MAIL

MAIL

Please send letters to:

MAIL Dept., CREEM Magazine

P.O. Box 202, Walled Lake, Mich. 48088

DEAR CREEM

Have you ever sat and read your magazine? It’ll knock you on your ass.

Here I am sitting by myself laughing my ass off. I’ve read the entire Feb. issue in one sitting (a 12 pack and a bottle of wine) and loved it. Keep it up Lester Bangs and the rest.

T.G.B. Key West, Fla.

A TRUE FAN

This letter is to tell you to cancel my subscription to that disgusting, filthy rag you laughingly call a rock magazine. It’s too lewd to leave around the house. I wouldn’t give it to a dog to read. Anyone who would continue to read your mildly veiled pornography and enjoy it must be some kind of pervert. If I want to read about rock V roll, I may as well write my own magazine, since I know more about it than those psychosexual child molesting idiots your uncouth editor employs. Don’t bother to send me more of your trash; if you do I’ll sue you for trying to corrupt a minor.

Goodbye, you creeps, Anne Sharp Livonia, Mi.

P.S. And you’d better send me back my money, too!

(Then we can't interest you in a Boy Howdy T-shirt? -Ed.)

Flash News!

Alice Cooper is the greatest guy around!

Black Sabbath is good as a mother fucker!

Lester Bangs shits worms!

Humble Pie stinks!

Iggy Pop is cute!

Jimmy Osmond keeps shit in his mouth at all times!

Procol Harum farts out pussy!

CREEM is a fucking good magazine!

Peace, The Old Pig Texas

CORREKSHUN

What the hell was the real name of the movie Lester Bangs wrote about in “The Incredibly Strange Creatures Who Stopped Living And Became Mixed-Up Zombies”? I saw it about three too many times on Sir Graves Ghastly and its bugging the shit out of me not remembering the damn name.

Love’N’Peace, Bev Detroit, Mi.

(Okay, it was called The Discreet Charm of the Bourgeoisie. — Ed.)

BARNEY $ MIKE k'AUd

LUDE DUDE BARKS BACK

I was just readin your Edgar issue. “Stomp a veg a day.” “You got a solution for sopor freaks?” Well lah tee da ti! Lissen you chomps, I take “sopors” and I LIKE ’em! And I get good & goddam fucked up too, and I dig it! It’s about time all you cats sitting out there in Walled Lake guzzling all that booze stopped acting so fuckin self righteous. I bet you’ve puked in your time too, & nodded out too on all that, Ripple you consume. Furthermore, NOBODY calls ’em sopors, all the dudes in the know refer to ’em as Quaaludes or ludes. Sopors is just for people like Birch Bayh. By the way, the next time you see old Birch, seein your so chummy an all, tell him I sed hello and the next time I see him I’m gonna poke my harmonica up his ass and let him fart “Dixie.” You running those two letters from Birch and the punk’s dad side by side was really chickenshit — “CREEM BREAKS EVEN” not in my book buddy if you keep runnin down the sacrament. So get straight. Take some Quaaludes and I think you’ll agree with me.

Power to the People, A1 Peratt Minneapolis, Minn.

Delighted to see that Joseph Pujol and his undeniable (if somewhat abstruse) contribution to popular art have finally been recognized in print.

Just one quibble, though - “Le Petomaine” translates from the French not as “anal emission, etc.,” but, I believe, as “The Fartomaniac.”

Gerritt Graham N.Y., N.Y.

Brian Cullman’s masterful piece on fart appreciation (May) proves him to be the arbiter elegantiarum in the field. Before I trucked my ass (and its talent) to California, I was the self-proclaimed and undisputed Fart Champion of the State of Oklahoma. And I hereby challenge Cullman to a battle at some future point and place.

There is enough material and widespread appreciation of farts for a book on the subject. Examples: Benjamin Franklin’s published essay on “pharting”; innumerable jokes (Confucius say man who fart in church must sit in own pew); there is a record someone put out some time ago on a fart contest, although I’ve not actually heard it; everyone has his/her favorite story on the most embarrassing (or funniest) fart they ever emitted. The renowned German physicist, Erich von Gaseous, has theorized that the “ether” of outer space is actually composed of escaped fart gasses. And there is a wealth of material by fart connoisseurs on the best type of food to produce the desired effect, i.e., volume, noise, aroma, staying power, etc. (turnips are killers - real room clearers!)

