Henry Rollins - Broken Summers

This past week I read Broken Summers by Henry Rollins. I bought a used copy in Cambridge MA and I would glace at the copy now and then. My goal this week was completing The Clinton Tapes. Instead I settled on something easier. Rollins is an easy writer to sink your teeth into, but I found his redundant themes of running into babbling drunks near his bus or back stage at the shows or how often he’d snicker at the USA, spelling America with a K or two…and he’s always on the move. What’s he running from? Facing his demons? Accepting he is vulnerable? What are missing were any real emotions or a girlfriend. Come on Henry tell us more about your infatuation with Cheryl Crowe. Other than hate, there is little else of substance in this book. He mentioned his upbringing, but did not go into detail. His parents divorced when he was younger, and remembers getting hauled off by his mother. That was about it. Rollins even assumed his grandmother may have been alive when his tour brought him to Detroit, but he hadn’t spoken to her in years. What kind of machine is this? Then again he’s in his early forties when the book was written, and I got the sense there was an adolescent masquerading as a middle aged man. The inner squabbles between his old Black Flag band mate is bush league. Here’s the gist of the book, after his recent spoken word tour Henry has a brilliant idea; record a benefit album of Black Flag covers and tour to raise funds for the Memphis three. The three are three wrongfully imprisoned young men for the murders of three young boys, but I never learned why they were wrongly imprisoned, just they got the shaft from the judicial system. Rollins had the gall to compare flying in a jet for hours to these young men who are in solitary? What the fuck? In fact before writing this I learned more details in a few paragraphs from a blog. The book ends without sharing details like how much did the tour and album raise? The three needed money for a DNA test, and this was a few years ago. Instead there are two more essays that left me feeling as if Rollins needed some filler. I’m not going to abandon Rollins writing based on one book. I respect his endurance and fight for social justice – around the world. His macho crap is over the top and reminds me of a few friends I had years ago, they always looked for a fight but backed down the moment you looked them in the eye. One shot was all they needed to cower, like a barking dog, their bark is worse than their bite. I was interested in attending one of his shows at Joe’s Pub in NYC next month; all the shows are sold out, but after reading this, I’m going back to listening to his music and reading some…more…Henry.