Punk Rock and Trailer Parks
After “My Friend Dahmer” rocked my world, I was left with a desire to finally track down more work from its creator “Derf” Backderf. Surprisingly, “Punk Rock and Trailer Parks” shares more than a few commonalities with the author’s latest work. Both touch on the utter dullness of small-town life, take place in high school, and focus on a social outsider. The key differences here lie in the tone which is pitched explicitly as a comedy and its protagonist. Otto Pizcok is a gargantuan nerd in both action and physical size, but he possesses a boundless confidence that transcends his social station. It’s this key factor that makes him such a compelling protagonist to read about.
We’re introduced to Otto from behind as he drives to school in Akron, Ohio, circa 1980 and offers up his thoughts on the sorry state of rock music at the time and then walks defiantly late into class and announces that “The Baron” has arrived. Make no mistake, he’s a nerd of the era of the highest order, quoting Tolkien whenever he can, and a proud member of the school marching band too. However, he has a car that works despite all outward appearances and that’s enough to get two classmates, Wes and Pete, to ask him for a ride to The Bank one night. That club is the hottest music scene for miles around, host to the hottest new wave and punk acts of the era, and it proves to be the start to a defining moment in The Baron’s life.
This whole book is The Baron’s show and Derf puts him front and center like the star he is. We’re treated to familiar scenes such as peeking in on the home of the girl with the biggest breasts in school as she changes, the oddities that inhabit the local trailer park where The Baron lives, and the traumas of highschool life. All these things feel fresh again thanks to the character’s unique take on things and the charisma he exudes. The Baron may be a social outcast, but you can see how he carves out his own niche in live simply by being who he is and not letting anything compromise that.
As the title implies, music comes to play a big part in his life after he gets a gig as a jack-of-all-trades at The Bank. It’s in the scenes here that the book takes on a “Forrest Gump”-like quality as The Baron winds up rubbing shoulders with some of the most notable acts of the era. Klaus Nomi, The Ramones, Wendy O. Williams, The Clash and more all make appearances and our hero makes an indelible impression on them all.
If there’s any flaw to the book, it’s that there’s an aura of wish fulfillment to all this. Seeing Otto interact with all of these famous artists and make great impressions on all of them starts treading into the realm of hero worship. You get enough encounters like these and they start to lose their appeal as we see all of these people fawn over him. Otto’s appeal then becomes something that’s not earned by the story, but something shoved down our throats.
Fortunately, things never get that far. Yes, having Joe Strummer of The Clash give The Baron a shout-out on stage after they pop the tires of a Journey tour bus with rock critic Lester Bangs comes close, but scenes like this are always balanced by the character’s everyday life. All of his efforts to get the girl of his dreams to really notice him go unanswered, the band he joins winds up to be full of losers, tragedy strikes one of his best friends, and then there’s what happens to The Bank. Truly a fate worse than being demolished. In the end, fame and fortune elude The Baron in place of something much more believable. I can’t use the words “a delicate balancing act” to describe something that involves an expanding recording of farts and a naked trailer park dweller who threatens to blow everyone up with the plastic explosives he has shoved up his ass. However, by the end of the book everything that happens to The Baron feels perfectly believable in this context.
Most importantly is that the book makes a very good case for confidence being the key to a happy life no matter what your station is. “Punk Rock and Trailer Parks” never tells you this, it shows you with The Baron’s exploits and where his complete faith in himself takes him. The end result is something very funny, sometimes sad and depressing, and occasionally unbelievable — just like life itself! …Man I bet The Baron would kick my ass for writing something like that. Doesn’t matter. I’m glad to have had the pleasure of knowing him for the time that I was reading this.