, and manages to belt out the last chorus of "Back on the Juice" before passing out cold, to thunderous applause. Righteous. A fitting end indeed to a film about the blood and guts of rock and roll.