You claim to know how musically incompetent The Germs were, but have you heard this record? Because until you have, you're hardly qualified. The drums are so comprehensively ramshackle and un-selfconfident that the results would be appropriate for a student drummer's third or fourth outing ever. The bass mutters along hopelessly lost in the weeds while the guitar shoots out hot white sheets of fumbled power chords in no particular time signature while Darby spits out his songs in a drunken drawl, his famous teen illiteracy somehow audible. It's a perfect storm of ineptitude the whole way, and, here is the catch: it seems like the perfect look on the band. And, while overwhelmingly difficult in some places, it's kind of the perfect Germs record. It almost makes you resent later recordings for being too refined. The What We Do Is Secret version of "Forming", hardly an exercise in precision, is danceable by comparison, which feature I have always liked until I heard this oily, mutated version that just feels so much more like The Germs you imagine. As another reviewer noted, "Victim" is particularly unforgivable. Darby Crash single-handedly made it cool to be stupid and the idea burned bright for practically 20 years. For all time, he is the king in this department of punk - GG is disbarred for having legitimate mental illness. So if you like your punk in trembling prenatal form, if you believe that nothing's punker than 4 instruments, tons of beer, and no ideas, this is the Germs record for you.