richard hell takes apart poor journalist

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Ken, I didn't mean that as a challenge, I meant Please tell us about it!

― don, Thursday, 10 March 2005 16:46 (nineteen years ago) link

I'm trying to remember. It was a while back-early nineties, I think. Just about all I can remember is that various people read excerpts from the book and then Richard was the last guy to go and he said "OK, I'm gonna read my excerpt now - from the index!" He had a big grin on his face while he read, it was only a page or a column of a page, I think it was around the letter H, but I don't know if he actually got to his own name, it was pretty brief. Then the thing was over and I think he was one of the first to leave, IIRC.

― Ken L (Ken L), Thursday, 10 March 2005 17:01 (nineteen years ago) link

I wonder if Bangs would have still died had he reached 1984.

― Pete Scholtes, Thursday, 10 March 2005 22:35 (nineteen years ago) link

Why 1984?

― don, Thursday, 10 March 2005 22:40 (nineteen years ago) link

I don't know, it's just harder for me to imagine him being able to give up on music (more or less) in that grand year, and maybe this would have helped him not die.

― Pete Scholtes, Friday, 18 March 2005 03:13 (nineteen years ago) link

At least one early account had him calling up a friend,"Hey, I just wrote this new song, you gotta hear it," or something like that, enthusiastic. When the friend got there (Lester supposedly always left his door unlocked, as a matter of principle), LB was sitting on his sofa, amp on, guitar in lap, and dead. But that doesn't mean there wasn't some underlying desperation or something. Apparently started using drugs again, and his death was related to that. If so, maybe desperation took the form of trying too hard for inspiration, and that was the/one reason, or rationalization, for taking drugs again?

― don, Friday, 18 March 2005 06:11 (nineteen years ago) link

four years pass...

richard hell is great

― cool app (uh oh I'm having a fantasy), Wednesday, 20 May 2009 18:25 (fifteen years ago) link

this is also a good thread

― cool app (uh oh I'm having a fantasy), Wednesday, 20 May 2009 18:25 (fifteen years ago) link

i'd like to note that Hell didn't like Meltzer at least partly because Meltzer didn't like Hell. (Unsure whose dislike came first.) Meltzer wrote in at least one essay if not more that one of Lester's unsupportable tenets was using Richard Hell as an example of anything positive. Sounded like a personal vendetta.

Meltzer's written plenty of crap over the years, but when he's on his game, he's as strong and thorough as any first-rate writer. Hell? I can't say. Blank Generation, the album, is a masterpiece. But I've never been inclined to read his prose. I might be missing something here. Am I?

My own extremely limited experience with both of them was completely cordial. I didn't ask them to share a room.

― OCONDOR (Pt.1), Thursday, 21 May 2009 01:30 (fifteen years ago) link

A good complement to this one is Prindle's interview w/ Hell:

http://www.markprindle.com/hell-i.htm

― Mark, Thursday, 21 May 2009 05:10 (fifteen years ago) link

Speaking of musicians taking apart poor journalists:

There's trainwrecks, there's horrible uncomfortable trainwrecks, and then there's Mark's interview with HR of Bad Brains. Awesome!

― Mr. Snrub, Thursday, 21 May 2009 18:41 (fifteen years ago) link

the chapter Hell wrote in Rock & Roll Cagematch about the Stones vs. Velvets was pretty good.

― Italics in Baltimore (some dude), Thursday, 21 May 2009 18:45 (fifteen years ago) link

three years pass...

Xgau on Hell's autobio, and Hell's whole thang---really rich:
http://bnreview.barnesandnoble.com/t5/Rock-Roll/Richard-Hell-The-Thrill-Seeking-Years/ba-p/10073

― dow, Saturday, 16 March 2013 23:49 (eleven years ago) link

And speaking of rich, leave us not forget Hell on Bangs upthread: terrific!

― dow, Saturday, 16 March 2013 23:52 (eleven years ago) link

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