Lester Bangs, A BOX FULL OF ROCKS

Photograph by Roberta Bayley, 1976.

This film looks at the adolescent years and young adulthood of legendary music journalist Lester Bangs. From age 11 in 1960 to 1971, when he moved to the Creem house in Detroit, Lester Bangs grew up and lived in El Cajon, a Southern California suburb 15 miles east of San Diego. It was in El Cajon that he became a writer.


Lester's high school friends Gary Rachac, Milt Wyatt, Jerry Raney, and Jack Butler (appearing in that order) discuss the music scene in El Cajon in the mid-60s. At this time, Lester would sit in with Jerry and Jack's Thee Dark Ages at El Cajon's Hi Ho Club, the biggest, most popular teenage nightclub in all of San Diego county.


In this clip from the film A BOX FULL OF ROCKS, Mike Stax of Ugly Things magazine cites Greg Shaw of Who Put the Bomp and discusses Lester's approach to writing. The "avalanche of words" observation is quite poignant.


We are starting to experiment with transitions to link together the various sections of the film A Box Full of Rocks:The El Cajon Years of Lester Bangs. Here is a montage of photos set to the song "Where is the poet Christ?" by the Flying Sandolini. Let us know what you think!!!


Lester's high school friend and fellow Beat, Rob Houghton discusses their experimentation with recreational chemicals and Lester's almost analytical approach to drug taking. This series of short clips comes from a longer 20-minute section of the film.

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Here, Lester's biographer Jim Derogatis discusses the role of the critic in Art and why Lester's legacy (and music journalism in general) is so important. A special thanks to Michael Fennelly for the photo of Lester with girlfriend Andy and Michael's band Crabby Appleton.


In this clip from the film, Lester's friend Milt Wyatt talks about a day when Lester's mom Norma drove the kids to the beach. Milt was also from a Jehovah Witness family. For years, he and Lester would hang out in Lester's room, listening to records and talking music, before and after the weekly Jehovah Witness meetings held at Norma's house.


Lester Bangs grew up in apartments. He lived in rented, attached housing virtually his entire life. Here, El Cajon writer Mindy Solis discusses the culture that rises out of the endless maze of El Cajon apartments. The street footage follows First Street north toward Madison. NOTE: The footage stops right below Lester's apartment window.


In this rough clip form the film, Grossmont College professor Sydney Brown explains some of the ways Lester Bangs is being honored today in El Cajon, CA, his hometown. The footage comes from the 2012 Lester Bangs Memorial Reading, which was attended by a couple hundred people.

UBUWEB SOUND: Charles Bukowski (1920-1994)

http://ubu.com/sound/bukowski.html


To celebrate the birthday of Charles Bukowski (1920-1994), here's dozens of hours of his audio works [MP3]


At Terror Street and Agony Way (1968) 

1. The State of World Affairs 2:41
2. Winter Comes 1:50
3. No Charge 0:43
4. A Literary Romance 3:16
5. The Twins 3:33
6. Regard Me 2:24
7. Love is a Piece of Paper Torn to Bits 0:53
8. Going for Sadists 2:11
9. Sundays Kill More Men 4:30
10. A 350 Dollar Whore 4:05
11. A Shot of Red Eye 6:27
12. Beerbottle 2:20
13. K.O. 1:06
14. Seventh Race 3:41
15. On Going Out to Get the Mail 2:58
16. I Wanted to Overthrow the Government 6:43
17. 35 Seconds 2:25
18. True Story 1:55
19. Sour Ghost 0:47
20. The Weather is Hot on the Back of My Watch 4:45
21. Migrants / John Dillinger 7:49
22. One for Ging with Klux-Top 3:45
23. A Trainride in Hell 9:01
24. Ignus Fatuus 7:18
25. Yellow 2:19
26. The Coloured Birds 3:33
27. From the Department of English 1:46
28. The Underground 2:18
29. Fire Station 7:32
30. Birth 3:26
31. No Lady Godiva 1:52
32. Don't Come Around 2:43
33. Number Six 1:19
34. They, All of Them Know 6:48
35. Flyleaf 0:59
36. The Tragedy of the Leaves 1:51
37. I Cannot Stand Tears 1:06
38. A Real Thing, A Good Woman 2:00
39. Man in the Sun 1:38
40. One Hundred and Ninety Nine Pounds of Clay 2:45

130 minutes of the first-ever recordings of Charles Bukowski reading his own work. Culled from tapes made by Bukowski at his Los Angeles home in 1968 for biographer and rock critic Barry Miles, long before the author had begun regular public readings. Bukowski was so shy he insisted that he record alone. He reads both poetry and prose, gets thoroughly drunk during the recording, and bitches about his life, his landlord, and his neighbors. 




