| The Blacklisted Journalist On Rock History |
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Bob Dylan and The Beatles: Volume One of the Best of the Blacklisted Journalistby Al Aronowitz1st Books Library  This is a review that has been very, very hard to write. Not because the 600-page collection of columns, essays, random thoughts and photos is bad. No, not at all. Al Aronowitz had a very fluid, graphic, yet stylistically concise way of making you feel like you were there with him when he was with George Harrison, Bob Dylan, John and Yoko Ono, Bobby Neuwirth, The Band, or Dr. John. This review has been very hard to write because it was actually supposed to be an interview with the man who, as pop culture columnist at the New York Post in the 1960s, became known as “the godfather of rock journalism.” He was also the man who, in a haze of drugs and alcohol years later, couldn’t get a story published to save his life, and was known as “the blacklisted journalist.” The summer of 2004 we traded many long phone calls. We had, after all, a similar career trajectory, and made tentative plans for me to go out to his place in Jersey to do an interview. But as life happens, I ended up in and out of the hospital for the next year, and the man who would end his calls to me with, “You know, I’m going to die soon,” to which I would reply, “You’re not going anywhere yet,” did, in fact, die. So, I felt huge guilt at not getting my ass over to Jersey so I could sit and listen to him personally tell me the story about Dylan sitting and typing up the original draft of “Mr. Tambourine Man” at his house whle listening to Marvin Gaye’s “Can I Get A Witness?” over and over, or what it was like to visit with George Harrison at Friar Park. I regret not getting to hear from him directly about a time when journalists had practically unlimited access with musicians and publicists weren’t so overbearing—a time when the rules were still pretty much being written, or in fact, rewritten as far as music journalism goes. It took me quite a while to get to where I could open the cover fo the autographed book Al had sent me in order that I should review it. It is part collection and part memoir. Parts are boastful, fan-ish, angry, confessional, and contrite. Some of it is comprised of his early published works, all polished and pretty, and part is raw and pulsing, freshly ripped from his soul and splattered upon the pages. It is a must-read for anyone interested in the time period of ‘60s music and the giants it contained, and who wants to know what it was really like to be that nebulous insider who got to see them, warts and all. For more album/dvd/book reviews like this, head over to CrusherMagazine.com |
