Random Thinking

It’s Friday and time for a song of the week from my iPod. This is a special entry to say goodbye to a special punk rocker…

I was perusing through the NY Times on Sunday when I was startled to read that Jim Carroll had died on September 11th. Carroll had his heyday in the late 70′s and early 80′s when he wrote his poetry and his shocking book, “The Basketball Diaries,” as well as releasing his groundbreaking punk album, “Catholic Boy.” Carroll’s book is based on the diaries he kept through his teenage years. The book tells of his double life as a high school basketball star and his addiction to heroin starting when he was 13. In spite of his addiction and his contracting Hepatitis C from hustling tricks in Times Square to pay for his addiction (Times Square was a very different place than it is today), Carroll still managed to attend Wagner College and Columbia University and write poetry that made him noticed by the likes of Allen Ginsburg and the Rolling Stones. The book was made into a movie starring Leonardo DiCaprio in 1995.

Carroll’s years as a punk musician were started when Patti Smith encouraged him to turn his poetry into music. His most well known song, “People Who Died” was released in 1980. The song is based on a poem by Ted Berrigan, a NY City poet who was a friend of Carroll’s. Berrigan died in 1983 from the effects of years of amphetamine abuse.

Carroll gave up his music career in the mid-80′s and went back to writing, living off his residual checks and the advance he was given for the book he was working on when he died. That book, “The Petting Zoo,” is an autobiographical novel and is to be published sometime next year. Carroll became sicker over the years, finding it impossible to keep any weight on and looking years older than he was. He finally died from a heart attack this past September 11th at the age of 60. The final passage in “The Petting Zoo” tells of the death of the book’s main character, Carroll’s alter-ego: It’s time your eyes remain shut, Billy Wolfram. Now is the time, so get on with it. Take that single step and fly.

People Who Died
Teddy sniffing glue he was 12 years old
Fell from the roof on East Two-nine
Cathy was 11 when she pulled the plug
On 26 reds and a bottle of wine
Bobby got leukemia, 14 years old
He looked like 65 when he died
He was a friend of mine

Refrain:
Those are people who died, died
Those are people who died, died
Those are people who died, died
Those are people who died, died
They were all my friends, and they died

G-berg and Georgie let their gimmicks go rotten
So they died of hepatitis in upper Manhattan
Sly in Vietnam took a bullet in the head
Bobby OD’d on Drano on the night that he was wed
They were two more friends of mine
Two more friends that died
I miss ‘em–they died

Repeat Refrain

Mary took a dry dive from a hotel room
Bobby hung himself from a cell in the tombs
Judy jumped in front of a subway train
Eddie got slit in the jugular vein
And Eddie, I miss you more than all the others,
And I salute you brother
This song is for you my brother

Repeat Refrain

Herbie pushed Tony from the Boys’ Club roof
Tony thought that his rage was just some goof
But Herbie sure gave Tony some bitchen proof
Hey, Herbie said, Tony, can you fly?
But Tony couldn’t fly . . . Tony died

Repeat Refrain

Brian got busted on a narco rap
He beat the rap by rattin’ on some bikers
He said, hey, I know it’s dangerous, but it sure beats Riker’s
But the next day he got offed by the very same bikers

Repeat Refrain