70 Minutes in Hell (1969) 

1. Buffalo Bill (3:03)
2. A Little Atomic Bomb (1:34)
3. The Hairy Hairy Fist (5:58)
4. An Action Afternoon (2:19)
5. Finish (3:09)
6. No Charge (0:49)
7. Something for the Touts, The Nuns, The Grocery Clerks and You
8. Love Is A Piece Of Paper Torn To Bits (0:52)
9. Songs For Sadists Without A Place To Sit Down (2:17)
10. The Genius Of The Crowd (3:57)
11. Farewell, Foolish Objects (5:09)
12. Experience (3:21)
13. At The End Of Feet The Blackbird Walks (4:37)
14. I May Make Paris In The Morning (1:28)
15. Men And The Sun (5:54)
16. The Japanese Wife (2:52)
17. Bukowski Still At It (5:05)
18. Freedom (3:29)
19. True Story (4:06)

70 Minutes in Hell, a German home recording made in 1969 of Charles Bukowski. What makes this so compelling is that nobody can read Bukowski like Bukowski. 

The Buk's 60-plus books offer a glimpse into the world of horse tracks, seedy bars, and sleazy LA rooming houses. 70 Minutes in Hell, with its haphazard recording (replete with comments to the German dude making the recording and the sound of traffic passing by) gives us some insight into the world of an aloof, desperate and drunken man disinterested in the normalities of society. 

Regardless whether you're an insomniac, a narcoleptic or none of the above, if you're a Buk fan you need to listen. 




King of Poets (1970) 

1. When All The Animals Lay Down
2. Smart Girl
3. Light Of Jesus
4. Pleasures
5. Rejoice And Asunder
6. Northern Acquaintance
7. Grammar Of Life
8. My Father
9. Soup, Cosmos and Tears
10. Life Of The King
11. Only The Truly Lost
12. A Need For Glue
13. Hammer and Leash
14. Another Academy
15. The Solar Mass
16. The Lesbian
17. The Night I Killed Tommy
18. The Lady With the Legs
19. Photo
20. Like That
21. Mystery Of
22. Plants
23. Bad
24. Bukowski Says Goodbye

Home Recording New Orleans, Louisiana (1970). Originally issued in an old plastic VHS box. 




Poems and Insults (1973) 

1. Creation of the Morning Line
2. Death
3. Sex Fiends
4. Love
5. Piss & Shit
6. Death Of An Idiot
7. Style
8. Law
9. My Friend André
10. Best Love Poem I Can Write at the Moment
11. World's Greatest Loser
12. Last Days of the Suicide Kid
13. Shower
14. Hot
15. Earthquake
16. Rat
17. Shoelace
18. Eighteen Cars Full of Men Thinking of What Could Have Been
19. Report Upon the Consumption of Myself
20. Something for the Touts, The Nuns, The Grocery Clerks and You

Live Reading, City Lights Poets Theater, San Francisco, September 14, 1973 




Solid Citizen (1978) 

1. Free (2:26)
2. Hot Dog (3:01)
3. An Observer (2:01)
4. You Can't Make a Lion Out of a Butterfly (2:40)
5. Some People (0:59)
6. The White Poets (2:11)
7. The Black Poets (2:18)
8. Looking for a Job (2:21)
9. Another Academy (1:35)
10. I Met a Genius (2:02)
11. The Bones of My Uncle (1:23)
12. The Fisherman (1:46)
13. When Hugo Wolf Went Mad (1:08)
14. Trading Insults (5:30)
15. The Flower Lover (1:45)
16. Love & Fame & Death (3:20)
17. I've Always Had Problems With Money (1:30)
18. The Place Didn't Look Bad (4:20)
19. One for the Shoeshine Man (3:00)
20. A Report on the Consumption of Myself (3:22)
21. I Was Born to Hustle Roses Down the Avenues of the Dead (2:43)
22. Cancer (13:53)

20 track collection of recordings of bukowski live in hamburg in 1978. Also include 4 bonus home recordings from 1969. His spoken word lyrics, later inspired 'the streets', with a style unique to the era. Beautifully crafted, poetic album. 




