It’s a big job to write a history book. Perhaps that’s why Jack Boulware and Silke Tudor, authors of “Gimme Something Better: The Profound, Progressive, and Occasionally Pointless History of Bay Area Punk From Dead Kennedys to Green Day,” decided to make theirs an oral history rather than writing their own. Sure you still have to do tons of research and conduct lots of interviews, but it’s got to be loads easier to edit other people’s thoughts than draft your own, right? Not that there’s anything wrong with the format. It certainly worked well for books about the early punk scenes of New York (“Please Kill Me“) and Los Angeles (“We’ve Got the Neutron Bomb“). And given the Bay Area’s importance in evolving punk’s sound, and later, catapulting it into the mainstream — its scene seems just as worthy of an oral history as its coastal cousins.

What’s good: The book gives a thorough look at the varied Bay Area punk landscape, highlighting important bands, venues and luminaries from the 70s to the present. It is well-edited, so the book reads briskly, never spending too much time in one place with one person. The longer chapters on Mabuhay Gardens, Dead Kennedys, 924 Gilman St. and Green Day are rich histories in their own right, and each could support a book on their own, as could the interesting chapter on Fang singer Sammy McBride, who murdered his girlfriend in a drug-induced rage and went on the lam before doing time at San Quentin. Also particularly colorful are the scene’s early days in San Francisco’s North Beach neighborhood, when punk was less about politics and more about self-expression.

What’s bad: Though the book covers Green Day and Operation Ivy/Rancid in healthy doses, chapters on NOFX, AFI and Jawbreaker seem slim given the reach of those bands outside of the Bay Area. The book focuses heavier on the scene’s first two decades and bands — Crime, the Nuns, Flipper, et al — so fans of modern punk won’t find as much to sink their teeth into. There’s a little on Fat Wreck Chords — and Fat Mike is one of the interviewees — but there’s virtually nothing on the rest of the label’s roster. Lookout!, however, is covered more thorougly. There’s also no appendix, which seems essential for any kind of historical text — punk or otherwise — and which renders the book useless as a research tool since nothing is cross-referenced.

Verdict: “Gimme Something Better” accomplishes its task nicely. It’s not perfect, but it provides a good look at at the explosion of punk rock from the San Francisco Bay with enough varying opinions that you feel like you get a balanced look at it’s many facets, but as it’s title suggests, if you want to dig deeper on any of the topics it covers, you might need something better.

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