| Anyhow, springing out of the cassette box as though propelled by
unseen alien hands is a tape my friend Craig made me a few years back.
It’s a collection of post-13th Floor Elevators stuff by Roky
Erikson, who, on a number of occasions during the 1970s, beat back
the demons of his unmedicated psychosis long enough to make some of
the most incredible rock records of all time. They were dark, and
melodic, and evil in the way that all great rock must somehow be --
often, quite overtly evil, as Roky’s illness led him down alleys
of the muse lined with pictures of demons and frightening space creatures
and backwoods monsters of his own invention. These records -- I use
the word “records” in my favorite form of its usage, that
is, to mean “songs” -- came out on tiny labels with hastily
cobbled-together covers in a time when such small labels weren’t
in vogue at all. It’d be great to have records like these, wouldn’t
it? But you mustn’t buy any of them if you see them unless they’re
used. In fact, if you see a new copy of one of these records, you’ve
gotta steal it, since none of them were released with anything like
legal consent from Roky. |
