The History of Rock and Roll

history of rock and roll_edited-2

Everyone wants to feign short term memory loss about all that weed they smoked in college, but no one smokes that much weed.

When I see Facebook pictures of some of the people I went to high school and college with holding their children, looking quite responsible and PTA-friendly, it makes me snicker. I remember what you did! You were crazy in the ’90s! And now you have to look your kids in the eye and tell them not to do the exact same things you had so much fun doing? How?

So this is a long-running joke I have with The Man, and it’s what we actually do, every time the subject comes up, whether we’re listening to old music, watching old movies, or reading current events. History of a brilliant career, et cetera, et cetera, “but then they took too much heroin and died.” I’m absolutely sure these kids will never, ever take heroin. Hooray!

For this comic, I attempted to draw 13 celebrities, most of whom came out looking more or less like themselves. In panel 3, on the left, is Nancy Reagan, the First Lady who famously implored the nation’s youth to “Just say no” to drugs while simultaneously working to ensure that the President of the United States never made any important decisions without first consulting a psychic.

To her right is Bristol Palin, the world’s most fertile argument against abstinence only education.

The dead music and theatrical personalities in panel 4 are Sid Vicious, Kurt Cobain, River Phoenix, Janis Joplin, Jimi Hendrix, John Belushi, Jim Morrison, Charlie Parker, and Billie Holliday. They didn’t all actually die of heroin overdoses, but they arguably all took too much heroin and they all died. If I had more space, I would have also drawn Dee Dee Ramone, Philip Seymour Hoffman, and Cory Monteith, at least.

Finally, in panel 8, Keith Richards, who has taken all the psychoactive substances known to science and lived a long, productive, successful life.

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