Nick Tosches

i don't think "racism" is the appropriate word. i think his reasons for using it are complicated. part of it is simply a vice magazine-like desire to shock his (presumably urban white) audience.

As long as they're about music, yeah, maybe.

(Actually, I don't wanna bend over too far to defend the guy; like I said, a lot of what he wrote I found offensive or ridiculous. [Not to mention poorly-spelled!] But he also had a lot of incisive observations that had rarely seen print before.)

So as far as that word I think the word faggot or fag... It's one thing to call someone that personally in a public space, but it's another thing to use it as a cultural term that I believe everyone knows. I think homosexuals use the term the same way I do. It's about a posture and that posture has been around rock n' roll for quite a while. Actually it's been around at least since the blues. You see a few 78 (rpm) titles that are about the homosexual underground and maybe some of those bluesmen were gay. The weird self-policing on those kind of issues was part of what the problem was, so I just figured, well I'll just take advantage of leaving the business and not worry about it, use it when it's apropos. It's also written in an almost absurdist style, a collision of academic and street styles. I thought that it was funny.

the full interview is here http://www.furious.com/perfect/carducci.html

I agree there are some really great passages, but there's an at least equel amount of pure self-indulgent claptrap. Like he's not just writing with his dick, he's trying to beat you over the head with it.

"Hand of Dante" is unreadable; "Cut Numbers" I find far superior to "Trinities"; I also found his Sonny Liston bio and "Dead Voices Gather" pretty hard going, crabbed would be the word. And going thru his Da Capo "Reader" I'm struck by how much shit is there, and I think he's great, at times, but distinctly inferior to Meltzer for the most part. However, "Hellfire" is classic--whether it's "accurate" I don't know...

Tho to be fair he admits that from the get-go.

if you have a bottomless trust fund...

PS. Ming dead.

er, which independent labels? for most, selling 10,000 copies is a real success.

Anyway, Clover, the industry doesn't deserve his screeds because he's done really well, considering. He keeps getting six-figure advances and critics keep licking his balls, even if no one reads him. As far as the sad little business of publishing goes, he's done far better than most. So yeah, I think his bitterness probably has more to do with alcoholism than any real valid complaint against publishing.

And one can only blame publishers so much. It's PEOPLE who have stopped reading and buying books. If they ever really did.

anyfuckingway alcoholism is the most valid complaint against publishing there is. cf. exley, pace hemmingway.

R.I.P.

Only 69.

I wonder if a mainstream publisher (not sure how big the Stranded publisher was) would print his Sticky Fingers essay today.

rip. that stranded prologue was profoundly influential on my writing though i haven't reread it in ages

rip. Too young.

Just got library ecopy of Country and it’s really good, doesn’t seem dated.

There are two editions! Took bits from/added others to the second. Wonder why he took some (might have seemed too ripe, even for him?), but glad for adds.

Don't have them at hand, so can't list pub. dates.