Born Innocent by Redd Kross

by Lana Fleischli

The thought process for listening to Redd Kross for the first time was relatively easy. Firstly, I hadn’t. Secondly, Steve McDonald, one of the main members, is my dad’s best friend. At this point, it seemed like the obvious choice. 

I did my normal process and listened to it throughout the week to try and absorb it to the best of my ability. I feel like the best way to explain what happened next is to take you through my thought process.

I looked at the release year of the album. It was released in 1982. This interested me for one main reason. Like I said, Steve McDonlad is my dad’s close friend, meaning that they are probably around the same age (nothing against friendships like Harold and Maude, that’s just not what their friendship is). My dad was born in 1970, so he was 12 when Born Innocent came out. I looked up the year Steve was born, 1967. He was 15. 

Personally, I think that that is incredibly fascinating because he and his brother put out a full-length album as teenagers! They didn’t have social media as a resource to gain an audience, as many young artists do today. In my mind, what they did is an incredible feat. 

Normally, I don’t like researching much about the album before I write it unless I need to, because I want my thoughts to be original. (Let’s be honest, you wouldn’t be reading this if you didn’t want to read my thoughts. This whole music section on Desperately Seeking Serious is devoted to my thoughts on music.) But for this album, it seemed necessary. 

After I found out about how young they were, I continued reading and I learned about their previous band members before Born Innocent. They had Ron Reyes, who ended up in Black Flag, and they had Greg Hetson of the Circle Jerks and Bad Religion. It continues to be so cool to me that all of these people knew each other and made music together at such young ages. 

As I kept reading, I read about the songs themselves and the eeriness that the album has to it. The first song, “Linda Blair” refers to the actress in The Exorcist. She was also in the movie Born Innocent, which the album was named after. Then the eerie part is that they covered “Cease To Exist” by Charles Manson (yes, that guy). I think it’s a cool choice and adds to the references of creepy pop-culture. It also keeps it very central to California. Obviously, the movie industry is here, and the Manson murders took place here. 

I am really glad I listened to this album and happier that I researched little, because it opened my mind to the interconnecting layers of music, pop-culture, and growing up surrounded by all of that. Not to mention how interconnected punk rock is. I definitely took this opportunity to learn a little and it has been really interesting. I guess the moral here is, if you have a question, look it up!