Summer of ’82. I left Prince George’s County with a sketchbook in my hand and a beat in my chest, chasing freedom in a steel city I didn’t yet understand. Pittsburgh was smoke and echoes, punks and prophets, shadows and sparks—and it changed me forever.

Steel Town: A Black Punk Memoir from the Haunted Summer of 1982 by Leslie Cunningham is a short book for teens and young adults that blends truth and myth, art and survival. It’s about the kids who lived loud at the edges, the ghosts who refused to be forgotten, and the soundtrack—Prince, hip hop, punk—that made us believe in something bigger. Published by TRIBES. Order in print or digital.