I reviewed Rick "Spine" Mountfort's 25 Years of Spine Tingling Artwork in November '22. My interest in the artist struck up a friendship, and from that, he gifted me an extraordinary biography, which upon reflection, still keeps me on edge, but I can say with utmost sincerity, I'm all the wiser for it.
Outside the Straight Edge: Behavior Mod, Punk, Junk and the Long Road Back is a tale of addiction, of institutionalized remedies versus the means to ascend through sheer determination and sublime, creative expression.
The book's focus falls upon the mind-controlling annals of flashback Florida (and later the dreaded dregs of DC), all erected in the name of good, even though a cult-ish, make-a-buck mentality distinguished Rick's detrimental "salvation". In essence, Rick wasn't so much treated for addiction as he was coerced into a kind of communist, re-education manipulation that fermented and amplified his dependency.
Mountfort experienced much of this in his younger years and nearly lost his identity along the way, but against the odds, he conjured the fortitude to stay on track and by the time of adulthood, had become one of the greatest, monster-movie artists of all time.
Despite his early "imprisonment" and his later, euphoric outcome, Outside the Straight Edge hits hardest via its in-betweens. For example. the account covers the arduous nature of methadone (though Mounfort does detail the grace granted through supervised maintenance). Also, Mountfort's general assessment of the drug culture, with all its sordid characters and terrifying foibles, is like living on another planet--a hellish one, at that. As such, though Outside the Straight Edge is a non-fiction work, its raw, punkish reflections roll like William S. Burrough's Naked Lunch, with a thick smearing of Synanon (the dramatized, movie counterpart helmed by Chuck Connors), though more shocking than either of the aforementioned, and that's saying a lot.
If one is unfortunate enough to be fighting the narcotic dragon, or knows someone who is, Outside the Straight Edge will act as an eloquent blueprint for taking one's life back. It may not be the conclusive source to cure an addiction (far from it), but it paves an honest path to getting there from a kind and insightful individual who experienced first hand the worst of the worst.
Buy this one. Through its unpretentious pages, there's much to learn, and trust me, in years to come, Outside the Straight Edge will be considered a classic.
https://www.amazon.com/Outside-Straight-Edge-Behavior-Punk/dp/B08YHWD6QP
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