MAIL

MAIL

Dear CREEM:

Well, fuck, I have to tell you one funking thing. Grand Funk is a motherfucker, they fuck you up better than ten hits of mushrooms and a bottle of Spinada. One day we was over this dude’s house drinking Robitussin and listening to Closer to Home when this guy tells us Richard Carpenter balls Karen. I couldn’t believe it, so he puts on “Close to You” at high speed and you could hear slurpin in the background.

CREEM is a great magazine cause only guys like you would print this. Well its time to get wined so shut up. Well, I’m out of mind now, and I read somewhere that Jeff Beck got Bogart and Appice - Finally. Well, Biongo is going out of his mind because he wants to go snort some lysol.

Chip and Biongo

Vacaville, Ca.

MICK'S PROBLEM

Dear CREEM:

Well I don’t know, maybe, as Greil Marcus says, the Stones never would have the Diddleyan raunch to “put out an album called Mick Has a Problem and have a big red question mark on the cover surrounded by pictures of disappointed looking girls.” On the other hand, there is that line on Exile about how “I only get my rocks off when I’m sleeping...” May all your Christmases be wet.

The Ultimate Nova Blowtorch of Savage Nihilism

Oakland, Calif.

Dear CREEM:

T. really Rex.

Long live Big Bill Hill,

Cary Baker

Chicago, Ill.

Dear CREEM:

Re: Lennon as Lenin (Oct.)

I love rock and roll because I believe it partially accomplishes what Noebel says. But I HATE school, so when you put the word unaccredited in parenthesis it comes across as a cut, which is saying credited schools are better which is bullshit.

Robert Gordon

Bloomfield Hills, MI.

(Can’t we get away with anything? — Ed.)

PAUL'S PALL

Dear CREEM:

If McCartney’s supposed to be lefthanded, how come on the cover of the “I Want -to Hold Your Hand” single he’s holding his cigarette in his right hand? Is that supposed to be a clue?

William Newport

Erie, Pa.

PHIL SPECTOR'S MAGIC LAMP

Dear CREEM:

I want to thank you for publishing excerpts from Richard Williams’ book on Phil Spector (Out of His Head, Aug.), and also for giving the address of the publisher — no bookstore around here has even heard of Phil Spector.

How come Williams (or anybody else, it seems) didn’t mention Phil’s tremendous acting stint on a segment of I Dream of Jeannie, where he actually plays himself “Phil Spector - record producer.” The show deals with Jeannie forming a group (rock & roll?) and auditioning in front of the master himself, who utters the ultimate Spectorism, “How does No. 1 sound to you?” If only it had been Ike and Tina Turner, right, Phil?

Keep up the good work.

Joseph Conti

Jenkintown, Pa.

Dear CREEM:

its three in the morning, shot up with wild turkey, barbecue bob on hifi. jimmy reed on radio, danger zone just around the corner, somebody threw a molotov cocktail and blew up the, block, an hour with keith richards will do. please tell tony glover, wonder where he is tonight, maybe pulling the harps outta the ole leather bag. playing along with ole sonny stereo, really liked that blues 72 piece, tony gets sharper and. real razor tongue, thanks for tony.

ps. thanks for r. meltzer

pss. WARNING, leave dylan alone, thats for you lester you pigfucker. love you love your dog but leave dylan to the ones who really love him.

psss. (piss) yes I was born in Chicago. patti smith

america (the country not the group) (Lester: “Whaddaya mean? I love Dylan! It’s just that I think Self-Portrait is his best album. And that ain’t nihilism either. ”)

YEAR OF THE MINOTAUR

Dear CREEM:

First off, your latest offer to the gods of publications, that which blatantly displays a femme’s tongue nestling a rather large pill bearing the call letters “AS” is about the grossest cover I’ve seen in some time (said time equidistant to and in conjunction with the equinox of VG6075 in the constellation Orion). I loved it! As an ex-pill head and drug-dabbler (I started with thorazine, which was in constant supply at my aunt’s, she being an undercover and purely-for-medicinal-purposes addict, and worked my way through stelazine, nembutal, quaalude, benzedrine, methedrine, equinal, librium, mescaline [this particular brand of “peace” was little more difficult to procure] and so on and so forth) I found that the only way I was going was down (Pun? - Ed.) while my good old synapses conveyed an ever increasing restfulness. Needless to say, my tolerance for the little devils grew and where one was sufficient, three became the minimum. I don’t really want this to be a down letter, but it ain’t a good road to follow. 1 don’t believe that shit about undermining the revolution (whichever one is in progress now) but it does undermine the revolutionary. My own case progressed to four suicide attempts that netted me a free vacation in the looney bin (pill inspired) and one near fatal attempt (when the pills failed, the razor didn’t) that really freaked me out, and turned my head within for a total reevaluation of my life and pursuits. I am now hooked on living, which I thought I had been doing before.