ERRATUM

In last month’s issue, we incorrectly identified the occupants of a picture on page 51 as the Cockettes. In reality, they were Jackie Curtis, film-maker Jack Smith and Holly Woodlawn.

Also in last month’s issue, we inadvertently neglected to credit both the Christgau Consumer Guide and the Robert Christgau piece on Alice Cooper. The credit line on both should have read: “Reprinted from Newsday, Long Island, 1973.”

For those who still turn up their noses (or hold them) when a person cuts a beauty, I can only say that they represent an advanced case of anal retentiveness.

Keep on fartin’. David Batterson San Francisco, C.

A lot Robert Christgau knows. Portentous is a proper word on its own, derived from the Latin - portens, portentis (tending toward chubbiness).

Gord Toronto, Canada

I don’t give a damn what your freaked out record reviewers say. Robert Christgau picks a dozen or so albums, gives them a review that makes them sound like shit no matter how good they really are, and then grades them like a school teacher (and probably sends the grades to the various recording companies like report cards).

Jimmie Groce Chalmette, La.

In reply to Barbara Secretary’s BIG Question in your April issue. I do. Out loud. If a square, middle aged housewife can find CREEM funny, don’t know why she can’t.

When I get a copy, I grab a cup of coffee, cigarettes, stretch out on the settee and read and laugh from cover to cover.

The mail column contains some of the finest writing produced in America. These kids are the Joyces and Pynchons of the future.

Only 2 things in CREEM upset me. 1) Those letters from parents and principals cancelling subscriptions. The kids involved should check with the ACLU to find out if such actions are legal. 2) I don’t understand half the words. The cuss words I do, they haven’t changed. But what do pud, wimp, raunch, funky, gonzo, MOR radio mean? They’re not in my dictionary. Some I get from the context, but I feel I’m missing a lot by not knowing the precise definition. Bangs, Tosches and Meltzer are the worst (or best) offenders. How about a glossary now and then for the unhip.

Thanks for all the laughs. Lois M. Cleveland, Ohio

(pud: a limpoid—from Dubble Bubble comix and other lame-o places; wimp: a pud sans balls; raunch: ask Dandy Jim Mangrum; funky: ask Buddy Miles (and he’ll sit on yer face); gonzo: heap big funky raunchy pud; MOR radio: radio listened to by morons.—Ed.)

I get it. It’s Dick Johnson who sticks needles through his face.

Love you, Nora Damp Miami, Fla.

(Yeah, that’s how he doesn’t write Rock-ARama. - Ed.)

In case anybody’s wondering about that Meltzer letter in your April issue, don’t blame the Jai Alai.

I myself was curious at first, but upon calling the beanery in question, I discovered that the reason Meltzer and Tosches were served puke was because they specifically ordered it. Not only that, they had seconds, and then, after asking for the doggie bag three times, left without tipping because it wasn’t leakproof.

Signed,

the person who has orders from THEM to watch Meltzer and Tosches

Newbury, Mass.

RX

As for you Mr. Bangs, thank you for your surprisingly intelligent article on Alvin Lee. It’s not like you, Lester. I think it’s time for another lobotomy, the first one’s starting to grow back.

Forever yours, Fred Millard University Park, Pa.

Re: The Marvel Comics Group. “Kirby’s one man show at National looks forced and lacks detail.” HUH!!! That show is not only the most unified comic series ever, both dramatically and philosophically, but contains such goodies as “THE PACT,” (NEW GODS 7) probably the greatest single issue ever produced by any comic company; “HIMON,” (MR. MIRACLE 9), a brilliant self-portrait by Kirby; “FUNKY FLASHMAN” (MR. MIRACLE 6) a deadly satiric swipe at Stan Lee and Roy Thomas; and DARKSEID, a serious contender for the greatest comic book ever written. I must agree, however, that Lee’s recent scripts for “Spiderman” tend to be corny and preaching.

Neil McNally Fredericton, N.B. Canada

In your review of the Spider-Man Rockcomic (Apr.) you said that anybody would be thrilled to hear the Hulk yell “It’s Clobberin’ Time.” They sure as hell would. Cause it’s the Thing that yells it. Make a comic book review a monthly article in CREEM. By the way who was the dude in the Spider Man suit?

David Duncan Nashville, Tenn.

(Check out Utter Trash, our monthly comix column, and we think you’ll be more than pleased. The guy in the Spider Man suit was the guy that writes Rock-a-Rama. - Ed.)

Your magazine must be run by a bunch Of perverts and demented freaks. The Rolling Stones contest results were hilarious, and I think that, along with your rag’s overall attitude toward the world, has convinced me to subscribe.