Hostage (1980) 

1. "I Come from San Pedro" 1:17
2. Jam 1:14
3. Cutulus 1:49
4. Indian Cigarettes, Pussy and Lepers 1:56
5. Trouble 1:19
6. Competition 2:09
7. The Secret of My Endurance 2:24
8. On the Hustle 3:29
9. "I'll be drinking when I bury you..." 0:51
10. I Am a Reasonable Man 3:28
11. Eating the Father 1:51
12. Intermission: Foop the Whales 0:50
13. Burning Time and Making Money 3:51
14. I Believe in Evil 0:57
15. "Let's go to work.." 1:23
16. The Nine Horse 4:24
17. Respect 2:18
18. I Don't Need a Cleopatra 1:51
19. Hemingway 1:31
20. "Try some shit, do some anger..." 1:40
21. Fan Letter 2:14
22. "Tweak-fucked by the surfboarders of hell..." 1:06
23. The Drunk With Little Legs 2:36
24. "The good old days..." 1:20
25. Tour 1:42
26. Losing My Mind 1:05
27. The Recess Bells of School 3:07
28. "I am Humphrey Bogart..." 3:01
29. Giving a Poetry Reading 5:14

Tonight will be a very dignified reading," intones Charles Bukowski at the outset of this public performance. "I will read dignified poetry in a dignified manner." Of course, this sends the audience into stitches, knowing that Bukowski will soon plunge into his poems, which seem more like anecdotes of gleeful depravity, packed full of prostitutes, horse racing, and displays of drunken candor. One piece finds Bukowski a guest speaker at a pristine private college, feeling under the weather after a night of fierce drinking. ("I think I was in the state of Nebraska or Illinois or Ohio.") In his nausea, he sits mutely before the class of wide-eyed students. When asked questions about his craft, he responds tersely, answering such innocent queries as "What do you think of Norman Mailer?" with "I don't think of Norman Mailer" (or "Who are your three favorite writers?" with "Charles Bukowski, Charles Bukowski, and Charles Bukowski"). While the poet is typically crude throughout the performance -- even in his interaction with the audience -- a couple of surprising things come to light when one hears Bukowski in a live setting: 1) how sweet and reasonable he can sound, and 2) how dead-on his comic timing is. Hostage is essential listening for anyone interested in the mythic Charles Bukowski. This is a highly entertaining recording. 




Do You Use a Notebook? (1986) 

1. Do You Use a Notebook?

Series: A Moveable Feast 3
Interviewer: Tom Vitali
Duration: 30 minutes 
Summary: An interview with Charles Bukowski precedes his reading of his poem, Do you use a notebook?, from the collection Dangling in the tournefortia. 

This was apparently an audio magazine series called A Moveable Feast, distributed on cassette. (I also seem to recall hearing some segments on my public radio station.) 

The tape is hissy, and the mp3 isn't encoded that well, with a couple spots of stuttering and repetition, but it's all very minor. And the tape itself is now over 20 years old and doesn't seem to be as easy to find as his albums. 




Bukowski Lives! (undated) 

1. consummation of grief 1:52
2. the soldier, his wife and the bum 3:14
3. The Genius of the Crowd 2:32
4. rain 1:37
5. a radio with guts 3:15
6. the poetry reading 1:56
7. short order 0:49
8. the strongest of the strange 2:08
9. the last days of the suicide kid 2:46
10. Friendly Advice to a Lot of Young Men 1:46
11. the most 2:03
12. the mockingbird 1:38
13. the proud, thin, dying 2:18
14. helping the old 1:40
15. Confession 1:29
16. fan letter 2:00
17. are you drinking? 1:51
18. Dinosauria, we 5:12
19. luck 0:51
20. we ain't got no money, honey, but we got rain 9:44

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