Geniuses of Crack
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- $21.99
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- $21.99
Publisher Description
From the author of Our Noise, an engaging and touching tale about the misadventures of a Virginia-based rock band Bottlecap that’s “an intricate and richly detailed study in twentysomething generational manners and mores that’s almost encyclopedic in scope” (Bret Easton Ellis).
Bottlecap, the Virginia-based group introduced in Jeff Gomez’s cult favorite Our Noise, traded in life as a small band on a struggling independent label for a lucrative contract with a big Los Angeles company. This should mean more money, more attention—more of all the stuff that comes with fame. But from the minute Mark, Steve, and Gary arrive in Los Angeles, they enter a world they don’t quite understand.
Mark, as leader of the band, tries to keep things under control, but his own life and his relationship with his new girlfriend Corinne—a native Angeleno and inveterate mallrat—begin to spin out of control. Steve falls under the influence of a neighbor with bad habits while Gary scours the city’s thrift stores searching for Atari memorabilia and a love of his own.
Confusion reaches its peak when the record company’s plans take an unexpected and, to the band, unacceptable turn. They must either completely sell out and surrender the band or take a stand, relegating themselves to commercial obscurity. Or is it already too late?
With humor and insight, Gomez limns the lives of three young men who are geniuses at everything except what matters. Fans of Our Noise will welcome this update of Bottlecap; newcomers will find a writer with a rare talent for capturing the mood and the voice of a generation.
PUBLISHERS WEEKLY
After signing their first major contract, Mark, Steve and Gary--members of the Virginia rock band Bottlecap--travel to L.A. in Gomez's hip but long-winded sequel to Our Noise. Far out of their element, the boys are immediately intimidated by California life and see bad omens for their album around every corner, but only the band's front man, Mark, notices the band's real-life obstacles: a combatively scrupulous producer, a slimy, manipulative executive and a jealous and ambitious mailroom boy. Along the way, the boys have relationship troubles (Steve can't find a girl; Mark can't live alone). In the end, it comes to a decision between selling out and throwing away their big chance. Gomez suffers from a generalized, reductive view of his characters' generation--a view unsharpened by the laundry lists of (undeniably accurate) brand names and pop-culture references. It's a shame, because so many of the minor characters--like Mark's new girlfriend and her parents, or Sam, the guy next door--are promising but poorly used. Instead, Gomez dwells, ad nauseum, on the boys' immature views of their relationships past and present (the violins are deafening here), drowning out the most interesting part of his tale: the question of what it takes to make it big in the hit-driven music business of today.