Second, or the one before the last if you started at the other end, I really think you guys have a super mag and although Lester is rather a hard pill to swallow at times (forgive the truism) he will get over it.

Third, your Firesign article had to be the freakiest thing this side of Medusa and if you continue to present us Firesignogists with that particular type of pa tie de foie gras, you’ve got a devoted and persistently effete audience. They are without a doubt the greatest thing to enter the vinyl or dynaflex dynasty since Edward the Myopic who rained on the small town of Ulna during the Two Minutes War between Our Lady of Perpetual Orgasm and the Monestary of Germain the Castrated. It all seems fruitless now that the reindeer have left Capistrano but unto every son a child is born who will read CREEM with a mixture of flour, sugar, cornstartch, antipasto and noxema. Bake at Mach I for 22 days and chill immediately before beating your wife’s neighbor. What more can I say, what more is there to say when you’ve got such really lapidarian guys working for you who can conceive and bear such gems of ectoplasmic pulp month after month, year after year, close before striking?

In the end, someone said “Let there be CREEM” and low and above, there wallowing in the muck and ire of Crawdaddy, Rolling Stone and aformentioned charlatans of yore, there appeared CREEM, brilliant as a new born hermaphrodite and without shame to rule the land that was without and the places that were within each of us a little flower grows...

Battiste Everett-Wells

Tumbleweed Connection, Mi.

WRONG AGAIN

Dear CREEM:

Rod Stewart did not write “Country Comforts,” as noted in the Never A Dull Moment review (Oct.). Elton John and Bernie Taupin did.

Leona Kuffer

Bellmore, NY

Dear CREEM:

Lissen, I just read your “apology” to this Terry Knight creep in the December issue. I ain’t quite sure who he is, but I don’t wanna have my reputation sullied by being used as a part of his game. How about an apology to me???

Terry Knapp,

Lovelock, Nev.

(O.K. We apologize. — You know something? We're startin’ to LIKE doin’ this! - Ed.)

Dear CREEM:

This is for Graham Carlton. I’ll betcha I’ve got better credentials than you. Like Nigel Olsen’s drumstick and Elton John’s coke can. I wouldn’t sell ’em for all the reds in China.

Laura Hoster

Columbus, Ohio

Dear CREEM:

Your rag is pretty good. But I have still not found out who Lester Bangs is.

Fred Mills

Wadesboro, N.C.

(Lester Bangs the shit out of his typewriter. -Ed.)

ONE HUNDRED YEARS OF PUNKITUDE Dear CREEM:

All my love to you for printing a review of 100 Years of Solitude. My regrets are simply that Ed Ward didn’t step out any more and Write a review worth all the spectacle of the book. Always an admirer of Ward’s writing — so simple and telling that the wealth of ideas behind it are almost overlooked — I was happy to get a peek at his reading.

One thing though — you should have gotten that bony moronie beatnik book out from in front of 100 Years. The monument Garcia Marquez wrote will be there long after Diane di Prima is food for worms.

But then Diane is probably a wonderful girl and the last thing I want to do is step on Mr. Bangs’ tofes. [Especially since he used to have enough of that problem when he was a shoe salesman: -Ed.] So let me just thank you again. Rolling Stone or any other hippie has not mentioned the book, perhaps an example of the arrogance of critics. One does not expect, as the genius Borges has pointed out, God to study theology.

John Domini

Cambridge, Mass.

P.S. I write Rock-A-Rama with my left hand! (Troublemaker. —Ed.)

Dear CREEM:

How come R. Meltzer never changes his clothes?

Lotta Lunch

Troy, Kansas

Dear CREEM:

Sure would like to read an expansion of the ‘‘Consciousness Carnival” idea (Oct.). I think 1 agree, but then again it’s hard for me to deny someone their way of doing something. But I understand what Michael (Rossman) is speaking of. I’ve even seen friends do it — some even go with the Gaskin farm. It’s the going off into any extreme that gets dangerous. But also, these days you look around and wonder where’s my brother or friend, or peer. All this can be looked at as healthy, in that people are at least looking for ways to actually become themselves. It could be that a lot of this will pass as people learn from their experiences that there is more to integrate. People have left the Gaskin farm, and Lyman, most likely because they felt there was more to do than live on one level.

Rhythmically yours,

Jeff

(No Return Address)

Dear CREEM:

Just read your review of Rock of Ages (Nov. ’72) and I didn’t know you felt that way about the Band; you left no clues.

Have you heard “Who Do You Love”/“Bo Diddley” by Ronnie Hawkins and the Hawks (Roulette 4483)? If not you must. The band is killer, listen to that bass! And Robbie Robertson plays like a lightning god.

Lisa Schoot

Brooklyn, N.Y.

CONTINUED ON PAGE 80.

MALL

CONTINUED FROM PAGE 10.