I really enjoyed your Marvel Comics article, but as a Marvelite in good standing for ten years, I must expose a few of your careless, unforgiveable mistakes: 1. To my knowledge, Neal Adams never did a strip called Deadman for Marvel, so it couldn’t die for lack of sales. 2. Hawkeye, the “archer supreme,” no longer grows to the height of ten feet. That was long ago when he was Goliath. 3. The woman in the Avengers with the “unstoppable hex power” is the Scarlet Witch, not the Red Witch. Jeez. 5. You say Stan N Lee acts like Sgt. Fury. Impossible, because you call Lee “a real nice guy.” Not the Sarge.

What really has me antagonized though is your use of the word geek. As the leader of the cult of Geekism, I must protest your use of the phrase, in referring to Spider Man, as “not just your average radiation-infected geek. .This is outrageous. Do you think anyone can be a geek. The Geek? No sir. There is no such thing as an average geek. There is only The Geek, the rest just imitations and admirers. Please refrain from such mistakes in the future.

Yours in Geekdom, Pete the Geek Memphis, Tenn.

So who the fuck is this Mike Baron anyway? Dean of American Comic Critics my anus! Why I’ll have you know that I actually had a Comic Consumers Guide a la Christgau in New York’s late lamented Metropolitan Review (well, for just one issue, cause they folded. But I did it first).

And sentimental attachments aside, the real action is at National. Kubert’s Tarzan, Wein and Wrightson’s Swamp Thing, the original Captain Marvel, Sword of Sorcery, any of Kirby’s things (which are much better than Baron sez) all of this cuts most any recent Marvel. And Batman has been the heaviest thing in comics for almost two years now.

And, I might add, Denny Q’Neil is a very nice guy. How ‘bout equal time, fellas?

Steve Simels N.Y., N.Y.

For anyone who bothered reading the article on “The Incredibly Strange Creatures Who Stopped Living and Became Mixed Up Zombies,” or who saw the movie, I’d like to set them straight on who I figured out Madison was. Madison was Angie’s brother, and the part where Jerry started choking Angie, it was Madison who pulled him off, not Angie’s old man. I don’t even think there was an old man, cause if there was he’d be bitchin’ about something in the show. Lester Bangs had it all wrong with who that guy was. Hope he didn’t screw too many people up. He almost had me confused. Other than that he described the movie pretty well. He should have mentioned that horny looking monkey in the beginning of the carnival scene though, who said “Get your tickets here,” he was a pisser. He described what Jerry looked like beautifully. The movie was great and so was the article except for all that bullshit in the beginning. What the hell was that for? You ought to have more articles like that.

Sarita Fucito Troy, N.Y.

TOP TEN BENDS

1. The Allman Brothers are an all-time great band.

2. Jethro Tull are decent but they’re not killer.

3. Blue Oyster Cunt is what mermaids'in the Antarctic Sea get once in awhile.

4. The Stones may be getting shittier but Keith Richards gets more cunt in a week than the average Gynecologist gets in a month.

5. Robert Plant is a kicky vocalist with a voice range as long as Lou Reed’s erection.

6. Phlo & Eddie’s new album tastes like Enchiladas wrapped in pickle sauce.

7. Carly Simon is such a stick-pussy but I’d still like to perform anilingus on her.

8. A1 Kooper is Alice Cooper minus his billion dollar twat.

9. If you like Rod Stewart and David Bowie. at the same time you probably look like a rhinoceros.

10. SEEING HUMBLE PIE IS REALLY A GAS.

Les Teitel Southfield, MI.

Jesus! Read Patti Smith’s review of Todd Rundgren’s album. Hadda hike on uptown and buy it, what she likes I buy (at least I suppose she liked it — didn’t understand the review till I bought the record). Well, I guess this proves once and for all that Todd R. ain’t dead. Oh, yeah. Cool jerk, uh-uh. Honestagod, when he started in with that demented laughing, I coulda swore he was gonna start screaming “Coo-coo for Cocoa Puffs!” No shit, Sherlock!! He must really be a crazy fucker, no? I like it, I like it (esp. them droopy eyes — drool). Don’t know why I’m writing this, it’ll cost me 8 cents to mail the fucking thing.

Annie Fort Frances, Ontario Canada

P.S. Don’t you think of anything but SEX?? (hyuk, me neither)

Allowing a person who has known a performer quite well for a number of years to review that performer’s new album would almost seem a form of rock nepotism.

