Richard Hell

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Richard Hell (born October 2, 1949) is the stage name of Richard Meyers, an American singer, songwriter and writer, probably best-known as frontman for the early punk band The Voidoids. Their 1977 album, Blank Generation, contained many elements that would become identified with punk, from the nihilism of the title track (a play off of Rod McKuen's 1959 spoken-word song Beat Generation) to the frantic energy of the anti-romantic anthem, "Love Comes in Spurts", although the overall sound of the album is wildly creative, showing the influence of music as various as rockabilly and free jazz.

Hell was not only an originator of the punk sound, but the punk look, including spiked hair, with torn and cut shirts often held together with safety pins. Malcolm McLaren, Svengali of the Sex Pistols, has acknowledged Hell's look as an inspiration for the Sex Pistols's look and attitude, along with the safety-pin accessorized clothing he sold in his London shop. McLaren and Glen Matlock, the original Pistols bassist and the group's primary songwriter, also acknowledge that their song "Pretty Vacant" originated as an attempt to "write a song like 'Blank Generation'".

Since the late eighties Hell has made his living as a writer, publishing two acclaimed novels, as well as several other books. He's also the film critic for BlackBook magazine.

Contents

1 Biography
2 Discography
3 External links
4 References

Biography

Hell grew up in Lexington, Kentucky. His father was a psychologist, who died when Hell was seven years old. His final year of high school was spent at a private boarding school in Delaware where he became friends with Tom Verlaine of Television (band), who was known as Tom Miller then. They ran away from school together and were arrested in Alabama for arson vandalism a short time later.

Hell never finished high school and moved to New York City to become a writer. In the late 1960's, Verlaine joined Hell in New York and they eventually formed the Neon Boys. Their 1973 self-titled single is arguably the first punk song. Not long after, they changed their name to Television.

Television's performances at CBGB helped kick-start the first wave of punk bands, inspiring a number of different artists, notably Patti Smith who wrote the first press review of Television for the Soho Weekly News in June of 1974; had an affair with Tom Verlaine; and formed a band of her own (the Patti Smith Group). Television was the band that convinced CBGB owner Hilly Kristal to book rock bands at his club, and they built its first stage.

In 1975 Richard Hell split (or was fired from) Television after a dispute over creative control. Hell claimed that he and Verlaine had originally divided the songwriting evenly but later Verlaine favored his own songs. Verlaine remains characteristically silent on the subject. Hell started playing his two most famous songs ""Blank Generation" and "Love Comes in Spurts" during his stint in Television.

Hell left Television the same week that Jerry Nolan and Johnny Thunders quit the New York Dolls and they formed a band called The Heartbreakers (not to be confused with the later Tom Petty band). After a few shows they added Walter Lure as a second guitar player. A year later, in early 1976, Hell was asked to leave the Heartbreakers and started The Voidoids.

Hell was married to Patty Smyth, formerly of the band Scandal, and the two had a daughter, Ruby. The marriage, like the bands, did not last, and Smyth (who is not to be confused with Patti Smith) married tennis star John McEnroe in 1997 after living with Don Johnson for many years. Ruby lived with Smyth and Johnson and then Smyth and McEnroe, but frequently visited Hell.

Hell, like Johnny Thunders and Jerry Nolan, was a notorious heroin user. Smyth also used heroin but both she and Hell had quit drugs by the time they got married.

In 1996 Hell wrote a novel, GO NOW, that was drawn largely from his own experience, and released a collection of short pieces (poems, essays and drawings) called Hot and Cold in 2001. His second novel, Godlike, was published in 2005 on Dennis Cooper's Little House on the Bowery Series on Akashic Books.

He was married to Sheelagh Bevan in 2002 and they live in New York.

Discography

The Voidoids:

Blank Generation (1977)
Destiny Street (1979)

Richard Hell:

R.I.P. (1984)
Funhunt (1989)
Spurts, The Richard Hell Story (2005)

Dim Stars:

Dim Stars (1992)

External links

References

Steven Grant / Mark Fleischmann / David Sprague / Ira Robbins, ["''Richard Hell"], TrouserPress.com,

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