Psychotic Reactions and Carburetor Dung

May 22, 2004

I powered through the Lester Bangs compilation Psychotic Reactions and Carburetor Dung this morning in one sitting (and some laying down). I read the other Lester Bangs compilation, Mainlines, Blood Feats and Bad Taste a few months ago and liked it enough. Psychotic Reactions, on the other hand, is a monumental piece of work.

Bangs is almost universally recognized as the greatest rock critic there ever was, and it’s pretty easy to see why. His rambling, tangent filled tirades are as entertaining as the bands he writes about. The thing that seperates Bangs from the rest is his honesty, and his absolute need for it. When he raves about Count Five, Van Morrison or the Clash, it comes from a real place, just as much as he truly despises James Taylor and Led Zeppelin. He was someone that couldn’t abide by phoneys and fakes and you never got the sense that he was ever trying to be cool with his choices.

He was also unafraid to get uncomfortably personal with his material. Greil Marcus compiles a series of essays and interveiws that Bangs wrote about Lou Reed, and there’s a genuine sense of betrayal and disappointment as the pieces go on. He loved the Velvet Underground as much as any band, and Bangs reaction to Reed’s solo career is a lovely and sad treatise on hero-worship. When they finally meet for an interview it is awkward and fascinating in all the right ways.

Oh, and the part where the President of Vietnam goes on and on about how Jethro Tull bites ass because they sound just like Vietnamese folk music? That’s just genius.

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