But, I must say, Patti Smith’s piece on Todd Rundgren (in your April issue) is nothing short of a masterpiece. I enjoyed reading it almost as much as I enjoy listening to the album. Ms. Smith has such an uncanny understanding of Rundgren’s music and soul (no pun intended!), maybe you should try to get Bianca to review the next Stones album!

Cathy Boston, Mass.

I was reading some, of the rqail that people send you in your March issue. Well I read what the Jumping Cowboy wrote about Alice Cooper and that pisses me off. Tell Jumping Cowboy that he can go get FUCKED! Alice Cooper is the best thing that’s happened to music since it began! If anyone is to go beat off, it should be that fuckin Cowboy! One more thing Cowboy DON’T KNOCK IT TILL YOU’VE TRIED IT! After all you just might like it!

Linda Doyle Millinocket, Me.

You guys must really be getting low on letters. Printing a letter about some guy’s dream. Jeez. Well I had a dream too about a week ago. It goes like this: I walk out of my house. It’s daytime but it’s dark. My friend next door (the neighborhood doper-hood) says he is going to get some doobies from Lester Bangs. I say “Who? You mean the guy from CREEM?” He says “I guess so.” He doesn’t seem too thrilled. I think to myself, “How come I didn't know Lester Bangs lives here in Vacaville?” Finally this old brown Oldsmobile pulls up and this blonde haired pimple face guy about 19 with glasses gets out. I say “are you Lester Bangs?” I was excited about meeting Lester until I see this guy. He says “Yeah.” 1 say “Hey doesn’t the Guess Who have a new bass player?” He says “Uh Huh.” He seems to be in a hurry. Just then this Big Fat Ugly Chick who goes to my school walks by. She weighs about 300 lbs. We all say “Yecch!” and start making obscene noises and gestures, but Lester gets a hard-on and he says "I want to eat!” We all Laugh at him and he gets back in the car. We spit on it and throw rocks and thats how my dream ends. I used to like Lester but now I’m not so sure.

CONTINUED ON PAGE 80.

CONTINUED FROM PAGE 10.

Chip Chiapuzzo Vacaville, CA.

P.S. This letter better be printed because my uncle is in the M—a aka C-sa No-t-a.

P.S.S. Are you guys commies?

(Dave Marsh was a fellpw traveller once. — Ed.)

After listening to David Bowie getting his rockets off, 1 thought I’d dribble some shit to y’all about yore fiiinnneee magazine. I think you earthlings are doing a great service for rock V roll music. As the seventies roll on, more and more jerks keep spewing out that “rock is dead!” Rock really isn’t dead, right now its drowning in its own “media swill.” So many scillions of people are putting out so much shit today that “one-hit wonders” are quite an easily gome by commodity.

The service I see you performing is that of bursting the “ROCK AS ART” bubble. The label “ART,” was one which helped to castrate jazz to its now floundering level of mass-popularity (Miles, Mahavishnu, etc. excluded of course). I think it might do the same for rock music. Just as rock superseded jazz as the “young peoples’ music,” so might another form of music supersede rock in popularity.

So, write now I’m brushing up on my Haitian Voodoo trance music and the erotic sounds of two electric toothbrushes playing an octave apart. I may also add to this “New Music of My Own Creation” by recording the amplified sounds of a tampon thrown into a bucket of water and playing it backwards while getting off on the vocal to “Nadine.”

Yours in perversion, Earl Brennemam Jr.

P.S. Does “Boy Howdy” go on dates with strange young men?

(Only if they come in hottles.-Ed.)

I know you guys gotta lotta big contacts and can get the word through to the guys who run things in the record business, cause I saw Lester Bangs picture in Esquire.

So use that influence and do America a favor. As you may have noticed Faggot/Gay/ Liberated Male/Swish Rock is “In” today. (If Bangs didn’t invent the term “heavy metal” that’s too bad — he deserves to. And five years from now, should a critic look for a word to cover Alice Cooper and all imitators in said genre, remember that I was yours truly, Dr. Rock ’n’ Roll who decided that all such music should be called Pansy Punk Powerhouse Music, OK?)

Anyway, since Pansy Pop is now in, what with Edgar Winter in lipstick ... So why not get somebody to get Johnny Ray on the comeback trail.

Dr. Rock’n’Roll Dave Hill Anoka, Minn.