Dear CREEM:

I don’t know how many of your readers have had a chance to see D.A. Pennebaker’s (Monterey Pop) Keep On Rockin’ but if it’s in your town try to get out and see this film! I doubt if you’ll come out not liking what you saw or heard!

The film starts out with a tribute to Janis Joplin and Jimi Hendrix by capturing a performance of each and then goes into high gear with the performances of four of the greatest rockers in history: BO DIDDLEY,. JERRY LEE LEWIS, CHUCK BERRY and LITTLE RICHARD.

Filmed in color' with sound in 4 track stereo at the 1969 Toronto Rock and Roll Revival, the action is captured perfectly by Pennebaker and his crew.

If you happen to be a fan of only one or two of the artists featured in Keep On Rockin’, or if you’re like me, a fan pf all four, then this movie is one you 11 really dig.

Pennebaker’s result: a concert film that is a MUST SEE for any true rock and roll enthusiast!!! .

Sid Korob

Los Angeles, Ca.

Dear CREEM:

In your Nov. issue, you stated that Francis Ford Coppola was directing the film American Graffiti, which features Wolfman Jack and California cruising circa 1962. This is false. Actually George Lucas, who directed sci-fi thriller THX-1138, is directing A merican Graffiti.

Jack O. Nebraska

Long Beach, Cal.

Dear CREEM:

1. Whatever happened to Barbara Lewis?

2. What’s the name of Lester Bangs’ book? College libraries don’t seem to haye it.

3. Which is better — getting a master’s degree or being a disc joCkey?

Greg Morton

Carbondale, 111.

(1. Gone the way of the buffalo. She WAS a killer, wasn’t she?; 2. Lester’s rock and roll book is Psychotic Reactions and Carburetor Dung and his “other" book is Bogue Culture. Your library doesn't have them because they aren’t quite done yet and no publisher has picked up on ’em either. They’ll be out soon, don’t fret; 3. AM or FM? - Ed.)

METAPHYSICAL QUICKSAND

Dear CREEM:

Chet Flippo’s review of Tropical Detective Story has exposed Ray Mungo as yet another victim of that pseudo-philosophical doubletalk that sometimes seems to be epidemic among those counter-cultural minds which have been ravaged by drugs or maybe just plain stupidity — namely the (perhaps unconscious) English language. How else could they play their silly little word games like “liveevil” and “alone-all one”? Do Manson, Lyman, et. al., win many converts among speakers of Swahili, Serbo-Croation, or Amharic with this kind of rap? It’s really sad to see a man of Mungo’s talents sucked into this metaphysical quicksand.

And speaking of talents, I’d like to go on record as being strongly in favor of an anthology of the writings of Greil Marcus. Marcus is far and away the most perceptive and articulate writer ever to deal with rock and roll music, and his long article on the state of rock, in your May, 1971, is an absolute classic.

Robert Mitchell

Lawrence, KS.

(Greil’s book based on the article you mentioned, Rock-A-Hula Clarified, is in the works. Doubieday’s the publisher, but dori’t hold your breath: it’s going to be out sometime in the next year, but it’s 80,000 words with pictures, not an anthology, but a book or rock criticism and theory. In the meantime, try Double Feature, a book on the movies which Greil and Mike Goodwin put together [including the Marin County Shoot Out script published in CREEM in Aug., 1971] for Outerbridge & Lazard and an earlier anthology of writings by Marcus and. other West Coast critics, Rock and Roll Will Stand [Beacon]. Also, you can look for new Marcus stuff in CREEM. — Ed.)

GOD IS EVERYWHERE

Dear CREEM:

Dave Batterson has got balls to listen to Rev. Noebel (Nobel?) preach his bullshit to him, which is something I couldn’t do without laughing in the man’s face. I am convinced. Noebel is either from Uranus or Pluto.

Eric Applegate

Avant Reader

New London, Conn.

Dear CREEM:

I can’t believe Lester Bangs is real. I can’t believe Lester Bangs is real.

I can’t believe Lester Bangs is real. I can’t believe Lester Bangs is real.

I can’t believe Lester Bangs is real. I can’t believe Lester Bangs is real.

I can’t believe Lester Bangs is real. 1 can’t believe Lester Bangs is real.

I can’t believe Lester Bangs is real. I can’t believe Lester Bangs is real.

I can’t believe Lester Bangs is real. 1 can’t believe Lester Bangs is real. I can’t believe Lester Bangs is real. I can’t believe Lester Bangs is real. Lester Bangs isn’t real, 1 talked to his mother.

Mike Meador

Bloomington, Ind.

ERRATUM

In our Janu ary issue, a credi t line should have run with Robert Christgau’s story, “I Can’t Get No Satisfaction.” That line should have read, “Copyright© 1972, Newsday Inc. Reprinted by Permission.” Our apologies, to both Newsday and Christgau.