Steven Taylor's blog

The Allen Ginsberg Estate is about to re-release in dowloadable format the most comprehensive audio collection the poet ever produced. Volumes have been written about Ginsberg's poetry, but nothing substantial has been written about the songs. Why not? Because poetry is "literature" subject to "literary criticism," and music is not? (more)

"Howl" is about family, friends, lovers, nations that go mad, or die, or try to.  Allen lost his mother, but found Jack Kerouac and friends. The magnitude of the loss meant that the find couldn't simply be an inspired group of intimates; it had to give birth to something, it had to change the world.  In a sense, it did. (more)

The great American modernist poet William Carlos Williams said that the job of the artist is to move the century forward an inch or two. I thought of that while watching this film. (more)

Inception is James Bond meets Orpheus in the underworld meets Billy Pilgrim. Now, die Gedanken sind nicht frei; on the contrary, even your unconscious is a commercial for the corporation. (more)

Poet, singer, songwriter and anarchist genius Tuli Kupferberg died on Monday. A founding member of the Fugs, the first underground rock band, he was 86. (more)

If you are in the New York area at any time before February 28, do not miss the opportunity to participate in this transformational theatrical experience. Go there, play with the players, and be sure to say hello to Judith Malina. You won't meet a more venerable and magical visionary of the theater. (more)

James Cameron's blockbuster movie Avatar, which fetched a billion dollars in its first two weeks, will reach millions of viewers. Can it help us to see that our forest-eating machinery and our savage romance are two sides of the same compulsion to co-opt and consume?   (more)

The last big wave of global change commenced on October 17, 1962. I was there. It happened in my living room. Now, the Spirit of History, casting about for a music to announce the next big shift, has found that nothing worthy of the gig has been produced in four decades.     

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All the music you will ever need appeared in three boxed sets of LPs in 1952, produced by Harry Smith and published as The Anthology of American Folk Music by Folkways Records. This anthology was an important source for the folk music revival of the 1950s, and through that movement played a role in the larger cultural phenomenon that we call "the sixties." (more)

Poet, novelist, and rocker Jim Carroll died on September 11, 2009. He was 60 years old. I wrote the following at the funeral at Our Lady of Pompeii in Greenwich Village. (more)

In a culture where participation in American Indian spiritual practices can be arranged for you by a travel agent, it is important to understand the history of the things we choose to practice, particularly with regard to historical conditions of exploitation. So does this mean that my white students shouldn't be rapping?  (more)

If you are a socially-conscious independent artist operating today, and you are not due for senior citizenship any time soon, then the Fugs are your daddy whether you know it or not. (more)

Underground legends the Fugs will rock Brooklyn on April 29 to raise money for brain tumor treatments for Fugs guitarist (and RS editor) Steve Taylor's nephew, and to bring awareness to this little-understood disease.

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Two broad streams feed into punk. One is the African stream that since the mid 19th century has been a wellspring of American popular musics. The other is the avant-garde stream that since the late 19th century has blurred the boundaries between art and life. Both made art a medium of protest. (more)

When I was 21, I met Allen Ginsberg. We worked and traveled together for 21 years after that. This is the first part of a memoir-in-progress. (more)

Since ancient times, people have believed that music holds the power of transformation, and that new forms of music tell us about changes in society to come. (more)