Mick was lying when he said he cut his hair because he would be visiting countries with warm climates. Bullshit. He’s visited ’em before and never cut it. He did it because he lied, and because time’s not on his side, and because Bowie and Reed did. But not Alice Cooper, thank god. But then, Alice is a good old boy.

Love your magazine. Carolyn Ann Arbor, Mi.

Robot and Brian have done it again! The Ten Worst Restaurants article sets me to yokel guffaws every time I think about it. They missed one, tho. B’s snax in Sun Valley, Calif. Ever heard of Sun Valley? No? Well don’t come lookin’ for it ever. Only three people live here and one owns a fuck shop he calls B’s. He’s a mafioso with a beer belly and smells like ... oh well, the food. It consists of corny dogs, pizza and burritos. The corny dogs are pig intestines dipped in the stuff you scrape off the side of your toilet bowl. The pizza’s are tomatoes and ding-dopg’s hit with a sledge-a-matic. The burrito’s are three months old chocolate pudding he’s been washing the dirty spoons in..

4,(100 Mexicans are always sitting on, around or under the three simulated plastic tables. The heavy, hip and far-out jukebox has Sam the Sham Records and Raspberries. Scratched.

Love yer ass, Lightningman Peyote ex-faggot G.I.

P.S. Who does Lester Bangs belong to? If its ■ you honkys would you please restrict that suck? He’s ruined every mag from here to N.Y. with his asine, bonzo articles. (So what else is new, right?)

Doncha think it’s about time somebody consumer guided the consumer guiders? Yeah, so do I, so here.

Lester Bangs — Flirts with brilliance. Great at introspectivity. But his taste is too elitist for the punkytude he expounds and efforts at compensation leads him to the Guess Who. Gawd. And he’s too final and too in and ultimately I don’t know what I dislike more, Rolling Stone stodginess or cuteness.

Robert Christgau — Venerable grandaddy. College prof type who’s hard to dislike though I rarely agree with him. All in all not a bad dean of ...

Brian Cullman/.Robot Hull/ R. Evan Cirkiel — Good concept I suppose, punk writing and all. Ya know wut I mean ya stoopid fukker. But where L.B. can be esoteric these guys are just gross. A grossness bared by a distinct paucity of humor. No fun after all.

Ken Emerson — Of the Marsh school, and almost as good.

Simon Frith - All the truth flows from Merry 01’, or so it seems. The best mind since Nik Cohn himself. Bursting of insights though never obstrusive with them.

Greil Marcus — Transcended West Coast orthodoxy to become one of the best.

Dave Marsh - The Bob Seger of rock writing. Gorging with boyish intensity. Real punk. So honest that his trials and tribulations with rock records can be simultaneously more interesting than Bangs and funnier than the gloppy Cullman/ Cirkiel/ Hull school though I don’t think he ever tries to be Tunny.

R. Meltzer — He fathered Robot Hull, but then Sgt. Pepper sired a lot of shit and I still like it.

Greg Shaw -Unequivocably my favorite. None has a better reading and pure understanding of pop. Without him, I think we’d all be lost.

Patti Smith — I guess sheeze really good. Macho punk chick? I do think she’s a trifle out of her territory with rock and roll. A lot of it’s rhetoric.

Nick Tosches — As pretentious about his punkitude as Jerry Rubin was about his rectitude.

Jaan Uhelszki — She has a hard time reviewing a record straight,. in fact she doesn’t. In fact she does it pretty damn well anyway.

Ed Ward — .275 — .290 hitter, good power, good glove. Crafty vet.

Rick Johnson Drayton Plains, MI.

REGIONAL CHAUVINISM LIVES

Did you know that people in San Francisco don’t have to talk to each other, because they already know what they’re going to say?

Mark Lysher Brooklyn Park, Md.

Congratulations — you’re not just America’s only rock and roll magazine, you’re Australia’s as well! I’ve read CREEM ever since that issue with Lester B’s thing about the Godz and you just keep getting better and better.

The only thing I can’t understand is Lester’s preoccupation with punk rockers. I mean, who cares? A punk is a punk.

Howie Ardal

Bentley, Western Australia (Bangs replies: “Right! The only punk rocker worth a shit is Carly Simon. ”)

Just this morning I received your reply to my first letter. Since that first letter I have written another letter which you no doubt have by now. In that last letter I made a remark to the effect that you didn’t have the decency to reply to my first letter. I must admit that my patience had run out at the time. Please accept my apologies, but I was not entirely at fault since such a long period of time elapsed between letters.

Richard Bunn Greenville, N.C.

(Don’t mention it - Ed.) |j|^