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Rock Reads: Death Punch'd: Surviving Five Finger Death Punch's Metal Mayhem by Jeremy Spencer
Reviewed by Kevin Wierzbicki
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Jeremy Spencer, drummer for Five Finger Death Punch, is a total scumbag. That's not a personal judgment of Spencer, it's his own opinion, and as he chronicles a lifetime of debauchery here he uses far worse terms to describe himself. Spencer actually cleaned up his act more than two years ago and if he hadn't of he never could have kept it together long enough to write this book, and maybe he wouldn't even have been alive to try. The book takes an interesting path to tell the story; every other chapter is about Death Punch while the others focus on the pre-stardom years. The fact that Spencer doesn't write chronologically is a little disconcerting at first but the end result is that the reader can easily see the parallels between the two phases of his life, and they're not good. Alcohol, cocaine and careless sex are the main excesses that Spencer details; the other thing in the mix is his determination to succeed as a musician, and to that end the reader will hear about Spencer's first drum kit and early bands, pre-5FDP brushes with stardom, all the infighting in Death Punch and member hirings and firings, and some amazing things like the band's having traveled to Iraq to play for the troops and staying in one of Saddam Hussein's palaces while they were there. But in the end the book is not really about Five Finger Death Punch or even about music; it is about Spencer finally waking up one day, seeing that scumbag in the mirror and saying "enough!" There's nothing whatsoever preachy here and when Spencer wraps up the book he only takes a few pages to celebrate his sobriety and the good things that his now positive lifestyle is manifesting. It all makes for a good read, and it's nice to know that there is now one less scumbag in the world.Order your copy here.
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